8 



able epoch in its history occurred till near the close of the 

 seventeenth century. In the early ages of Modern Europe, the 

 Feudal system exerted a most unpropitious influence upon agri- 

 culture. So military was the spirit of that system, such a servile 

 dependence did it produce on the one hand, and such a haughty 

 aristocracy on the other, that both science and art were wither- 

 ed by its touch : and though the system itself has long since b^en 

 nominally extinct, yei its influence remained for centuries. 



But a still more powerful obstruction to the progress of agri- 

 culture, was an almost entire ignorance of the scientific princi- 

 ples on which it is founded. Till near the close of the last cen- 

 tury, the very sciences from which those principles are derived, 

 can hardly be said to have had an existence. Previous to that 

 period, therefore, treatises upon agriculture were merely a col- 

 lection of common place maxims, partly true and partly false, 

 mixed with most extravagant hypotheses and wild and hurtful 

 superstitions. And it is only ju<=;tice to say, that the Agricultural 

 Chemistry of Sir Humphrey Davy, contains more new and valu- 

 able principles to guide the agriculturist in making improvements 

 in husbandry, than all which the experience and science of pre- 

 ceding centuries had developed. And it is to be imputed mainly 

 to the application of these principles, by intelligent men, that ag- 

 riculture, within the last half century, in Europe, and particnlarly 

 in Great Britain, has made such rapid progress. 



I know, indeed, that there is a prejudice existing in some 

 minds, against the application of scientific principles as guides in 

 agricultural experiments. It is thought that they serve rather 

 to bewilder, than direct. But if the agriculturist be not guided 

 by scientific principles, what shall he follow? True, his own ex- 

 perience alone may do much to assist him ; and it has accom- 

 plished wonders in times past. But will not a correct knowledge 

 of the composition of soils, of the food of plants, and of the mode 

 in which that food is converted into nourishment, will not this 

 knowledge prove an important auxiliary to expeiience 1 The ex- 

 perience of one man teaches him it is important he should ob- 

 serve the position of the moon, or whether the day of the week 

 be lucky, or unlucky, when he sows and when he reaps. But 



