COUNTRY CHURCH AND PROGRESS 171 



stay there. We may praise the country because 

 it furnishes brain and brawn for the world's 

 work; we may argue for country life because 

 it possesses a good environment in which to 

 rear a family; we may demand a school system 

 that shall give the country child as good a chance 

 as the city child has. In all this we do well. 

 But we do not yet stand face to face with the 

 rural problem. 



For the rural problem is the problem of those 

 who farm. It is the problem of the man behind 

 the plow. It is he that is the center of interest. 

 His business, his success, his manhood, his 

 family, his environment, his education, his fu- 

 ture these constitute the problem of the farm. 

 Half our people make their living from the 

 brown soil. In virtue, in intelligence, in real 

 worth, this half compare favorably with the 

 other half who saw wood, and shovel sand, and 

 pull throttles, and prepare briefs, and write 

 sermons. The business of agriculture provides 

 directly for the material welfare of nearly forty 

 millions of our people. It supports gigantic rail- 

 way systems, fills the hulls of immense ships, 

 furnishes raw material for thousands of indus- 

 tries. This rural hemisphere of American eco- 

 nomic and social life is surely worthy the thought 



