THE NEW EARTH 



time to help upward and onward the tiller of 

 the soil at a time of great crisis, when the 

 swords were being beaten back into plow- 

 shares. Coming, too, at the very beginning of 

 the period of the New Earth, it emphasized 

 the revival in agricultural interest and gave 

 promise of national recognition upon a gen- 

 erous scale. 



This promise has been splendidly fulfilled. 

 The department itself has passed through 

 many crises, has made its own lamentable 

 mistakes, and sometimes may have been halt- 

 ing when it should have been aggressive, but 

 it has been administered in sincerity and it has 

 been a credit to American life ; it has been of 

 vast help to the people. 



Little by little, as the new thought has 

 spread, the Department has broadened its scope 

 to keep abreast with the progress of the New 

 Earth. One by one new departures and ad- 

 vances have been made, and one by one old 

 features have been taken up where they 

 showed signs of slumbering vitality and revivi- 

 fied. The initial object, to acquire and diffuse 

 knowledge, has steadily been kept in mind. A 

 review of all the lines of approach to the 



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