CHAPTER IX 



THE DIGNITY AND HONOR OF MANUAL LABOR 



Is it desirable to believe in the dignity of manual 

 labor ? Compare the countries where men and women, 

 able to work with their hands and prqud of their 

 ability to do so, are not restricted from rising to the 

 highest positions, with those countries where manual 

 labor is looked upon with contempt by a patrician class ; 

 where caste lines, in this regard, are so strict that 

 manual labor is considered degrading and defiling. 

 Compare the United States, Germany, France, Eng- 

 land, Denmark and Switzerland, with China, India, 

 Korea and Ceylon. In the former, the brains, the 

 progressive spirit, and the inventive skill, of thousands, 

 the workers, keep their countries continually in the 

 front line of civilization. In the latter, where farmer 

 is synonymous with serf; where the artisan and me- 

 chanic are never allowed to be leaders in any large 

 sense; these countries have advanced but little in their 

 civilization during a thousand years. 



The teachers of a land can form the trend of 

 thought of the next immediate generation. If they 

 preach and practice a belief in the dignity and honor- 

 ableness of manual labor the result is to improve the 

 standard of labor. The men and women who labor 



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