" If other nations, in the vigor of maturity, 

 with more k-isurc and more means than we 

 posso,-;s, have outstripped us in tlie race of plii- 

 losopliical discovery, let it be our boast, that we 

 have spread these discoveries loider, and made 

 them at once available by making them part of 

 the current knowledge of the nation. Let it be 

 our tirst aim to diffuse knowledge — where the 

 constitution has rightly given power — to the 

 whole people. 



" It is not the sole object of onr Society to re- 

 ward those who bring to our Fairs the finest 

 animals, or to remunerate those who, with skill 

 and industry, raise the best crops. These are 

 but the means, and part of the means, by which 

 it is hoped to achieve higher and wider ends. 

 "We w^ish. hy association, by comparison of 

 ideas, and by a generous emulation, to diffuse 

 among ourselves, and the mass of the agricultu- 

 ral community, the results of experience, the 

 lights of science, and the productions of art. 



" Of the incalculable power, for good and 

 evil, of association and combi^ied effort, the 

 present age abounds in illustrations. That this 

 great element of man's power has often been 

 wielded to trample upon the equal rights, the 

 peace and happiness of society, cannot be 

 denied. Of the many instances in which, with 

 w^idelj' different and higher aims, it has effected 

 the noisiest achievements, I shall only refer to 

 one. With what language can we describe, 

 with what powers of calculation estimate, the 

 wide-spread good accomplished, the deep mis- 

 ery warded off, by temperance associations ? — 

 What individual, wielding even a despot's scep- 

 tre — what government, monarchical or demo- 

 cratic — what law — what armed force, could 

 have achieved the great results brought about 

 in our day, within our own observation, by 

 those efloits ? With this signal illustration be- 

 fore US, we cannot lack confidence in any 

 efforts wisely directed to a good end. With 

 motives which cannot be impeached, with ob- 

 jects which can no where be condemned, ask- 

 ing no special privileges, requiring no exclu- 

 sive immunities, seeking only to elevate and 

 render more effective that labor from which 

 man is destined never to be exempt, we may 

 surely here, if any where, call to our aid the 

 great power of association and combination.— 

 With this element of .strength we wish to awa- 

 ken the public mind to a sense of the import- 

 ance of our avocation, and to dispel whatever 

 may be left of that ancient prejudice, that the 

 tiller of the soil is the drudge of the human race. 



" It is strange that it should have been over- 

 looked, even in the darkest days of despotism 

 and ignorance and superstition, that he who 

 sows the seed and reaps the harvest, works not 

 only with the plow and with the hoe and with 

 the scythe, but that he wields, far beyond the 

 labori^r in any other branch of industry or art, 

 the elements of powers and nature. There is 

 certainly 710 pursuit in which so many of the 

 laws of nature must be consulted and under- 

 stood, as in the cultivation of the earth. Every 

 change of the season, every change even of the 

 winds, evoiy fall of rain, must affect sumo of 

 the manifold operations of the fanner. In tlie 

 improvement of our various domestic animals, 

 some of the mo.st abstruse principles of physi- 

 ology must he consulted. 



"Is it to be supposed that men thus called 

 upon to study, or to observe the laws of nature, 

 and labor in conjunction with its power.s, require 

 less of the light of the highest science, than the 

 ■71) 



merchant or manvfacturer ? Or is it to be be- 

 lieved, that men who go weekly, almo.-st daily, 

 to ditl'crent occupation.s, changing with the al- 

 most unceasing changes of the sea.sons, and 

 who.se business is to bring to maturity such a 

 multiphcity of products, exercise less the high- 

 est intellectual faculties of man, than the laborer 

 who, day after day, and year after, follows the 

 unchimging manipulations of art ? 



" Happily for the interests of the farmer, the 

 histoiy of our country abounds in evidence that 

 this gi'eat misconception of the nature and ten- 

 dency of agricultural labor no longer exists." 



" It is not alone in the brilliant results of sci- 

 entific investigation, nor in the fertility of the 

 soil, nor in the general salubrity of the climate, 

 that the American fanner finds the ground of his 

 briglitest anticipations for the future. There are 

 other and higher elements in the conipo.sition of 

 his fate. The government which watches over 

 him is the government of his choice — a govern- 

 ment m whicli the permanent interests of the 

 great mass of the people are secured by placing 

 the power in their own hands. Under such in- 

 stitutions the pendulum of public ju.stice may 

 sometimes vibrate between dangerous extremes, 

 but it must eventually repose where justice and 

 the interests of the many, require that it should 

 rest. Such are the hopes of the fanners of our 

 countiy. It is not to be denied that their inter- 

 ests have been sometimes neglected, and their 

 rights sacrificed to the sinister aspirations of 

 classes more f^orably situated for political com- 

 binations ; but if there is any foundation for our 

 faith, that a free government is the fountain of 

 equal justice, these aberrations must be correct- 

 ed in the slow but certain progress of truth and 

 right. 



" I trust that American agriculture will illus- 

 trate and confirm the striking remark of the au- 

 thor of the ' Esprit des Lois,' a writer, the most 

 philosophical and liberal of his time, ' that it is 

 not those countries which possess the greatest 

 fertility, which are the best cultivated, but those 

 which have secured the most liberty.' I find 

 this suggestion, so flattering to our hopes, elo- 

 quently commented upon by a late distinguished 

 agriculturist of our country, in an address \\'hich 

 he delivered before the Agricultural Society of 

 Pennsylvania ; and I gladly avail myself of this 

 opportunity to pay to his memory a tribute of 

 respect, which is due, in a more eminent de- 

 gree, to but one other name in the history of 

 American farmers and patriots. With many 

 other improvements in agriculture, Judge Peters 

 was emphatically the author of the plaster and 

 clover culture. The time which your patience 

 will allow me to occupy on this occasion, will 

 not permit me to recount the many expin-iments, 

 at once ingenious and philosophical, with which 

 he demon.strated the wonderful efBc^icy of plas- 

 ter, nor the efforts, e(iually jiersevering and phi- 

 lanthropic, with which he labored to introduce 

 into general practice, this great fertilizer. He 

 succeeded. None but those well acquainted 

 with the course of husbandry in our wheat- 

 growing districts, can estimate how much of the 

 eighty-four millions amiually produced in our 

 country, is owing to the introduction of plaster 

 and clover. The benefits of this improvement 

 are to be counted by annual millions ; and I call 

 it up to your attention, not only to pay the debt 

 of gratitude due to its distinguished author, but 

 as an incentive to those who, with the better in- 

 sl^ruments of a more advanced science, liave the 



