FARMERS' REGISTER— REMARKS ON J. B. 



641 



much of his superstructure, it merits particular ex- 

 amination. "/^flds,''-(sa3-s he,) ^Hhe causes oj 

 which are not understood, are not truths, and serve 

 only to mislead lis." In this sentence, short as it 

 is, there are two unquahfied assertions, totally in- 

 admissible as they here stand, 'i'hrow them into 

 the tbrm of a syllogism — whicli is the way to test 

 them — and where would they land us? Noi, per- 

 haps, "in the slough of despond," but "in con- 

 fusion worse contbunded." Let us try two of 

 these syllogisms to ])rove how llir ( am right. 



'^J'^ads, the causes of which are not understood, 

 are not truths.^'' 



But most of the facts stated bj^ J. B. himself 

 proceed from causes, not understood. 



Ergo — most of J. B's. facts "are not truths''^ 



Again. '■'■Facts the causes of which are not un- 

 derstood, are not truths.^^ 



But the causes of the fact that we exist, are 

 not understood. Ergo, it is not a truth, that we 

 exist ! ! 



I could go on, sir, to fill your Register with sim- 

 ilar syllogistic arguments, wherein the conclusions 

 would all be undeniable Irom J. B's premises; but 

 the two just stated suffice to show that his axiom 

 is a contradiction in terms. Nay, admit it to be 

 correct, and it would reduce the sum and substance 

 of all human knowledge nearly within the com- 

 ]iass of a nut-shell. It would do still worse; for 

 according to him, all the facts in the world, '-the 

 causes of lokich are not understood, serve only to 

 mislead »,s." To prove this assertion equally un- 

 tenable, I will ask but three short questions. Is 

 the negro Avho mauls our rails alter long practice, 

 misled by not understanding the cause of the 

 fact that "the wedge acts as it does? Is the car- 

 penter mislead in boring an auger-hole, or turning 

 a heavy piece of timber with a handspike, if igno- 

 rant of the cause of the fact, that the screw and the 

 borer work as they do, in those operations? Or is 

 the ploughman misled by the fact that his plough 

 cuts, and its mould-board turns the furrow-slice, 

 because he understands not the cause of either 

 effect? God help us, if they were, or their mas- 

 ters either, who are often nearly as ignorant of all 

 these matters as themselves. 



The worst tliat can justly be said of facts — the 

 causes of which are not understood, is, that such 

 facts may mislead us; but why, considering man's 

 natural desire for knowledge, they should oftener 

 lead him wrong than right; or should always so 

 far mislead, as to deprive them of all right to be 

 called truths as well as facts, I must believe would 

 puzzle all the logicians in the world to prove. 

 Certain it is — at least to my mind, that J. B. has 

 utterly tailed to sustain so strange a paradox — nay, 

 so palpable a contradiction, by any thing bearing 

 the semblance of proof. 



The next of J. B's. assertions to which I ob- 

 ject as deficient in proof^ is the one wherein he is 

 endeavoring to show an analogy between the 

 earth and the human stomach, for the purpose of 

 demonstrating that as the latter requires cooked 

 food lor the nutriment of the body, so the former 

 requires cooked manure, (if I may so express my- 

 selfj) for the nutriment of the plants which grow 

 on it. His words are — 



"Raw meat and vegetables contain more nutri- 

 tive matter for the human stomach, than after the 

 loss necessarily sustained by their being cooked: 

 yet the remainder, alter this process, ia fitted for 



the sustenance of man, and therefore is more valu^ 

 able than the whole was before the change, and the 

 waste caused by cooking.''^ Now, not to say one 

 word of the vast difference between nature's and 

 man's cookery, so forcibly illustrated by the old 

 adage — "God sends food, but the devil sends 

 coolis;" nor of the fiict, that nature alone is capa- 

 ble of cooking foo(?ibr plants, there are, I think, 

 numerous facts to prove that the above assertion 

 of J. B. is altogether untenable. Not to insist 

 upon the undisjjuted case of Nebuchadnezzar, (I 

 mean no irreverence, Sir. Editor,) who lived se- 

 ven years upon ra\v vegetables, and reigned a 

 considerable time afier as a great king, I will 

 confidently ask, if any people among ourselves, 

 generally appear better '■failed,^'' (as we say of 

 our cattle and hogs,) tlum that numerous class 

 styled gourmands and epicures, who eat all their 

 meats m a state so nearly raw, that the little vv'arm- 

 ing imparted is really not worth mentioning. 

 Again, all men eat a large portion of their vege- 

 tables raw. Such is the state of salads of every 

 kind, cucumbers, onions, celer}^, &c. when taken 

 into the stomach. Nay, that vile article called 

 cold-slaugh, so great a favorite with thousands of 

 our citizens, and which, in plain English, is nothing 

 more than raw cabbage with a ihw condiments 

 added, has been ascertained by Dr. Beaumont, to 

 be by far the most digestible of all the varieties of 

 food with which trials were made, in his very re- 

 markble experiments, at the City of Washington 

 tAvo years ago, upon the stomach of a man ^vho had 

 a hole in his side, through which, the food was in- 

 troduced. 



The last of J. B's. assertions against which I 

 beg leave to enter my dissent, is that wherein he 

 speaks of the coarse manure of our farm-pens, 

 composed, in great part, of corn-stalks. Of this 

 he says, among other assertions, that, "every 

 corn-stalk serves as a flue or chimney, to carry off 

 the gases which are evolved." Now, unless 

 there are such things as flues and chimneys stop- 

 ped at both ends, which can still carry ofl" such 

 subtle vapors as gases, or corn-stalks without 

 joints, of which I have never yet heard, this last 

 assumption is equally untenable with the others 

 which I have taken the liberty to examine. Ev^en 

 admitting that ever}- corn-stalk was a firm, hollow 

 tube from end to end, before it could act as "a flue 

 or chimnejr,'' one end at least must be higher than 

 the other, and the lower one not stopped up with 

 earth, (as it must be, if below the surface,) but 

 open, and sufficiently near the ground for the at- 

 mospiiere to force into it whatever is expected to 

 pass upwards through it. True it is, that corn- 

 stalks, in process of time, become hollow at the 

 joints, as well as between them; but not until eve- 

 ry thing in the form of gas has very nearly or 

 quite made its escape. 



Having done with with what appears to be the 

 fixults of J. B's. communication, I proceed to the 

 more agreeable task of commenting on its merits. 

 Of these, I think, I may venture to assert, that 

 you have had no correspondent since your Regis- 

 ter connnenced, who has manifested a more 

 thorough acquaintance wilh the opinions of all the 

 best writers on the subject which he has under- 

 taken to discuss; nor any who have selected topics 

 of greater interest to agriculturists, or better suited 

 to the chief objects of your paper. He has given 

 U3 scientific theory and practice combined, as they 



