3 



definition of knowledge and mine of education be correct, that the 

 term practical education comprehends within its scope not only the 

 lowest, but also the liighest degree of culture, the very beginnings of 

 knowledge as well as each successive stage of its development up to 

 the highest condition of mental and moral existence attainable 

 by man. 



The term, however, as generally used, has a much narrower and 

 more specific signification. By practical education we mean in- 

 struction in the theory and principles of the useful arts and indus- 

 tries, and in their actual application in practice. Of the inestimable 

 value of these industries it seems almost unnecessary to speak in this 

 presence. Their immense importance is becoming daily better un- 

 derstood and more justly appreciated. They lie at the foundation 

 and permeate the whole social structure. They not only furnish the 

 life-blood, but constitute the motors for its transmission through 

 every ramification of the body politic. They are the sources of 

 power, the well springs of progress, the fountains of blessings in- 

 numerable. And yet in the ages past how little of the world's 

 intellect, how few of its honors and emoluments have they com- 

 manded; how much even of the knowledge of them, acquired by 

 experience, was deemed worthy of being treasured up in books or 

 manuscripts for present use or transmittal to succeeding generations. 

 How meagre the progress made in these great I might almost say 

 fundamental and life-supporting, if not life-giving, industries, when 

 compared with that attained in other avocations and subjects of 

 study and ambition ! Literature and the arts, the science of war 

 and the mysteries of alchemy, the speculations of philosophy and 

 the struggles of religious creeds, engrossed the attention and con- 

 trolled the intellect and energies of men. Agriculture and Me- 

 chanics possessed no allurements for the energetic, the intelligent 

 and the ambitious. Fame and affluence waited not upon their 

 votaries. The poor, the ignorant, and the servile; in fact, those 

 only followed these pursuits whom vassalage or misfortune com- 

 pelled, or whose intellectual inferiority unfitted them for other and 

 more honorably esteemed employments. Hence they were neither 

 profitable nor honorable. And while at times gleams of light 

 pierced through the mists of ignorance and prejudice, it was not 

 until a later and more recent day that advancing civilization, and 

 the consequent increasing wants and necessities of man, began to 

 awaken a clearer comprehension and a juster appreciation of their 

 dignity and importance. But the glory of their complete eman- 

 cipation from degradation and their elevation to their true position 



