STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 29 



ning to study, they are anxious to learn. Thrice welcome then 

 are those who will give the instruction, the enlightenment needed. 



It seems to us, further, that the State owes to its grange and 

 to your society a debt of gratitude. Your works have been good 

 in the past, your influence broad in sustaining and restoring sick 

 and discouraged agriculture. And this must always operate as 

 an element of your welcome wherever you may meet. We are 

 all aware of agriculture's deep depression during the past years 

 in this State; of the hard struggle of many of our farmers to 

 maintain themselves, of their trials and discouragements. We 

 have deplored the fact that some of them have felt forced to 

 abandon their homes and seek other occupations. We have felt 

 sad to know that our rural population has been constantly 

 decreasing. The night has indeed been dark, the prospect 

 gloomy. But we believe that a brighter day has already dawned. 

 The law of compensation applies. During this very depression 

 the old system of farming has passed away, a system of theory, 

 of uncertainty, too often of ignorance, with all its weakening 

 and disastrous results. 



And on the grave of that old system has sprung up another, 

 a broader, and a better one, a system which requires thorough- 

 ness and a practical and scientific knowledge of the subject, a 

 system which exacts that the successful farmer shall be a man 

 of thought and of study as well as of labor, a system which 

 ordains that he shall be a comprehensive man, that he shall look 

 beyond the boundaries of his own fields, participate earnestly in 

 the affairs of State and see to it that his State's laws are wise 

 and wholesome and not injurious to his interests. That agri- 

 culture has had this new birth, that we have to-day some pros- 

 perous farmers among us, that we feel and have faith to believe 

 that there is coming to the intelligent farmer in the near future 

 a prosperity, the like of which has never been known, is due to 

 some extent surely, we think largely, to the labor and beneficent 

 influence of the grange and your society. We therefore hope 

 that you will enjoy your visit with us and that your good works 

 and influence may continue to increase until this community and 

 the whole State shall contain a population of prosperous and con- 

 tented farmers. Then, and not until then, will your mission be 

 performed. 



