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general intelligence and practical wisdom, the farmers of New- 

 England as a body are not wanting. Much more than this is 

 desirable. There is no class in our community who have more 

 favorable opportunities for the improvement of their minds than 

 our farmers, if they would, and knew how, to use them. Our 

 long winters, which bring so protracted a respite from labor, 

 furnish quiet evenings for reading and study. Many intelligent 

 men among us, some of whom have been the boast of science 

 and the ornaments of literature, have made themselves what 

 they were in the devotion of the hours of leisure, which their 

 long voyages or intervals of business afforded, to the improve- 

 ment of their minds, the cultivation of taste, and the acquisition 

 of knowledge. Our farmers have equal, in some respects more 

 favorable opportunities. The improvement of our common 

 schools, therefore, and the elevation and extension of the course 

 of instruction pursued in them, particularly concerns the agri- 

 cultural interest. It is not enough to meet the present condi- 

 tion of society that our boys and girls are able to read and spell, 

 to write and cypher, and to have some knowledge of geography. 

 The highest branches of natural science, the principles of moral 

 and intellectual philosophy and of political economy, should be 

 at least so far taught in them, which is at present perhaps all 

 we have a right to expect, that a taste for their continued pur- 

 suit might be formed, inquiry awakened, and the track marked 

 out by which they might unassisted advance at their own pleas- 

 ure to high attainments. The establishment of social libraries 

 and lyceums in every village and town ; and associations bring- 

 ing both sexes together for mutual intellectual improvement, 

 should have every encouragement, and would be followed with 

 the best results. Such cultivation of the mind need not inter- 

 fere with the necessary and useful labors of the farm ; but 

 would render these labors, otherwise, in some cases, discourag- 

 ing and severe, light and cheerful. Education is a good, meas- 

 urable by no pecuniary standard. As the cultivation of the 

 highest attributes of our nature ; as furnishing resources of 

 pleasure and gratification in the solitary and the cloudy hours 



