VoL. IL 
AUGUSTA, GA., DECEMBER 25, 1844, 
No. 26, 
ORATION OF THE REV. GEO. F. PIERCE. 
Delivered before the Alumni Society of Franklin Col- 
lege, at Athens, in August. 
(Concluded.) 
Another circumstance of'disastrous results in 
the past and ol evil o men lor the future, is the fact 
that anything but a learned profession (a wretch- 
ed misnomer by the way) has been considered 
quite beneath the dignity of a college-bred man. 
I mean no disrespect to lawyers ordoctots, when 
I say that the supply largely exceeds the de- 
mand ; and the want of employment among the 
incumbents of these departments ol society has 
gone far towards reducing the honor of mauual 
labor, and of giving respectability to idleness. 
The capital of a country is but accumulated la- 
bor, and he who adds nothing to the stock, by 
the toil of his head or his hands — whatever may 
have been his educational privileges, or what- 
ever may be his nominal fellowship with the 
diligent, the honorable and the useful— is yet 
tlie abettor (involuntarily perhaps) of impove- 
rishment and vice. 
There is but little difference, however, be- 
tween a life of inactivity by preference, and the 
choice of a profession which dooms one, by ob- 
vious and invincible causes, to lie hand-locked 
and idle lor years, and often for life. In the ab- 
sence of stern discipline and of high self-sus- 
taining integrity, the moral dangers that ambush 
this theatre of action are fearful, and some- 
times take captive those best furnished for the 
war. The arrest ol ambition — the forestalling 
of hope — the stagnation of enterprise, engen- 
der discontent and despondency, and drive their 
despairing victim into the apathy of a heart, 
from which the spirit of honorable independence 
has fled, or hurry him out of the insufferable 
calm into the rapids of dissipation, on whose 
dark waters he is destined to roll a hapless and 
dismantled wreck. Oh! how many ethereal 
spirits, appointed of heaven to enlighten and 
bless the world, have been quenched in the nox- 
ious vapors, exhaled from the bogs and fens of 
public life, or fanned into fury, have become 
firebrands to set society in a blaze. O! how 
many a grey head has gone down with sorrow 
to the grave', mourning the extinction of life’s 
last and fendest hope in the inebriate folly of a 
reckless son. Many a staid observer of society 
has preferred to retain his boy in the sheltered 
lowliness of life’s humblest walks, rather than ad- 
venture him upon the high places, where the 
rushingstomi sweeps anon and the heaving surge 
dashes upon the base, nor yet in vain. The pro- 
fessions, I know, ought to be filled ; but they need 
not be gorged. These necessary appendages 
to every well-ordered and well-provided com- 
munity, ought not to be eon,verted into enclo- 
sures to rear “ lilies that neither toil or spin,” 
or made to bear the odium of having admitted 
to honorary membership a set of men who, born 
to dig, are yet not ashamed to spunge. I 
have no respect for an idle man — the country 
has none — and the corse of education and of 
colleges has been that by the inconsistent poli- 
cy (rfthe people they have been made the apparent 
patrons, of an order of things hostile to the pri- 
mary virtues of personal independence and self- 
sustaining labor. But this cup of mischief is 
nearly full. The law of necessity is beginning 
to be felt. Thanks to our slandered climate — 
our crystal waters— the temperance reformation 
and the blessed Providence ruling over all, the 
crowd of M. D.’s who scatter themselves over the 
land, have time to review their studies and en- 
goy their title by virtue of their diploma, rather 
than by the abundance of their gains. The law, 
with its locust swarm, yields but little — except 
to the veterans of the bar — dooms the young 
candidates for fees and honors to the fate of a 
coroner, who derives his living from the acci- 
dents of field and flood ; or of an heir patiently 
abiding the death of his kinsman. 
This state of things surety cannot be protract- 
ed. Nor would it, if a vitiated public opinion 
did not d-=“preciate other avocations, ana make 
the professions the only stepping-stones to cha- 
racter, promotion and influence. 
Why has the ancient and honorable occupa- 
tion of agriculture been brought down from the 
high position assigned it in the allotments ol 
Providence and the true interests ol nations, to 
rank with those employments that lie level with 
the grossest natures and the darkest minds? 
Why is it that the cultivators of the earth are 
never recognised, in their true character, as the 
best citizens in times of peace, and the bravest 
defenders in the day of war, except when their 
numbers are reckoned for political purposes? 
The policy of bringing the moneyed interest in 
opposition to the landed, or of crowding out the 
sovereigns of the soil, by the concentration of 
all political influence in the hands of the pro- 
fessional, is mischievous to the last degree upon 
the character of the people and the stability of 
legislation. Whether by statute or by conven- 
tional arrangement it is immaterial, the effect 
is to create a sort of informal corporation — a 
class of men who merge the love of country in 
the love of gold and of self, and who would sus- 
tain liberty or promote disorganization, as the 
calculations of personal interest might show 
that either would enure to their aggrandize- 
ment. The distinctions and offices of the State, 
under this system, become, to a large extent, the 
hereditary property of professed politicians and 
political adventurers, who, having no interest 
in the country, daringly sport with its vital con- 
cerns, and mock the people with lair words, 
while they abuse their franchises. With no 
rule ol action but the retention of popularity, 
and no scruples about the character of the means, 
when they promise success, the world of poli- 
tics becomes one vast laboratory, and the cre- 
dulity of the people the crucible in which these 
political alchemists work out their endless ex- 
periments. On the principle that thunder puri- 
fies the atmosphere and tempests leave salubrity 
behind them, these little human Jupiters are 
for ever thundering. Panic after panic comes 
on — the cloven foot of oppression peeps from 
every enactment for which these men, or their 
party, cannot claim paternity; and, like the 
witch in the fable, who raised an earthquake to 
find her lap-dog, they are for ever shaking the 
heaven and earth of politics to get a name or 
keep an office. No man el that the young and 
ambitious, seduced by this strategy, enter the 
list ol competition, ready for every expedient of 
demagogueism, and perpetually strengthen the 
party we condemn. 
The agricultural interest is the only one that, 
in all conjunctions, is identical with the peace, 
wealth, and true glory of the State and Nation. 
The investment of capital, labor, time, in the 
cultivation of the soil, makes patriotism synony- 
mous with interest; and the happy moral influ- 
ence it exerts upon those engaged in it, rears up a 
j c ass who combine the domestic charities with 
j ihe sterner civic virtues of frugality and valor, 
j industry and independence. And v»’henever there 
is force enough in public opinion, or wisdom 
enough in State policy, or influential example, 
] to give pre-eminence' to this employment — to 
I multiply the possessors of the soil — to elevate 
them in knowledge and social character and. 
political importance, Georgia will have deve- 
loped a secret of wealth and power more fruitful 
than her mines, and less fickle than the price of 
her great staple. As the Englishman, wherever he 
wanders, w'herever he toils, turns his eyes and his 
hopes to Albion’s white cliffs, nor rests till, his 
fortune made, he returns to the parent land to 
enrich it with his treasures — so here local affec- 
tions w'ould spring into bloom and fragrance 
and fruitfulness. Population would multiply 
— stability its law; improvement its pride. 
Science would enrich the soil, and taste embel- 
lish the habitations of the people. Uur barren 
hills would smile with plenty, and our country- 
seats would be the retreats of virtue and the 
home ol the graces. The spirit of rivalry, with- 
out its bitterness, would pass over the land to 
vivify the doimant energies of the citizens, and 
the face of the earth would blossom as if a pri- 
meval spring were about to usher in another 
Eden. The social hearth, the festive board, the 
field, the wayside, would be the theatres 
where genius wmuld dispense its treasures 
and intelligence diffuse its light- — general edu- 
cation w'ould rise in value and grow catholic in. 
its blessings— li.erature would return from her 
exile radiant with glory, and life itself put on 
charms for ever new. 
The history of education throughout the ci- 
vilized world will sustain the observation, that 
the most efficient mode of promoting common- 
school instruction, is to foster, by a liberal pro- 
vision, the higher institutions of learning. 
There must be a parent tree, shooting its vigo- 
rous roots far and wide, and casting its seed 
upon the pilgrim winds, if you would stock the 
land with kindred scions. Common-schools 
constitute one of the varieties of educational 
appliances, demanded by the diversified condi- 
tion ol a numerous population ; but the sphere 
in which they operate, can never reach the mo- 
tives and energies that must be stirred to pro- 
duce a college. Any effort to supply the last 
with pupils, and means, by an exclusive enact- 
ment, in behalf of the former, is an effort to in- 
vert the laws of society, and the natural relation 
of things, as futile and absurd as would be an 
attempt to irradiate the heavens by a congrega- 
tion of glow-worms when the sun w^as in an 
eclipse. Light descends ; it is nature’s law. 
If you would bespangle the sky with stars, lead 
forth the moon in brightness and bathe the earth 
in splendor, kindle the sun. The people, the 
churches ol Georgia, tantalized for years by the 
legaJ guardians of this great interest, have taken 
into their own hands the work of popular in- 
struction. Under their auspices, by voluntary 
contributions, colleges have sprung into exis- 
tence; and within their walls, hundreds will 
be trained to knowledge and usefulness, who 
else would have groped in the gloom of obscu- 
rity, to fortune and to fame unknown. These 
institutions did not originate in the spirit of il- 
liberal rivalship, or from the impulse of enmity 
to this ancient and honorable “ mother of us all.”* 
'Franklin College. 
