From the days of the pilgrim-fathers to the days of our fathers, industry and education have gone hand in hand together. As population has increased so have schools been multiplied, and the higher seminaries of learning endowed and encouraged, while the fertile brain and the ever ready hand, have been constantly employed in providing the means to sustain these and other institutions for the general welfare, by adding continually to the wealth of the State and the ability of its citizens.

Hitherto the great diversity of pursuits demanding our attention commerce and navigation, the fisheries, manufactures, and the mechanic arts have presented a field so ample for labor, that every industrious man has been able to reap an abundant harvest, sufficient not only to supply his own wants, but leaving a surplus in his hands to be disposed of for the public good; and it is because of the prolific returns from these pursuits that the most reliable source of wealth, in this and in every country, has been too much overlooked and neglected.

That source of wealth is AGRICULTURE. To say that we have made no progress in this direction would be untrue, but it is true that our advance in it is very moderate when compared with what has been done in other pursuits. In navigation our forefathers performed a wonderful exploit, when they built that first little shallop, "The Blessing of the Bay," to cruise between Plymouth and Boston; but now, our stately ships, unsurpassed in workmanship, beauty, burthen, strength, and all good qualities, navigate not only the Bay of Massachusetts, but carry the flag of freedom to distant oceans and make themselves familiar things in all parts of the world. Our whale-fishery, once confined to a few boats from Nantucket, scarce venturing where land could not be seen, now employs a magnificent fleet of well appointed ships which scour the great Pacific from Cape Horn to the frozen regions of the South, defying all competition, and bringing home millions of wealth annually. Our Fisheries have increased in like manner, and the banks of Newfoundland, the Bay of Chaleur, and every bank and bay in the Atlantic Ocean where fish resort, are as familiar to our numerous and hardy fishermen as their own homes. Our Commerce, timidly commenced with a small schooner laden with Yankee notions, such as lumber, fish, and onions, for the West Indies, now spreads to every port in the world near and far; there is not a port where traffic is permitted, but is visited by Massachusetts ships, and known to Massachusetts merchants. Our manufactures, once confined to the spinning wheel and the house loom, have become the stay and the staff of thousands and tens of thousands of our people, whose great skill and industry have enabled them to distance competitors and to obtain a reasonable reward for their labor.

If we could hope always to retain our superiority in these pursuits, we might go on neglecting our own soil, and bartering the products of our labor for the bread of other lands. But it may not be. What is profitable to us, if pursued with the same skill and industry, will be equally so to others. Rivals we shall have competitors in all things our equals, and in manufacturing especially, the victory will finally rest with those who can obtain the raw materials cheapest. Already our sister States of the South, instead of exhausting their breath in vituperations against the protected manufactures of the North, are following our example. In Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee and Alabama, manufactories are daily springing up, and even in South Carolina, is a large and flourishing establishment for turning the cotton which grows on the land into cloth to be worn on the spot. For a time our superior skill, greater capital, and indomitable perseverance will give us great advantages over these beginners, but even these will have to give way at last before cheaper material, cheaper food, cheaper labor, and a market for their goods at their own doors. Our extended whale fishery is becoming yearly more precarious and more dangerous; it has reached its maximum, and in all probability will soon begin to decline. Our cod and mackerel fishermen have found a powerful rival in the people of Nova Scotia, who have this great advantage over us, that they can catch the fish in their own harbors without employing costly vessels expensively fitted, as we are obliged to do.

The day is coming then, when our present great resources will be narrowed down; when the profit on our present employment will be curtailed; when the knowledge imparted under our existing system of education will be insufficient to enable Massachusetts men, on Massachusetts soil, so to dispose of their labor as to earn, as they now can, a surplus beyond the supply of their reasonable wants: when our children, it is to be feared, will be kept from school and compelled to labor for physical instead of intellectual food; when the brightest and best, the most intelligent and enterprising of our citizens will seek relief in expatriation. If there is any fear of such a result and who that takes a broad and impartial view of the subject will say there is not? then it becomes us to examine well our own resources, to see what of them are neglected, and to adopt the means, if means there be, to avoid the threatening evil.

And have we not one great resource left; neglected hitherto, and therefore presenting the more room for improvement now? With proper cultivation the SOIL of Massachusetts will maintain in competence double the number of her present population; and as every tiller of the soil adds one to the consumers

of all other productions, so will the thrifty increase of our rural population give employment and strength to every other pursuit. But our present system of education does nothing for this great interest; it has not shed the first ray of the light of science upon agriculture, and our farmers know but little more of the nature of the ground they cultivate, of the best means and appliances to make it productive, than their fathers knew a century since. We educate our children for every other pursuit in life but this; commerce, manufactures, mechanic arts, the learned professions to all these the door is open free and wide, but where in Massachusetts shall a child go to learn the science of agriculture. In Europe an acre of land scientifically cultivated, will well support a man; what will it do under our cultivation? And why shall Massachusetts, the successful rival of the old world in all other of the industrial arts, be so much behind in this, the most important of all.

And yet, neglected as it has been, agriculture, even here and now, is the most certainly productive of all our pursuits. It is said, and facts are recorded to bear out the assertion, that nine out of ten who embark in commercial affairs are unsuccessful, while of those who follow agriculture about the same proportion do well. And if this be true now, how much more probable still would be the comparison if agriculture were to have the aid of science, and if equal talents, intelligence and education were employed in it.

But the gains of agriculture, though certain, are slow; it holds out no brilliant prospects; no hopes of a fortune to be made in a few years; no wealth to be created out of a single bold speculation. It has, moreover, no scientific attractions; it has not been presented as a science or pursued as a science. The man of enterprise, and the lover of science are equally taught to shun it, as too slow and unyielding for the one, too barren of results for the other.

All that Massachusetts has yet done for agriculture is to be found in bounties paid for a few years on the production of wheat and silk, and annual donations of a few thousand dollars to county agricultural societies; in the one case stimulating for a time the culture of articles not the best adapted to our soil and climate, in the other holding out trifling rewards for superior specimens of crops, the result of meritorious but isolated experiments, and for the most part unattended by any explanation of means or appliances which can be of general benefit. We want something more than and beyond this; we want something that in a great degree will supersede these experiments. Pour water upon the top of a hill and its whole surface may be improved and rendered productive; pour the same water at the base and it will have no effect upon the fields above. We want

institutions which will commence operations in the right place by instructing children in agriculture as well as in all the arts and sciences which are useful in that pursuit; whigh shall furnish such an education that a young man who has acquired it may be able to cultivate his land to the best advantage at once, instead of wasting the best years of his life on hap-hazard experiments which have no scientific base, and are quite as likely to end in failure as success. We want institutions which will tend to direct enterprise, energy and genius to the cultivation of the soil, instead of turning the possessors of these faculties and quali ties to any other pursuit in preference.

It is a mistake, a very fatal mistake, to suppose that any man with any sort of an education, or with none at all, may be a farmer. Any man, it is true, can perform the ordinary labor of a farm, so he can dig the earth for silver or gold; but he wants something more than physical power, in either case, to command success. Any man may become an accomplished mineralogist under our present system of education; he may be so instructed in that science that he will never throw away his labor in searching for gold where gold never was, but in the ten thousand times more important science of agriculture where shall he go to get one ray of light? Where shall he go to obtain such instruction as will enable him to labor without loss?

It is no part of the writer's present purpose to propose a plan for, but simply to call attention to the necessity of agricultural education, as to a matter of the highest importance which has been too long neglected. It is worthy of serious attention, not only from farmers, but from men of all pursuits who desire to sustain our Commonwealth in her present commanding position. We have able, intellegent ministers, physicians, lawyers, merchants, mechanics-and the means of producing more in abundance; let us add to them intelligent, energetic, scientific farmers, and then-not before-shall we have imparted the full benefits of education to all our citizens. Then, and not before, shall we have paid to our children the full value of the legacy left to us for transmission by our fathers.

THINK OF THE FUTURE-Said an ancient Sculptor, when asked how he could bestow such untiring labor upon a block of mere marble, "I work for eternity." Does any one ask the Teacher how he can labor on with patience and hope amid so many impediments, he may reply, with more truth than did that noble artist, "I work for eternity." Mounds of earth and mo::uments of marble shall pass away; but impressions made upon the deathless spirit, like scars upon the oak, become a part of itself, and abide forever.

POLITICAL ECONOMY.

WE hope that our readers will not be alarmed.

We are not about to enter the field of politics, but merely to discourse a while upon a Science which is but little and should be better understood.

Political

or as Mr. Colton well calls it - Public economy, is a Science; and on a proper understanding of it depends vastly more than may be thought at first sight- not only our prosperity as a people, but the success of all education for competence among the masses is essential to such success, and it is the part of this economy to show how that competence shall be attained.

This Science is taught rather, we should say, professed to be taught, in some of our higher seminaries; but it is not too much to assert, that the teachers themselves do not possess the knowledge which they profess to impart, and hence it follows that the learners gain but little benefit from their efforts. A work of some value on this subject, has recently been published by Judge Phillips, of Boston, and the learned author says in his preface: "It has not happened to me in thus devoting my attention more particularly to these inquiries, as it did some thirty years ago. Being then imbued with that economical creed which is taught in our public seminaries, I had occasion to attempt its vindication against the aggressions then supposed to be made on commerce by the useful arts, through protective legislation; and I had the good fortune, or misfortune, on investigating the subject anew, to convert myself to the opinions I had undertaken to combat." He made the discovery that all he had been taught was wrong- that it "consisted very much of groundless postulate and sophistry." But he did not discover, or if he did, he does not mention it, why this erroneous system was introduced and continues to exist.

In this Science, as in other Sciences, we look for light to the great minds of the old world. We import and study the works of the most celebrated authors of Europe, and we feel safe in adopting their conclusions. We forget, or overlook, the most important element in the case, which lies right in our path, and must be carefully examined before we make the first step: we forget that we are not a part of the old world—that our people, our government, our social system are "sui generis." We leave out of sight especially, the important fact that labor in this country is twice as valuable as it is in Europe; that whatever tends to keep up this difference is the true policy for us, and that whatever tends to depress the value of our labor to old World prices, is the wrong policy for us. If our people were obliged to work for