168 The State and the Farmer 



ture is no longer local. It is now more in the 

 public mind than any other phase of educa- 

 tion. It is interesting to note the zest with 

 which the public is discovering the truths that 

 the good prophets in the agricultural colleges 

 announced ten and twenty years ago. The 

 leadership in rural affairs is rapidly passing to 

 the interests that associate themselves with 

 the agricultural colleges and experiment sta- 

 tions. In twenty-five years there will be a new 

 political philosophy of the open country born 

 out of these institutions. 



A mere enumeration of the departments 

 comprising a modern college of agriculture 

 indicates that while the main or central busi- 

 ness of such college is to teach the science 

 and the practice of farming, it really stands 

 for the human affairs of the whole open coun- 

 try, taking this field because it is indivisi- 

 ble and also because other institutions have 

 passed it by. There are institutions called 

 universities that have a lesser scope than these 

 leading colleges of agriculture, and in which 

 the business affairs are less than in a modern 



