have far greater results than would come from
her efforts if expended in the average city. The farm home too has
latent capacities that are yet to be developed. It ought to be the ideal
home and, in many cases, it is. But there are not enough of such ideal
homes in the country. No college woman with a desire to do her full
service in the world ought for an instant to despise the chance for
service as it exists on the farm.

All of these opportunities so briefly suggested might be enlarged upon
almost indefinitely, but the mere mention of them emphasizes the call
for this service and this leadership. Nowhere are leaders more needed
than in the country. The country has been robbed of many of its
strongest and best. The city and perhaps the nation are gainers: but the
country has suffered. From one point of view, the future of our farming
communities depends upon the quality of leadership that we are to find
there during the next generation.

So we come back to our question, Can the farm be made to yield to the
man or woman, residing upon it and making a living from it, that measure
of growth and all-round development that the ambitious person wishes to
attain? And our answer is, Yes. In its work, its leisure, its field for
service, it may minister to sound culture. If you love the life and work
of the farm, do not hesitate to choose that occupation for fear of
becoming narrow or stunted. You can live there the full, free life. You
can grow to your full stature there. You can get culture from the corn
lot.

FOOTNOTE:

[2] Addressed to students in an agricultural college.

THE AGENCIES OF PROGRESS

CHAPTER VI

EDUCATION FOR THE FARMER

The two generations living subsequent to the year 1875 are to be
witnesses of an era in American history that will be known as the age of
industrial education. These years are to be the boundaries of a period
when the general principle that every individual shall be properly
trained for his or her occupation in life is to receive its practical
application. Future generations will doubtless extend marvelously the
limits to which the principle can be pushed in its ministrations to
human endeavor, but we are in the time when the principle is first to
receive general acceptation and is to be regarded as a fundamentally
necessary fact of human progress.

We are already "witnesses of the light." Even within the memory of young
men has it come to pass that the old wine ski