NEGLECT OF THE LEADING INDUSTRY.
MEN are suffering for the necessaries of life because the prime industry, the cultivation of the land, is neglected. The products of the soil, which supply all of man's necessities, may everywhere be procured by the most healthful of all employments—labor in the open air, on the surface of the ground. Yet men neglect or forsake that which God designed for their sure support, and dig down in dingy mines for uncertain treasure, or house themselves in close apartments to rack their brains over schemes to overreach their fellow-men through dishonest speculations or extortion in trade. The bad business policy of the whole race is aptly set forth by a writer named G. H. Simons, as follows:— The histories of past generations are ashamed by the heritage of worn and wasted fields. If these fields had been tilled with care and wisdom they would have been like gardens. For six thousand years man has been tilling the soil, and yet the sons of earth are hungry; the flax and cotton from the rich valleys have been gathered, yet the naked are not clothed; the hills have been robbed of their forests, yet many are homeless; and taking the iron from about earth's heart, iron prison bars have been made for its free men, and chains for its slaves. This neglect of the industry that of necessity must support all others, is not only manifest among the masses, but the legislative and executive departments of government show the same disregard of the interests pertaining to soil cultivation. Hon. Walter P. Brownlow, member of Congress, from Tennessee, has introduced a bill providing for an appropriation of $24,000,000 to be apportioned to the different States for the encouragement of good wagon roads. In support of the measure he represents that it is mainly for the benefit of the farmers. He also gives some items showing how the government has assisted other interests to the prejudice of the tillers of the land. For instance, in ten years the appropriation for rivers and harbors has been $176,226,934. This is distributed in localities, according to political influence, and for the benefit of shipping and commercial interests. Millions and millions are spent to improve cities by erecting costly buildings at expense about double what it would cost private individuals to build the same. The government has given 197,000,000 acres of land to railroads, and to the Central and Union Pacific companies it gave $61,000,000 in bonds, besides large amounts to other roads. Now with all these (and many more) aids to every other interest, is the farming interest in any way protected?—No; instead of the producers of earth's products being benefited in any way, the interests already helped so liberally, use these facilities for preying on the farmers rather than for assisting them. Of all the business enterprises of the country, the tillers of the soil form the one class that can not set the price of their products. For what the farmer buys he must pay what is asked; for what he sells he must take what is offered. He has no prerogative either way, as in other industries. In rating the prosperity of the country, the standard is always the profits of the railroads and great manufacturers, yet these profits are, largely at the expense of the agricultural classes. Man has made a sorry failure of managing the heritage that God gave him in the beginning. Through greed and waste and neglect, earth's resources are diminishing; the masses are becoming impoverished for the benefit of the few. And it has all come about by the exercise of human wisdom, a wisdom inspired by the great deceiver, whose aim is destruction. Men have not only turned from the wisdom of God available for the proper use of the products of earth, but the masses are neglecting or rejecting the overtures of mercy by which they might secure homes in the earth, as it will be restored to its Eden beauty and fruitfulness, and wherein righteousness will reign supreme. Surely "the wisdom of man is foolishness," and it is being demonstrated more and more as he runs his downward career.