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THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



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at times, to enjoy social gratification. I 

 do not speak against this most excellent of 

 all the human faculties, but encourage it in 

 every one with as much ardor as does any 

 divine, nor confine it to so narrow limits 

 as to debar it of the proper influence in 

 society. 



Virtue neither honors nor needs any 

 limitation. Vice only minds restraint. No 

 generous affection is in the least danger of 

 harming any one, its latitude being never 

 so large. The farther it extends the more] 

 universally benevolence pervades every] 

 grade of society. No one will ever think 

 of restraining any humane desire but he 

 who never harbors a sympathetic emotion 

 in his own breast. It is only the surly 

 child of envy which makes anyone doubt 

 the sincerity of another's friendship. An- 

 gels are the exercisers of friendly affec- 

 tions. Deity, himself, is love ! Shall man 

 then who bears his holy image, shrink 

 from the exercise of it, chill every social 

 affection and freeze every sympathetic 

 emotion with moroseness ? Happiness is 

 the great desire of every being. We were 

 all made and designed for that end ; and 

 society being the only way in which civi- 

 lized beings can hope to enjoy it, let any 

 one who cherishes the inclination, cheer- 

 fully contribute his genial spark to kindle 

 and enliven the social flame, which shall 

 light us all to everlasting felicity ! 



Philo. 



Governor Banks on the Parmer. 



Gov. Banks delivered the address before 

 the Agricultural Society at Amherst, Mass. 

 After speaking of the great general pro- 

 gress of America, and the part which 

 farmers have taken therein, especially dur- 

 ing the past year, when their products 

 amounted in value to sixteen hundred 

 millions of dollars, he sail : — 



This is what agricultural industry con- 

 tributes to the wealth of the country ! A 

 yearly contribution ; a contribution in dol- 

 lars and dimes merely, and not embracing 

 an estimate of its physical strength, capa- 

 city for endurance, the love of labour and 

 the moral power, with winch agricultural 

 industry invests communities wherever it 

 prevails. In this view we confine our 

 consideration strictly to those who make 

 field culture the business of life. Beyond 

 this, how wide the influence which it exerts 

 upon other pursuits? Whence do we de- 



rive the vigorous intellect of professional 

 life that adorns society with its varied ac- 

 complishments, and protects individuals in 

 the enjoyment of life, health, and their 

 moral and personal rights ? Whence comes 

 that vigorous and exhaustless intellect that 

 revels in new channels of thought, and by 

 new conceptions of power, creates the 

 marvels — miracles almost — that fill the 

 world of invention from day to daj r ? Who 

 supplies the successive races of men that, 

 occupying for a brief hour an obscure spot 

 upon the merchant's exchanges of Boston, 

 New York, Philadelphia, Paris and Lon- 

 don, give to the world of finance and pol- 

 itics its law ? Does professional society 

 reproduce itself? Can inventive spirits 

 call up their own successors ? Have the 

 mercantile centres of the world ever re- 

 produced their own financial giants? Nev- 

 er! The farm supplies ail. It is the sale 

 of the earth, and if this earth's salt lost 

 its savor, wherewith shall the earth be 

 salted ? — Maine Farmer. 



Height of Economy. 

 Old Deacon Briggs is as remarkable for 

 his closeness as Dicken'sman Barkis. His 

 name has come to be a proverb in our re- 

 gion for such an economy as ever makes 

 the man the subject of ridicule and con- 

 tempt. One bitter cold morning, a few 

 falls ago, he bade the boys drive together 

 all the pigs that were to be fattened for 

 market, into the little yard just at the cor- 

 ner of the house. A pig was caught by 

 one of the youngsters — the Deacon with a 

 pair of pincers in one hand, a sharp knife 

 in the other, seized the unfortunate by the 

 tail and cut it off close up. So, through 

 the whole herd, leaving not a pig with 

 even a stump of a tail. Cort, who worked 

 for his grandfather, stood by in amaze- 

 ment — his hands in his pockets, his body 

 wrapped into a crescent by the cold, and 

 his teeth jawing against the outrage with 

 a prodigious chatter. At last he stuttered 

 out : 



" Grandpa! what are you cutting off 

 those tails for ?" 



Sober and solemn was Deacon Briggs, 

 as he replied : 



" You will never be a rich man, for you 

 do not know what it is to be savin'. You 

 ought to know, my child, that it takes a 

 bushel of corn to fatten an inch of tail." — 

 Maine Farmer. 



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