AGRICULTURE OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



THE RELATIONS OF AGRICULTURE TO 

 CIVILIZATION. 



From an Address before the Essex Agricultural Society. 



BY CYRUS M. TRACY. 



The civilization of to-day is no doubt better than any the 

 world has seen before. To say that there is no better still 

 beyond and to come, would be too much ; yet no man knows 

 of it save by conjecture. We have to do with that of to-day 

 as the best yet devised, and that for the security and promo- 

 tion of which we are all obligated and responsible. If we 

 analyze it, it is a composite thing, multiplied in parts, and 

 full of dependencies. To deal with it in every aspect is more 

 than enough for the wisdom of every statesman, and the 

 acumen of every teacher. Yet, like all stupendous existence, 

 the more it is studied the better it is known ; and it may be 

 more useful to work awhile at a few of its most salient points, 

 and try to understand them, than to do nothing, on one hand, 

 or, on the other, seek to do the whole when we cannot. And 

 thus, considering the relations of agriculture to the best 

 civilization, let me say, at the outset, that it is the nurse of 

 its truest liberty. 



There may be in it something of imagination, but to me it 

 always seems as if each craft of mankind bore upon its very 

 face something of its spirit and social tendency. The arti- 

 san, even in his freest condition, acts and moves like a man 

 employed under another, and too often, more than this, under 

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