160 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
based, they cannot successfully compete with their better instructed 
neighbors. Feeling themselves entitled to the same favor that has been 
shown to the doctor, the parson and the lawyer,^-desirous of acquir¬ 
ing this useful knowledge in their business so necessary to the common 
interests of the family, and influenced by a laudable pride to become in 
fact, what they are in name, on a footing of equality with their already 
learned brethren,—the working boys now ask the family, to estab¬ 
lish for them a school, adapted to their employments, now that the af¬ 
fairs of the family are prosperous. We cannot, say they, acquire the 
desired knowledge in the doctor’s school, because it is not taught there, 
and because, were it taught, we cannot be spared from the farm and 
shop to go after it. We want a school in which We can practise our hands 
to useful labor, gain instruction in the principles of our business, and 
at the same time qualify ourselves for the higher duties of social and 
public life. Is there anything unreasonable in this request? Or is 
there aught in it which a wise and prudent family would not grant 
with alacrity ? 
The state has expended about three millions of dollars towards quali¬ 
fying the doctor, the divine, the lawyer, and the gentleman, to discharge 
their several duties in society, from which the farmer and the me¬ 
chanic can derive but partial, if any, direct advantage. The plainest 
principles of justice, which accede to all classes an equal participation 
in the favors of a free government, as well as a provident foresight, re¬ 
quire alike some special provision for those who live by the sweat of 
the brow. 
We affect to be above the people of the old continent in all our social 
and political privileges. To sustain this superiority, we should be 
above them, too, in our intellectual and moral improvements. But we 
arenot. We are superficial in too many things. We mistake the name, 
too often, for the substance. We are satisfied with sowing a few seeds 
at random, upon superficial tillage, leaving the after culture to chance; 
and the consequence is, weeds spring up with luxuriance, and often 
smother and destroy the plants of usefulness. We have but begun in 
cultivating the mind, the great lever to the arts, and the refiner of hu¬ 
man enjoyments. We do not go far enough to ensure the harvest. In 
many portions of Europe, the mind is brought into early discipline, 
carefully prepared, and sown with those seeds which promise the best 
return to the individual and to the community. Take Prussia for an 
illustration of this remark. There the government provides seven 
years instruction for every child in the kingdom, at the public charge 
when the parent is unable to defray it. And what branches of instruc¬ 
tion are there taught? Not merely those elementary studies, as read¬ 
ing, writing and the preliminary rules of arithmetic, which constitute 
the main studies in our common schools—but the sciences which instruct 
and dignify the useful arts—chemistry, geology, botany, &c.—geogra¬ 
phy, history, geometry, drawing and music; the mechanic arts and ag¬ 
riculture. Nor does the Prussian government stop here: It provides 
the schools with the means of teaching this knowledge efficiently. And 
the primary, or common schools, are not only provided with books and 
other ordinary matters, but with a collection of maps and geographical 
instruments, models of drawing, writing, music, &c. with instruments 
and collections necessary for studying natural history, and, according 
to the extent of the system of instruction, with the apparatus necessa¬ 
ry for gymnastic exercises, and tools suited to teach the mechanic arts 
or manufactures in the school. She also attaches to every school in a 
village, or small town, a kitchen or orchard garden, which is made 
available for the instruction of the scholars; and to her normal schools, 
or schools for the education of teachers, a farm, for practical instruc¬ 
tions in agriculture. Dr. Channing, in speaking of the Prussian sys¬ 
tem of instruction, says it is adapted to a monarchy—to bring the minds 
of subjects in quiet subjection to the will of the sovereign. So far as 
we have sketched its features, it seems as well adapted to a republic 
as a monarchy. If a king finds it for his interest thus to have all his 
subjects instructed in the higher, or at least most useful branches of 
knowledge, of how much greater importance is it, that those who are 
themselves to share in the sovereignty, to make and execute laws, 
should have their minds early imbued with useful knowledge. In giv¬ 
ing these outlines of common school education in Prussia, we give, with 
trifling variation, the system in operation in Wurtemburgh, Bavaria, 
and other German states, and which is now being adopted in the French 
empire. The education of the great body of the people, with the view 
of implanting good habits, and fitting them, in school, for the various 
and important pursuits of life, is an improvement of modern times,! 
and one of great moment in a moral and national point of view. It isj 
particularly adapted to the welfare of a free people. 
We want schools of science and practice, where the principles and 
the practice of the useful arts may be simultaneously taught, and the 1 
physical and intellectual powers of our youth fully developed in aid of i 
each other. We want in our common schools a higher grade of studies, 
as a necessary foundation for increasing the knowledge and usefulness! 
of our people. We want those stimulants to the development of mind, 
the germination of latent skill, and the practice of useful industry, 
which are the sure preludes of national prosperity and greatness. We 
want, particularly, a school of scientific and practical agriculture, as 
matter of experiment first; and should it prosper as we think it will, 
we shall hereafter want other like schools. We have seen the agricul¬ 
ture of England more than doubled in its products, under the vivifying 
influence of an efficient board of agriculture, patronized and sustained 
by the government. We have seen Scotland increasing, three and four 
fold, the production of her soil, under the active and salutary influence 
of the very liberal premiums, which have annually, for fifty years, been 
distributed by her agricultural society. AVe see France, growing wise 
from the example of her neighbors, establishing national farms, and 
sustaining her agricultural societies by appropriations from her trea¬ 
sury ; and we see the speedy and happy effects of this patronage, in 
the new impetus which has been given to the beet culture, and to im 
provement in her agriculture generally. We have seen our sister Mas¬ 
sachusetts sustaining her agricultural societies by liberal annual appro¬ 
priations from her treasury ; and when the law making these appro¬ 
priations had expired, we have seen her renewing it, thus affording the 
strongest evidence of its wisdom and utility. We wish it was in our 
power to add, that New-York, great as she is in territory, in popula¬ 
tion, in resources and enterprise, had done something great, or gener¬ 
ous, or just, to promote the improvement of her agriculture, the great 
business of her population. We hope the opportunity will be afforded 
for some one to do it hereafter. 
The means which come legitimately within the purview of legisla¬ 
tive duties, for promoting improvement in the productive arts of labor, 
are,—the dissemination, through our common schools, of the elemen¬ 
tary principles of natural science, now become indispensable to the’ 
successful prosecution of the useful arts;—the patronizing of schools 
which shall simultaneously teach, practically, at least the great busi¬ 
ness of agriculture, and the sciences which serve to illustrate, enlighten, 
and render it more useful and profitable to the state;—to disseminate, 
through common school libraries, standard works upon husbandry and 
other common arts of labor ; and to encourage the formation of county 
and local associations of farmers, with the view of calling into useful 
action, by pecuniary and honorary rewards, the latent energies of our 
rural population. 
“The arts,” says Sir John Herschell, “cannot be perfected, till their 
whole processes are laid open, and their language simplified and ren¬ 
dered universally intelligible. Art is the application of knowledge to 
a practical end. If the knowledge be merely accumulated experience, 
the art is empirical; but if it be experience reasoned upon and brought 
under general principles, it assumes a higher character, an^ becomes 
a scientific art. In the progress of mankind from barbarism to civi¬ 
lized life, the arts necessarily precede science. Application comes 
later; the arts continue slowly progressive, but their realm remains sepa¬ 
rated from that of science by a wide gulf, which can only be passed by 
a powerful spring. They form their own language, and their own con¬ 
ventions, which none but artists can understand. The whole tendency 
of empirical art is to bury itself in technicalities, and to place its pride 
in particular short cuts and mysteries know only to adepts; to surprise 
and astonish by results, but conceal processes. The character of sci¬ 
ence is the direct contrary. It delights to lay itself open to inquiry; 
and is not satisfied with its conclusions till it can make the road to them 
broad and beaten : and in its applications it preserves the same charac¬ 
ter; its whole aim being to strip away all technical mystery, to illumi¬ 
nate every daik recess, and to gain free access to all processes, with a 
view to improve them on rational principles.” 
The measures we have proposed are not untried experiments, or of 
doubtful tendency. They have been adopted by governments,, which 
we are taught to consider less friendly to, and less interested in, the ge¬ 
neral diffusion of knowledge, than our own, and the results have justi¬ 
fied the experiment. The British government has caused agricultural 
surveys to be made of every county in the kingdom, and published these 
surveys, comprising fifty or sixty volumes, for the benefit of her agri¬ 
culture. The French government has had collected and published, un¬ 
der the supervision of her minister of the interior, the agricultural 
works of her most enlightened citizens. She is now, through her Cen¬ 
tral Agricultural Society, giving a new and remarkable impetus to im¬ 
provement in her agricultural labors. As an evidence of her zeal and 
liberality, and of her wisdom in calling forth useful competition, we are 
able to state, from documents in our possession, that she has offered to 
her farmers, for improvements in the beet culture, and in the domestic 
fabrication of sugar, alone, bounties to the amount of seven or eight 
thousand francs, or one thousand to fifteen hundred dollars. These 
premiums are to be awarded the coming spring. The effect of the com¬ 
petition which these bounties to skill and industry are calculated toex- 
citp, cannot fail to be greatly beneficial and abiding She has in a few 
years increased the products of sugar from her soil to 80,000,000 pounds; 
while her arable and stock husbandry have been immensely benefitted 
by the extension of her beet culture; and she is likely successfully to 
compete, ere long, in our own grain markets. 
The scramble for political power having for at least a time abated, 
and our means of improvement being now ample, the hope has been 
