158 FARM MANAGEMENT 



ually intensify methods, and as in making any change, the 

 majority do not advance quite so rapidly as conditions 

 warrant. 



With the revival of interest in country life, the country 

 is being flooded with advice by persons who know little 

 about farming. The usual theory is that every farmer 

 ought to grow two or three times the yields per acre that 

 he now secures, regardless of cost or profit. Farmers are 

 usually wise enough to try these theories cautiously. 



Such advice is most ruinous to the intelligent " back-to- 

 the-lander," who is usually thoroughly convinced that all 

 he has to do to insure his success is to. raise a larger crop 

 than his neighbors. He hopes to apply scientific methods 

 and show his neighbors how foolish the old ways are. 

 Usually his science is only that of increasing the yield. 

 He fails to count the cost. No method is scientific that 

 fails to count the cost. A little more intensive methods 

 will pay in most regions, and sometimes a complete change 

 is needed. But farming is not subject to such violent 

 changes as manufacturing, because the climate and soil 

 are its unchangeable basis. 



This idea is not new. It is expressed by the farmer who, 

 while viewing the enormous crop on some experimental 

 grounds, says that he also could raise such a crop if the 

 railroad or state would pay the bills. 



The same idea is expressed by the economist when he 

 speaks of the law of diminishing returns. 1 



Cato expressed the same idea when he said, " Know that 

 with a farm as with a man, however productive it may be, 

 if it has the spending habit, not much will be left over." 



Pliny expressed it better, " I may possibly appear guilty 



'Principles of Rural Economics, T. N. Carver, pp. 118-119 and 



182-184. 



