(00 



GENESEE FARMER. 



July, 1845 



tirenters and paupers inrrease in our rural dii-tricts 

 much faster than population. If the cultivators of 

 the earth in England and Wale?, by our system of 

 giving a good deal and getting a little back, were 

 able. ?s Mr. Colinan says, to count over a million 

 and a half of public paupers, I feared that like caus- 

 es would produce like eltccts in this Empiie State. 

 Its direct taxes last year were $4,243,100! 



Should a representative of a whole community 

 while called upon to vote ^00,000 to erect a netv 

 state prison, wilfully close his eyes to evils of this 

 magnitude, which no art can conceal, and no effron- 

 tery deny? It was to check a system of levelling 

 downuard, which robs the many to enrich the few, 

 and thus prevent pauperism, high taxes and crime, 

 thai induced me to say a few words on the impor- 

 tance of teaching the useful science of keeping pro- 

 perty to the half million of field laborers in New York. 

 It cannot be denied that this science comes home to 

 the bread and meat, the coat and trowters, the bed 

 and shelter of every laboring person in the State. 



Instead of yielding my position to the storm of 

 criticism with which my Report has been assailed, I 

 feel bound by a sense of duty to insist on the impor- 

 tance of the principle to the well-being of the com- 

 munity, that the great body of Ameiican soverei^sins, 

 who produce the wealth of the Republic, mutt un- 

 derstand how to keep for their own comfort and hap- 

 piness, not hah", nor two-thirds, but the entire pro- 

 ceeds of their productive industry. Secure to every 

 healthy human bemg thro igh life a sum equal to the 

 entire products of one intellect and one pair of hands, 

 and those the very ones which God has wisely given 

 him to provide for all his bodily and mental wants ; 

 and that perception of right and of duty which his 

 Creator has also placed in his bosom, will make him 

 satisfied. Guarantee this measure of even and exact 

 justice to all alike, and you may dispense with half 

 your jails and prisons, half your taxes, and half your 

 civil and criminal prosecutions. But if you establish 

 an artificial systam of exchange that takes from the 

 proceeds of A's labor 10 per cent., and a like sum 

 from the earnings of B and C, in order to give D 30 

 per cent, more than his labor calls into existence, the 

 eense of right which God has given to A, B and C, 

 to protect their abiding wants of hunger, nakedness 

 and of sleep, is outraged. It matters not to a hun- 

 gry stomach— to outr ged humanity— by what tor- 

 tuous indirection you rob a person of that Avhich 

 rightfully belongs to him. Human nature, hunger 

 and nakedness, by the decree of Heaven, will not, 

 and cannot be satisfied. 



Man's physical wants, his powers of reason, and 

 his moral perceptions, all rise at once to vindicate 

 the inalienable rights of Labor and Humnnity. How 

 long will it take an intelligent, Chrittian people to 

 learn and believe that the golden rvle which com- 

 mands them " to do unto others as they wish others 

 to do unto them,'' is no idle fiction ? This dvty is 

 impressed by our Maker on every fibre of the human 

 constitution. It is a part of that breath of the 

 Divin'ty which gave to the first of our rare a living 

 soul. God has so organized the loathesome reptile, 

 th.at he can live comtortably in a cage 400 days on a 

 single meal. On man, with all his exalted hopes 

 and sense of just accountability, he has imposed the 

 abidmg necessity of having 1,200 meals in 400 days! 

 The serpent needs no clothing, no artificial shelter. 

 God has given it no hands to work and provide these 

 things, and no powers of reason to direct its con- 

 structive energies aright, if it had hand?. 



There is now no mystery in the operations of na- 

 ture which render it necessary for man to have one 

 thousand meals in the same length of time that the 

 nearly cold blooded reptile needs but one. I allude 

 to tiiis physiological fact as one among hundreds 

 that might be named, all going to prove that infi- 

 nite Benevolence has made the peculiar and extreme 

 weakness, and destitution of the human body, the 

 peculiar, and untold strength and riches, of the hu- 

 man soul. If, then, our nrcessities are a part of our 

 nature, and the mothers of our invention, why shall 

 not the inventions of all civilized nations in Agricul- 

 tural Science be carried home to the understanding 

 of evejy young man in the State, who is to cultivate 

 the eaith for a living ? Where is the crime in tell- 

 ing " the 600,000 field laborers in New York," of a 

 few of the " inventions,'" by the every day operations 

 of which, honest, productive industry is robbed with 

 impunity, to feed dishonest idleness ? 



He knows but little of human nature who sup- 

 poses that a majority of the fiee citizens of this 

 State will bo content to work hard, and farehaid, 

 live miserably and die, either in, or out of a poor- 

 house, to enrich others. 



Why is it that men, professing to be statesmen 

 and republicans, are so unwilling to look at holh 

 sides of this great question cf the rights of labor, 

 and of the manifold wants of humanity ? Is there 

 anything so mysterious in producing property ; or 

 in learning to keep and enjoy a sum equal to the 

 products of one mind and one pair of hands, which 

 places these sciences above the comprehension of 

 common day laborers ? If so many thousands can, 

 and do learn to get a great deal more than either 

 their mental or phy-ical labor produces in any form, 

 are we sure that those that now get a great deal 

 less than they produce, can not learn to keep at 

 least their own ? Do not so wrong the natural 

 powers of the immortal mind. Be guilty of no such 

 absurdity as attempting to maintain i\\^\. property — 

 a thing made by intellect, directing aright the 

 mechanical power of human hands — has anA'thing 

 about it above the comprehension of the author of 

 its being. In nineteen cases out of twenty, our 

 loss of what we have, occurs from an attempt to 

 get more than our own — to give to some one 99 

 cent?, or a loss sum, and get a dollar back. Instead 

 of working and studying to produce all that we 

 need, and to keep and enjoy a sum equal to to all 

 that w-e produce, and wisely being content therewith, 

 we gamble w'ith our neighbors, and justly meet the 

 gamblers fate. 



Charcoal.-— In one or two instances where char- 

 coal has been applied to winter wheat in the State Of 

 Ohio, at the rate of 50 bushels to the acre, it has 

 evidently prevented the injury of the very severe 

 drought which has nearly ruined adjoining wheat 

 fields. Mr. R. H. Haywood, of Buffalo, is the own- 

 er of a large farm near Sandusky in Ohio, and has 

 tried the use of pulverized charcoal with marked suc- 

 cess. The crop is not yet harvested, but the bene- 

 fit of the coal dust is very signal. 



The American Agriculturist Almanac. — Mr. 

 A. B. Allen, editor of the American Agriculturist, 

 has issued from the press of Messrs. Saxon and 

 Miles, 250 Broadway, N. Y\, an almanac for 1846, 

 which contains a large amount of agricultural infor- 

 mation in addition to the calendar for the year. 



