V. / 
272 WISCONSIN STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
or ministers a gratification to a pure and healthy taste, cannot 
be fitly called unproductive. 
Still less properly can the term be applied to professional 
labor generally. It is a very common notion which has been 
encouraged by some who would be esteemed philosophical 
writers on the subject, that the manual labor of the farmer, 
the carpenter, the cotton manufacturer, &c., is productive; but 
some are disposed to set down the mental labor of the doctor, 
the lawyer, the editor, the teacher, the legislator, &c., as un¬ 
productive. But the real difference is only that the labor of 
the latter class is directed in a general way to favor the essen¬ 
tial conditions of effective labor universally. It is expended on 
the human beings individually and their social state to fit them 
for labor, to protect them in their labor and to gratify and ex¬ 
pand the wants which are to be satisfied, by the fruits of labor. 
So long as physical health, intelligence, morality, security un¬ 
der good government and just laws, justly administered, and 
social refinement and good feeling are essential conditions of 
successful industry, all labor of the kind referred to must be 
set down as indirectly productive, nor is labor in this form fur¬ 
ther removed from, or less essential to the ultimate result than 
is the labor of the miner in the ore-bed, with reference to the 
needle and the comfort of the coat made by its use. I have 
seen a pictorial sheet, the prominent object in which is a far¬ 
mer, standing in the center, while around him in the margin, 
appear representatives of half a dozen different professions. 
The lawyer says, “ I plead for all,” the merchant, “ I trade for 
all,” the clergyman, “ I pray for all,” the soldier, “ I fight for 
all,” the railway manager “ I carry for all,” and the physician, 
“ I prescribe for all.” But in letters of double size, the farmer 
is made to say with emphasis, “ I pay for all.” 
Now I suppose this picture fitly represents the current pop¬ 
ular notion on the subject. But according to the views just 
expressed, the notion is false. None can deny that agricultu¬ 
ral labor lies at the foundation of human society, at the begin¬ 
ning of human industry, because it is busy producing the 
necessaries of life. For that very reason it is sustained, stim- 
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