PERSONAL IDEALS 147 



say that other ends in life than the making of 

 more money and the getting of more goods are 

 much needed in country districts; and that this, 

 more than anything else, will correct the un- 

 satisfying nature of rural life. 



Teachers of agriculture have placed too much 

 relative emphasis on the remuneration and pro- 

 duction sides of country life. Money-hunger 

 is as strong in the open country as elsewhere, and 

 as there are fewer opportunities and demands for 

 the expenditure of this money for others and for 

 society, there often develops a hoarding and a 

 lack of public spirit that is disastrous to the 

 general good. So completely does the money- 

 purpose often control the motive, that other 

 purposes in farming remain dormant. The com- 

 placent contentment in many rural neighbor- 

 hoods is itself the very evidence of social incapa- 

 city or decay. 



It must not be assumed that these deficiencies 

 are to be charged as a fault against the farmer 

 as a group. They are rather to be looked on as 

 evidence of an uncorrelated and unadjusted 

 society. Society is itself largely to blame. The 

 social structure has been unequally developed. 



