5 



wrong, because they left out of sight this great truth : that God never made a 

 man to prosper, in the fullest sense, by the neglect of any of his powers. 



Ruskin has graphically described the dwarfing influence of that division of 

 labor which complicated machinery and the competition of modern mechanical 

 skill too often demands : 



"We have much studied and much perfected of late," he says, "the great civ- 

 ilized invention of a division of labor ; only we give it false name. It is not, 

 truly speaking, the labor that is divided, but the men. Divided into mere seg- 

 ments of men, broken into small fragments and crumbs of life ; so that all the 

 little piece of intelligence that is left in a man is not enough- to make a pin, or a 

 nail, but exhausts itself in making the point of a pin or the head of a nail. Now 

 it is a good and desirable thing, truly, to make many pins in a day ; but if we 

 could only see with what crystal sand their points were polished, — sand of a 

 human soul, much magnified before it can be discerned for what it is, — we 

 should think there might be some loss in it also. And the great cry that rises 

 from all our manufacturing cities, louder than their furnace blast, is all in very 

 deed for this, — that we manufacture everything there except men ; we blanch 

 cotton and strengthen steel, and refine sugar and shape pottery ; but to brighten, 

 to strengthen, to refine or to form a single living spirit never enters into our 

 estimate of advantages." 



Fortunate it is for society that there are employments like agriculture, in 

 which division of labor can never be pressed to such an extent as to dwarf or 

 weaken the powers of the laborer. And more fortunate still is it, that there is 

 one institution of social life that can be brought in, in all places and in connec- 

 tion with all employments, to cultivate the common manhood of the race — to 

 develope the higher sympathies — to present, every day, questions of different 

 interest and of varied relations to the world, and thus counteract the isolation 

 of the man and partial culture of his powers, which the modern division of 

 labor is constantly demanding. This conserving institution is the family. 



The family, and the home for the family, is the real unit of society. And 

 when machinery, and commerce, and science, have done all they can do to 

 lighten labor and perfect it, even by division of labor — in the model family, 

 there will be found a practical employment of all the faculties and powers of 

 our nature. While we are pushing our improvements in every department of 

 thought and industry, what we want brought to perfection to correct the defects 

 of our civilization, is the family. What Massachusetts and every other State 

 w T ants, is more homes — homes for the people — homes for every family — homes 

 surrounded with all that civilized man needs for his enjoyment ; and the nearer 

 these homes are alike in the abundance of their comforts, the better Jor 

 every member of the community. 



I wish this society would offer a premium for the best farmer's home. It 

 would pay to send a committee all over the State to find it and report upon it — 

 a home around wilich all the beauties of the natural landscape were improved 

 by all the labor expended upon it — in which it should be shown that no labor 

 had been wasted — a home in which good order, plenty, refinement and con- 

 tentment reigned. Such a home Massachusetts offers to every family in her 

 borders, unless unusual misfortune comes upon them. Her strength and her 

 glory consists in the number of these homes. And what is the value of all this 



