428 SELECTIONS FROM ADDRESSES. 



the labor devoted to the cuUivation of the land does not in- 

 crease at all in the ratio either of that devoted to other pursuits 

 or of the population. This inference is entirely sustained by 

 such imperfect statistical returns as I have been able to com- 

 mand ; and particularly by an ingenious and well reasoned ar- 

 ticle inserted in the transactions of this society during the past 

 year, from which, it would seem that the tendency of late has 

 been to a diminution rather than to an increase of the principal 

 agricultural products of the county. 



I am very well aware that this view which I have taken, con- 

 sidering the laudable efforts that have been made in the Com- 

 monwealth to advance the cause of agriculture, is not flattering 

 to our pride. Perhaps it would be still less so if I were to ex- 

 tend my glance into other regions of the State, and even to 

 those in which the pursuit is most exclusively carried on, with 

 the greatest amount of natural advantages. But my object in 

 stating facts as I find them is not one of mere curiosity, I wish 

 to go at once through them to the cause of the difficulty, and 

 then to set about devising some remedy, if I can. I wish to 

 find out why it is, that with an admitted accumulation of 

 human beings greater in our borders during the last than any 

 preceding decade, there is no apparent proportion kept in the 

 number engaged in providing for their subsistence or in the pro- 

 ducts which are supplied to the increased demand. 



Doubtless the first explanation will be, that it is the compe- 

 tition with the great agricultural resources of the virgin soil of 

 the west which overwhelms those who try to seek their bread 

 on the comparatively thankless surface of New England. And 

 it is the diversion of industry from what is here the less profit- 

 able form of agriculture, to the more lucrative one of manufac- 

 tures, which occasions this seeming paradox in the social econ- 

 omy. But although this be the hard reply of the statist, who 

 looks at mankind just as he would look at a column of figures 

 in arithmetic, 1 must frankly confess that to me it carries with 

 it little satisfaction and still less of conviction. Whatever may 

 be the temporary advantages of stimulating manufacturing to 

 the depression of agricultural labor, my belief is that, in the 

 long run, no community will be so independent or so happy 



