10 MR. gray's address. 



power as exhibited in the propelling of the steamship, 

 you are filled with admiration, not so much because of 

 the majestic and rapid motion which it produces, as be- 

 cause you see in it the proudest monument of the triumphs 

 of science over the most formidable element in nature. 

 Steamboats and locomotives did not spring up in a 

 night without any attention to natural laws or the appli- 

 cation of scientific principles. 



The whole circle of the mechanic and manufacturing 

 arts, from the building of a seventy-four gun ship to 

 the manufacturing of a pin, have attained their won- 

 derful perfection because they are based upon the prin- 

 ciples of science, and their history conclusively proves 

 that their progress has been constant and permanent on- 

 ly so far as these principles have been properly applied. 

 If a mechanic may not construct a log cabin without 

 some scientific knowledge of architecture, shall we ex- 

 pect to attain perfection in agriculture without any at- 

 tention to the peculiar prmciples upon which the art 

 should be founded? If the less difficult, the less import- 

 ant arts require the aid of science to secure progress 

 and success, is it possible to attain permanent advance- 

 ment in the more difficult as well as the most important 

 of all arts without any such guide to point out the way? 



What a vast amount of labor has been saved by the 

 introduction of machinery in the mechanical arts. Is it 

 of no importance to the progress of agriculture that its 

 labors may be abridged by similar means? It would 

 seem that as this art is the most laborious of any other, 

 an art which the great majority of men in every age and 

 country must practice, it would seem I say that it should 

 be the first to which the principles of science would be 

 applied, the first to reap the benefits of scientific dis- 

 coveries and new inventions. The history of Agricul- 

 ture itself proves that permanent improvement has been 

 secured only so far as the art has been based on the 

 principles of science, and all that is valuable to be re- 

 tained may be traced either directly to scientific discov- 

 ery, or found to correspond to the principles which sci- 

 ence has disclosed. 



