ILLINOIS DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 49 



then there were signs of the coming day, when mind should assert its su- 

 premacy over the physical and brute forces, when the pen, the emblem of the 

 one, should be mightier than the sword, the symbol of the other. Between 

 the club of the savage, and the printing press and telephone of the civilized 

 man, history shows an unceasing struggle with natural forces ; a restless sea 

 of conflict with advancing ^nd receding waves of victory and defeat. And 

 all along the perilous shore lie the graves of the martyr spirits who have 

 carried the world's progress in their brains as incorruptible trustees of the 

 eternal purpose : Socrates, condemned to death for knowing more than his 

 fellows, who died, leaving as a legacy, which the world seems slow to claim, 

 his conviction that nothing can harm a really good man either before or after 

 death ; Galileo, imprisoned by men who fought against the harmony of the 

 universe ; and a thousand others, less known and sooner forgotten, who could 

 not be false to their inspirations. 



Imperfect as it is, the record of man's struggle toward a higher plane of 

 existence shows the operation of the law, that only through the reflex action 

 of varying mental powers can moral or material progress be secured. The 

 common weal and individual welfare are promoted in direct proportion to 

 the free interchange of the results of thought, research and achievement, 

 among nations, communities and individuals of different powers, or working 

 under different conditions. This interchange is really the basis of all the 

 activities which we call civilization, and any means by which such inter- 

 change can be promoted have a valid claim for support. 



If there ever was a time when the association of men for the furtherance 

 of a legitimate common interest needed a defense, that time has long since 

 passed. Occasionally a man, who by years of constant work and costly experi- 

 ence has reached an advanced position in the pursuit of a difficult branch of 

 industry, is heard to say, that his knowledge is a part of his property, his 

 experience his working capital, and he cannot afford to give it to the public 

 and thereby facilitate and increase competition to the injury of his material 

 interests. 



If he is a well-informed man, as he is likely to be, he may add that he re- 

 gards the request, which sometimes assumes the form of a demand, that he 

 give of his hardly-acquired knowledge— as not far removed in principle from 

 the communistic demands for a division of the property of the able, indus- 

 trious and self-denying class, among the incapable, shiftless and improvi- 

 dent. H^ may say that the government protects by its patent laws the in- 

 terests of inventors ; that improved processes of great value, unpatentable in 

 their nature, are kept secret by manufacturers to further their interests, and 

 in equity, the individual worker in any field is not less entitled to the ex- 

 clusive benefit of his own researches so far as prudential reserve can secure 

 it, although the results of his experimental work may not assume a patent- 

 able form. 



This is perhaps a somewhat strong statement of the only argument ever 

 offered against the principle underlying organization and association, and a' 

 refutation may seem like an attack upon a man of straw ; but the argument 

 is probably oftener urged than the members of this Association would 

 readily admit. 



The advocate of such an argument may well consider how small a part of 



