148 SELECTIONS FROM ADDRESSES. 



To this end it contributes, in the first place, negatively, by 

 locating the farmer in the country, and thus withdrawing him 

 from all those influences unfriendly to virtue, which are known 

 to be ever multiplied and strengthened in proportion as men 

 become congregated in masses, and the means of animal gratifi- 

 cation are concentrated ; and, in the second place, positively, by 

 the direct tendency of his position and employment to promote 

 simplicity of manners, regularity of habits, moderation in his 

 desires and in the indulgence of his appetites, and to inspire him 

 with sentiments of justice, patriotism, philanthropy, and piety. 

 Depending for subsistence, not upon the gains of commerce, not 

 upon the success with which he can drive a rival trade, or com- 

 pete with his fellows in professional life, but upon the direct re- 

 wards of Providence to his honest industry, he is exempted in a 

 good degree from those trials to temper and to integrity, and from 

 those temptations to avarice and venality, to over-reaching and 

 injustice, to jealousy, envy, hatred, and strife, which often prove 

 too strong for the virtue of other men. His greatest interest lying 

 in the soil which he cultivates, the love of country is with him but 

 a natural sentiment; his only rivalry with his fellow-men being 

 that of kind offices, he is under no temptation to indulge the feel- 

 ings of misanthropy; and, led by his employment constantly to 

 "look through nature up to nature's God," he is restrained from 

 infidelity and irreligion. 



The influence of these circumstances on the moral character 

 of the agricultural class is not imaginary. Jefferson, who was 

 a shrewd observer of men, has declared, that, " generally 

 speaking, the proportion which other citizens bear in the State 

 to that of husbandmen, is the proportion of its unsound and 

 unhealthy parts, and is a good enough barometer by which to 

 measure its degree of corruption ; " and it is a matter of 

 notoriety, that, while the agricultural class composes the very 

 great majority of our population, the proportion which it fur- 

 nishes to our pauper and criminal lists is very small indeed. 



The pursuit of agriculture is profitable, considered as a 

 source of pecuniary advantage. 



It is not to be pretended that agriculture holds out any very 

 great inducement to those "that make haste to be rich." Sud- 

 den wealth is seldom among its achievements. But, though its 



