ANNUAL MEETING. 
469 
thered and promoted the interests of the other. They could not 
impede the progress of science ; it would master them — it would 
bear them down. How desirable, therefore, was it to direct it 
into proper channels, in order that it should accomplish those 
vast benefits which it was specially intended by the great Creator 
to carry out. Would any one venture to tell him that the use of 
the drill had reduced the employment of manual labour? or, who 
would affirm that the invention of threshing machines had im- 
peded it? On the contrary, it gave employment to more nu- 
merous labourers. They were now enabled to thresh out their 
wheat in the barn more rapidly than ever — not by hand — not by 
horse power, but by machinery. To cite another instance — rhad 
the spinning jenny impeded the work of man ? Had it not, on 
the contrary, given an increased impetus to trade, and to the em- 
ployment of labour? If it were not so, how did it happen that 
they saw such great masses of people springing up in their manu- 
facturing towns, and actively employed ? They, indeed, occa- 
sionally heard of the want and misery of some of these men, who 
were thrown for a time out of employment ; but how small was 
their number compared with those who were deriving their bread 
from the employment of spinning jennies, power loom machines, 
See. He was convinced that it was utterly impossible to resist 
the onward march of science. 
Mr. Ransom , after some introductory matter, with regard to 
the inconvenience and loss which he and his brethren had sustained 
from the strange misunderstanding that had arisen respecting 
the exhibition of their instruments, thus proceeded : “ You have 
stated your high appreciation of the value and importance of me- 
chanics as applied to agriculture, and you do not over-estimate 
these advantages as a means to the furtherance of the cause of 
agriculture. If we turn our eyes to the large manufacturing dis- 
tricts, and ask what has enabled us to maintain and employ the 
dense masses of their population, has it not been the result of 
the application of mechanics to the lessening of the hardship of 
labour, and reducing the cost of production ? There yet remains 
a wide field in agriculture for increasing its prosperity from the 
same source — at once reducing the cost, and multiplying, and con- 
sequently cheapening, its production for the benefit of all. 1 am 
VOL. xvi. 3 R 
