MASS. BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 481 



Mr. Gorham, delegate from the Hampden, Hampshire and 

 Franklin Society, next spoke. He said he saw in the com- 

 munity a prevalent apathy in regard to this snbject, in the 

 continuance of which he foresaw great evils to the Slate, if 

 not to the race. The dependence of all other interests upon 

 agriculture he dwelt upon, and said that when it suffers all 

 others suffer, when it fails all others fail. And yet the position 

 of this cause, in a national point of view, is most sad and 

 humiliating. It was useless to say that this cause would take 

 care of itself. It would not. The calling has to do with the 

 great mysteries and laws of nature, and you can no more ex- 

 pect agriculture to flourish without knowledge than you can 

 expect religion to flourish separated from the practice of virtue 

 and morality. What science has done for commerce on the 

 ocean, she has yet to do for agriculture on the land. The 

 ocean was once a hairier between countries. Timid voyagers 

 crept from headland to headland. Science furnished the trem- 

 bling needle that always pointed to the pole, and the barrier 

 became a highway. Why will not science, if permitted, do as 

 much for agriculture. The American farmers are looking anx- 

 iously for some guiding star to direct them in their calling. 

 He believed that star had risen ; that its glimmerings can be 

 seen, and that with faith in it, it would lead to glorious results. 



Professor Fowler, of Amherst, inquired, why at this day 

 there should be any doubt of the value of education as applied 

 to agriculture? Especially, why should this doubt exist in 

 Massachusetts? One reason, he believed, is that the advocates 

 of agricultural education are not distinctly understood in their 

 principles or purposes. It was not true that science, in its 

 application to agriculture, was independent of labor and capital. 

 Mere book knowledge is not better than practical knowledge 

 drawn from experience, and the friends of this movement do 

 not entertain or sustain any such theory. Science, without 

 common sense, will not succeed. What they mean, is, that 

 science, with common sense, energy, and practical experience, 

 will accomplish the desirable results at which they aim. He 

 supposed a young man about to enter into a partnership with 

 earth and nature, in his profession as a farmer. To enter into 

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