8o ■ LITERARY CULTURE. 



teenth Century will not die and make no sign concerning the unequalled 

 merits which they are unable to conceal. By careful groping, we occa- 

 sionally find a land-mark in the dusty dells of departed years; and by con- 

 trasting these with the history we are making, we may ascertain whether 

 the precepts of the past have brought guerdons to the practical prosaic, 

 present. 



The sponsors of our county organization were strong men — bold, in- 

 dependent, intelligent. While few could boast a classical education, there 

 were less who were profoundly ignorant. The Bible, Milton and Shake- 

 speare, could be found in many homes of every neighborhood, and they 

 were earnestly studied not pedantically displayed. They had left a world 

 of statesmen, philosophers and poets whose works have immortalized their 

 authors. Algernon, Sydney, Cromwell, Newton, Bacon, Locke, Milton 

 and Dryden — intellectual kings who would be the pride and glory of any 

 age — were to our progenitors as familiar as household words. Their at- 

 tainments, though limited, were solid and substantial, not flippant and 

 fanciful. Thought preceded action, and wisdom brought its own exceed- 

 ing great reward. The)' regarded a great book as a ship deep freighted 

 with immortal treasures, breaking the sea of life into fadeless beauty as it 

 sails; carrying to every shore seeds of truth, goodness, piety, love, to flow- 

 er and fruit jierennially in the soil of the heart and mind. 



Their methods of education blended literature andreligion. Having 

 no public schools, the clergynian of each parish devoted five and a half 

 days in each week- during the winter, for the summer was given to man- 

 ual labor — to instructing the children in " the three R's, '' ending in a Sun- 

 day sermon whose length was only exceeded by its breadth and brimstone. 

 That was the orthodox era, and earthly threatenings and contemplated 

 punishments in the world to come made the Day of Doom a continued 

 guest and fireside companion. At that time our county comprised about 

 eighteen hundred souls — the entire province numbered but ten thousand — 

 and less than forty preacher-pedagogues moulded the minds of the young 

 and strengdiened the faith of the mature. This method was varied but 

 little during Suftblk"s first century; and it seems to have been akin to that 

 adopted by its sister counties. About this time, William Smith, the histo- 

 rian, wrote of the educational condition of our people: " Our schools are 

 "of the lowest order — the instructors want instruction; and through along 

 "and shameful neglect of all the arts and sciences, our common speech is 

 "extremely corrupt; and the evidences of bad taste, both as to thought and 

 "language, are visible in all our proceedings, public and private." Yet 

 the people were striving for something better, anticipating the coming day 

 when generous culture should make men little less than gods. While they 

 were hampered by iron fortune, they held a kinship with those grand spirits 

 of whom Lowell wrote that the country grew 



"Strong thro' shifts, an' wants, an' pains, 

 Nussed by stern men with empires in their brains." 



At the time our county was organized, there was not a newspaper on 

 this continent; now we claim fifteen, and in the United States there are 

 more than six thousand. In the entire world there were not so many as 

 are now published on Long Island alone. Our first newspaper was pub- 

 lished at Sag Harbor in 1791. 



Public libraries seemed then as far removed as the stars; now w^e can 

 boast of one in every school district, with extra ones of thousands of vol- 



