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INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITIES 
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I.IVA                 BY  J. B. TURNER,                        U
CHIAIRMAN OF THE COMMITTEE.
JACKSONVILLE:
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Please Read and Circulate.
INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITIES
FOR THE PEOPLE.
PUBLISHED IN COMPLIANCE WITH RESOLUTIONS OF
THE CHICAGO AND SPRINGFIELD CONVENTIONS.
AND UNDER THE
INDUSTRIAL LEAGUE
OF ILLINOIS.
BY J. B. TURNER,
CHAIRMAN OF THILE COMMITTEE.
JA CKSONVILLE:'PRINTED AT THE MORGAN JOURNAL BOOK AXD JOB OFFIt4%








PREFACE.
The reasons for proffering this pamphlet to the public will be found in the
proceedings of the INDUSTRIAL CONVENTIONS, held at Chicago in 1852, and in
Springfield, 1853. But while the author has endeavored to comply with the general wish expressed by these conventions, and the Directors of the ILLINOIS INDUSTRIAL LEAGUE, it should not be inferred that any friends of those conventions or of the League are responsible for the particular statements or sentiments
herein expressed. In all these incidental matters, the author alone is responsible,
as it was found impracticable before publication to secure even a revision by the
committee, which, had it been possible, was greatly to be desired,
It will also, be readily seen that it is no part of the design of this work, to notice the many and great improvements and excellencies in our existing systems of
education, but rather to call attention to their remaining defects and urge these.
as a reason for immediate effort and action in the direction indicated.
For a plan of action the reader will please refer to the close of the pamphlet.








INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
The progress which the people of the United States, and especially of our own State, are continually making on the great subject of education, must be gratifying to every patriotic and philanthropic mipl.,
This progress relates to the ENDS, INSTRUMENTALITIES, and
MODES of all mental and moral culture, and is most apparent in
tilhe condition of our best Common Schools-at once the pride and
hope of our country.
The END of all education should be the development of a
TRUE MANHOOD, or the natural, proportionate and healthful culture
and growth of all the powers and faculties of the human beingphysical, mental, moral and social; and any system which attempts
the exclusive, or even inordinate culture of any one class of these
faculties, will fail of its end-it will make mushrooms and monks,
rather than manhood and men. For similar reasons, any system
of education adapted to the exclusive or unequal and inordinate
culture of any one class or profession in the State, is defective:
it generates clans and castes, and breaks in upon that natural
order, equality and harmony which God has ordained. It will
oreate a concentration of intellectual power in the educated head
of the body politic-cold, crafty, selfish and treacherous, which
will sooner or later corrupt its heart-will exhaust and overlabor
and overtask its weak, uncultured and undeveloped, subordinate
powers and organs, and produce a bedlam rather than a kingdom
on earth-a despotism either of the tyrant, the church or the mob,
or of all these combined; not a government.
And this effect will inevitably follow, as sure as God lives and
reigns, eventhough a nation write its soil and sea over with parchment, declarations and manifestoes, and rend air and sky with
elamorousshouts of "Equality, Liberty and Fraternity."  "Be
not deceived: God is not mocked."  "That which a man soweth,
shall he also reap."
In former times not very remote from our own day, mere learning-book knowledge-scholasticism, was considered the great
end of education, and all such systems of culture direct the mind
too much towards books, and too little towards facts. The pupil
is taught to think of letters and words rather than of things and




3         ~INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
events-to remember on what part of the book page he saw [thb
form of words, better than he knows on what part of the world's
page, the events took-place, if at all. All the way along, from
a-b, ab, and long a in hate, and a seven years' war at spelling
up through spelling books, grammars and dictionaries, English:,
Latin and Greek, till he at las took his diploma, it was one everlasting agonism at verbiage, as though God, angels and menthe sky above and the earth beneath, were all moonshine; and
spelling, grammar, tallc —the prime proprieties of man's utter-:ance facile and precise-were the only realities in the universe.
A real grammar-school-boy of such schools, can *       no other
idea than that God made the world out of the nine parts of speech,
and in English, at least, spelled it all wrong.  And so throughout
the whole course, books, books, books, form the great staple and
instruments and ends of culture; and the living voice, speaking
of living facts and presenting living realities to the mind of the
pupil, but a very small part of it. By such methods the mind is
trained to undue deference to the authority of the book, with little
capacity to look after the fact-and men's opinions and usages,
instead of God's laws and ordinances govern the world: and generally, in those communities where this mere book learning is
most dominant, the minds of men are most depressed and enslaved
to tyrant custom. For example-compare Germany and England, and New England and Illinois. It engenders an undue
deference to mere learned authority, a spirit of effeminate timidity,
and pedantic servility, rather than one of true wisdom, true freedom, and true manhood, such as has shone in the prophets, apostles
and martyrs of every age.
It does not produce mind, but mere learning-not intelec.t,
but scholarship-not thinkers, but plausible and sophistical debaters; SCHOOLMEN, (as of old,) who can prove either side of any
proposition, but not real men who can discharge the hard side of
every single duty.
A proper remedy for such a state of things, wherever it may be
found, would, of course, consist in drawing our resources of culture,
less from books and the laws of verbiage, and more from facts
and the laws of God. Less from nature distorted into abstractions.
propositions, prisms and triangles, as seen in ordinary books, and
more from nature, as it comes all radiant and instinct with life,
beauty and glory from the Hand Divine. What a monstrosity was
that which some vears since took little boys and girls, not yet
seven years old, out of God's clear sunshine, away from the birds
and the breezes, the flowers and the trees, and set them, for six
hours -in the day, bolt upright on a wooden bench, to look at big




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                    7:cetters and triangles made of cotton rags and lampblack!!-and all
this, only to educate them!!!
Welli this absurdity has passed away; and all others similar to
it are fast departing.
But the great instrumentalities of education are-the FAMILY,
the SCHOOL, the CHURCH and the STATE; and in order to the best
results, it is indispensable that order, virtue, wisdom and freedom
should direct, pervade, enlighten and control each and all these
several departments of human culture with a simultaneous energy
and power.  The apostasy, or corruption, or perversion of any
one of these is sufficient to cripple and distort, if not to utterly
annihilate all the good that can be educed from the other three.
The vanity, selfishness, pride and vice of the household-the pedantry and folly of the school —the bigotry and superstition of the
church, or the tyranny and corruption of the State, are, each one
of them, adequate to pervert or destroy, in a single generation,
a;ll the real good of the other three, if, indeed, the phenomena of
the existence of such vices in either quarter, does not show a pre~vious latent corruption in all departments alike.  Hence, a watchful. care over all these interests alike, is as indispensable to the
proper education of our youth, as it is to their after security in life.
But in the narrow and pedantic view of the subject, schools of
literature and science are usually considered the great, if not the
Role instruments of education; and sometimes, in accordance with
this view, the brain or the mind, the mere intellectual powers of
man, are the only powers really sought to be educated.  Wherever
this fatal delusion prevails, the necessary result must be a monstrosity, not a manhood; a monk, rather than a man; and it will
ibe found, at last, to give the world pedants and pettifoggers for
priests and teachers, rowdies and robbers for rulers, and only old
vices under new  names, for all the abandoned and discarded
virtues of their forefathers.
This pedantic and shallow view of the subject of education, also
leads to another most fatal error in the minds of both the old and
the young. Instead of regarding education as the great lifelong process-the great life-business ot every human being here
n earth, it limits it to the quarter days of the school-room, and
valls even the most corrupt, effeminate, useless and senseless of
men, educated, if, forsooth, they have overmastered a certain
quantum of a prescribed course of mere book-learning, though
turned loose upon the world without either the capacity to take,are of themselves, or the disposition to leave the best interests of
their fellows untouched.*'Joaiah Holbrook, in the "National Era," of June 16th, states,'has "in oni




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
A  young boy or girl, under thisidea, obtains a smattering or
language, literature and science, perhaps, in the schools, and thein.
forsooth, as it is very pertinently and significantlyv said, "he has
finished his education."   It is, but too often, stricttly true;-it is
finished; and all true manhood  has, also, been crucified  in the
process. It is all ended with him, and you have before you your
plausible sophist,your accomplished idler,or your educated hirelinog
-another relentless donkey to hold back the great car of social
and moral progress, and bray at every new idea that dawns upon
the world for the good of man and the glory of God.
But motion-progress-is the law of matter and of mind; and
all civilization, all true christianity, all true education and all true
raanhood, are nothing else but one everlasting progress in true
knowledge, wisdom  and virtue.
It is obvious that the instruction of the schoolroom  should be
eolnstantly based upon this idea.  That it should aim  to put every
pupil in such a position that his whole life afterward may  be but
Orone continuous, natural and easy progress from one stage of
mental and moral development and power to another.  Nature's
order and God's law, when observed, is, that the child should become the youth, the youth the man, the man the angel; and so,
onward and upward forever-ever developing-ever progressing,
Seate's prison of our Union are twelve graduates of colleges-a greater proportion to the whole number of convicts in one prison, than the entire number of
college graduates in our country to the whole population. Every body knows,"
sa.s he, "that the most depraved beings in our country are among those upon
whorm most is expended for their education; and that thieves, midnight assassins
and incendiaries have come from our schools by hundreds and thousands."
If this is true, and other prisons show similar statistics, the whole number of
graduates of colleges in all the prisons, must exceed the relative proportion
furnished to the same honors by the industrial classes, many hundred per cent.
Does not this denote something wrong in our schemes for the mere culture of
the tongue and the brain? But suppose all who have been under the regimen of
this drill, but never graduated, were reported, the ratio would be even more
frightfully swollen, and we should find that no class of persons disgorge so great
art anual'perent into our prisons and almshouses and the drunkards ignoble
grave, as those who have attempted to seek a liberal education, while under our
more rational and practical common school system,in which practical knowledge
is sought in connexion with domestic duties and industrial pursuits, the facts are
esactly the reverse. Has a tree that bears such fruit,true christianity, or heathea
mythologv at its roots?  Is practical duty, or pedantic display,its life and its aim?
The fearful loss of life which these systems of monkish and distorted culture
annually produce,is well known to all. But the annals of the crimes and criminals
it has generated,.is a chapter in our history not yet fully developed.
Mr. Bramwell, an English writer and traveler, is reported to affirm that the
universities of Great Britain have contributed more to the pride, aristocracy, vice
and debauchery of the empire, and furnished more sots and penitentiary criminals,
is proportion to their numbers, than any other class in English society.
Did the schools of the Carpenter and fishermen of Gallilee, or even those,t
Socrates and Plato exhibit such results?
Will not the patrons and defenders of those systems of education answer?




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                    9
but never finished. A true process of education,therefore, can never
stop; it can never be either remitted or finished; and all systems of
scholastic learning constructed on that idea, are monkish, preposterous, delusive and false; and just so far forth, a curse instead of
a blessing to mankind, ever begetting a spirit of pedantic littleness,
frivolity and the supercilious pride of a conceited monk or an
India Brahman, instead of that brave, generous and steadfast
heroism that should characterize the true man.
It is self-evident that in order to reach this end, and to avoid
these antagonistic evils, our systems of public instruction shoul(
all have due reference to the varied employments of men in after
life; so that each class may be placed in a position which shall
enable them to develop a LITERATURE OF THEIR OWN, and acquire
a mental as well as moral discipline, in connection with their own
occupations, interests and pursuits.  In other words, the effort
should be to make each man an intelligent, thinking man, in his.
own profession in life, rather than out of it; to teach him, first,
to understand his own business rather than other people's. Then
he will be better able to govern and take care of himself, and need
less expenditure from the State and the church in controlling and
taking care of him.
This principle has, in theory, become fully recognized, and
applied with more or less perfection to some four or five of the
varied pursuits of men, and obviously, ought to be applied in the
same way and on the same principle to them all.
The divines, the lawyers, the physicians, the teachers, and themilitary men of our country, each and all, have their specific
schools, libraries,apparatus and universities. forthe application of
all known forms of knowledge to their several professions in life.
Hence the surprising intelligence and power which these classes
now exhibit, since the founding of universities and schools for their
special uses, compared with that manifested by the same classes
-in the times!of the.monks, barons, quacks, schoolmen and crusa-.
tlers of the middle ages.  Hence the eloquence and power of our
pulpits, and our courts and senates-the efficiency of our medical.
and military skill.
It is true that the laws of God are everywhere, and to all persons.
and classes, the same; and that all science is based upon these
uniform laws; but it is equally true that their application to the
pursuits of life, and the consequent natural discipline and devel-.
opment of mind is infinitely various.
No man, in his senses, imagines if all our divines had beeun
trained at West Point, all our lawyers, physicians and generals
at Mount Holyoke or Andover or Princeton, that.there would have




i 0                INDUSTRIAL EDUCATIO6.
been either the same energy of effort and success, or the same discipline of mind in these professions that now exist.. Skill,and a proper
knowledge of the laws of projectiles —the chainshot and the bombshell will hardly make a divine; and adroitness with the dishcloth
or with the folios of the fathers, would scarcely have achieved the
conquest of the empire of the Montezurmas.
So far forth as discipline of mind is concerned, all know that
the greater part of it is procured in all these professions, not at
their several schools, however excellent and appropriate in themselves, but by the continued habits of reading, thought and reflection, IN CONNECTION WITH THEIR SEVERAL PROFESSIONAL PURSUITS
IN AFTER LIFE; and if not so acquired, it is never, in fact, acquired at all.
The young graduate from all these schools, alike, is generally
pronounced green, raw, undisciplined and sophomorical, and shows
himself to be so.  But his university or his school has done one
thing for him of immense value and importance, and only one: it
has neither duly informed, nor disciplined his mind, as is sometimes pretended; but IT HAS SHOWN HIM HOW THAT MIND CAN BE
J)ISCIPLINED, IN CONNECTION WITH THE PROFESSIONAL PURSUITS OF
HIIS AFTER LIFE, if he will attend to it  but if not, it cannot be.
This is the most that universities or schools of any sort can, as a
general rule, do for any man; they give him  a start in that course,'which, in after life, he is to pursue. To this end, the peculiar
literature appropriate to each of these professions, is quite as important as the universities and schools which created it: for as
a general rule, men will not read and reflect on subjects totally
disconnected with their daily duties and interests, so as to derive
that needful discipline of mind, from other pursuits, which nature
teaches should be derived from their own.-Sorne few minds, it is
true, in all professions, have an appetency for universal knowledge,
just as some men seem to have skill in universal art, but the great
majority of men obtain all the real discipline and development of'
mind which they ever do obtain, in immediate connexion with
their own individual pursuits and duties in life, and not outside
df these.
The sun which they see, is only the one which lightens their own'world; and from this, alone, the light of life must come to them,
if it come at all: all beyond is, to them, starlight, and must remain so till they quit their present sphere of action and duty.
Now, our industrial elasses, although much more numerous than
all the others combined, are, to a vast extent, to say the least,:alone, of all others, left entirely without the indispensable means
of applying this same knowledge or science to their several p-or



UINDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                  11
-suits, to teach them, also, how to read, observe and think, and'act so as to derive this same needful and wholesome mental discipline from their pursuits in life, which the professional and military classes are taught to derive from  theirs.  Of course, thev
-are also equally destitute of the needful literature for such ends,
and must, of necessity, remain so, till universities are endowed for
(creating it in the same way it has been created for others.  They
are all, in this country now, so far as appropriate educational and
scientific privileges are concerned, where the professional and imil-;itary classes, themselves, were, in the days of the monks and
schoolmen, with no appropriate schools, apparatus, or teachers,
or literature suited to the proper application of knowledge to their
several pursuits and callings.
Is it said that farmers and mechanics do not and will not read?
Give them a literature and an education then, suited to their
actual wants, and see if it does not reform and improve them in
this respect, as it has done their brethren in the professional
classes.  As a matter of fact, all know they now have no such
practical, congenial literature to read; and still, as a general rule
they read more, and know more about the proper pursuits of the
professional classes, than those classes do about theirs, in proportion to the opportunities they have.
Suppose you should supply the libraries of the divine and the
4awyer with practical treatises on the raising of crops,the resuscitation and improvement of soils, and the management of stock, or the
-navigation of the polar seas, instead of books treating of the
peculiar nature and duties of his own profession, does any, man
suppose that these professions would exhibit the same love of read-,ng and study, or attain the same mental discipline which they
now do?  The idea is absurd.
Give a divine or a lawyer a book on agriculture, and how soon'it is thrown aside! And is it surprising that the farmer and mechanic treats other books on the same principle, and in the same
way, for the same reason?  But how greedily they devour, in all,our periodicals and pamphlets the few scraps that directly pertain
to their own interests, and how soon new implements of life and
power start up from  their practical and  creative minds out of.every new idea in philosophy that dawns upon the race and
claims its place in the crystal palaces, and its reward at the industrial fairs of the world? And are such minds on this great continent to be longer left, by the million, without a single university or school of any sort, adapted to the peculiar wants of their
craft, while the whole energies of the republic are taxed to the
utmost to furnish universities, colleges and schools adapted to the




2  INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
wants of the professional and military classes, who constitute not
the one hundredth part of the population, and represent not the
thousandth part of the vital interests of any civilized and well ordered community?
Are these pursuits,then,benca.th the dignity of rational and accountable man? G-od, himself,made the first Adam a gardner or farmer.
and kept him so till he fell from hi his high estate. The second Adam..
sent to repair the ruin of this fall, he made a poor mechanic called
"the son of a carpenter," who chose all his personal followers front
the same humble class. Deity has pronounced his opinion on the
dignity and value of these pursuits, by the repeated acts of his wisdom and grace, as well as by the inflexible laws of his providence
compelling industrial labor as the only means of preserving health
of body, vigor, purity of mind and even life itself.
Where did Socrates, the wisest of the Greeks, and Cincinnatus.
the most illustrious of the Romans-Washington, the father of
America, and Franklin, and Sherman, and KIossuth, and Downing, and Hugh Miller, and a whole host of worthies, too' numerous
to mention, get their education?  They derived it from their connexion with the practical pursuits of life,where all other men have
got theirs, so far forth as it has proved of any practical use to
themselves or the world.
What we want from schools is, to teach men, more dull of apprehension, to derive their mental and moral strengh, from their
own pursuits, whatever they are, in the same way, and on the
same principles, and to gather from other sources as much more
as they find time to achieve. We wish to teach them to read books,
only that they may the better read and understand the great volume of nature, ever open before them.
Can, then, no schools and no literature, suited to the peculiar
wants of the industrial classes,be created by the application of
science to their pursuits? HIas God so made the world,that peculiar.schools,peculiar applications of science,and a peculiar resultant literature are found indispensable to the highest success in the art of killing men, in all states, while nothing of the kind can be based on theinfinitely multifarious arts and processes of feeding, clothing and
housing them?  Are there no sufficient materials of knowledge,
and of the highest mental and moral discipline in immediate colnexion with these pursuits?  This is to suppose that God has
condemned the vast majority of mankind to live in circumstances
in which the best and highest development of their noblest faculties is a sheer impossibility, unless they turn aside from those
spheres of duty to which his Providence has evidently consigned
them.  Such an assumption is as pedantic and shallow  as it is,




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                1
wicked and blasphemous.  For what, but for this very end of intellectual discipline and development, has God bound the daily
labors of all these sons of toil in the shop and on the farm, in
close and incessant contact with all the mighty mysteries of his
own creative wisdom, as displayed in heaven above, and on earth
beneath, and in the waters and soils that are under the earth?
Why are there more recondite and profound principles of pure
mathematics immediately connected with the sailing of a ship, or
the moulding and driving of a plow, or an axe, or a jack-plane,
than with all three of the, so called, learned professions together,
if it be not intended that those engaged in these pursuits should
derivemental culture as well as bodily sustenance and strength
from these instruments of their, art and their toil?  Why has God
linked the light, the dew drop, the clouds, the sunshine and the
storm, and concentrated the mighty powers of the earth, the ocean
and the sky, directed by that unknown and mysterious force which
rolls the spheres, and arms the thunder-cloud-why are all these
mystic and potent influences connected with the growing of every
plant, and the opening of every flower, the- motion of every engine
and every implement, if he did not intend that each son and daughter of Adam's race should learn through the handicraft of their
daily toil, to look through nature up to nature's God, trace his
deep designs, and derive their daily mental and moral culture, as
well as their daily food, from that toil that is ever encircled and
circumscribed on all hands, by the unfathomed energies of his
wisdom and his power?  No foundation for the development and
culture of a high order of science and literature, and the noblest
capacities of mind, heart and soul, in connexion with the daily
employments of the industrial classes! How came such a heathenish and apostate idea ever to get abroad in the world?  Was
God mistaken when he first placed Adam in the garden, instead
of the academy? or when he sentenced him to toll for his future
salvation, instead of giving him over to abstract contemplation?
when he made his Son a carpenter instead of a rabbi?  Or when
ke made man a man instead of a monk.?  No: God's ways are
ever, ways of wisdom and truth; but Satan has, in all ages, continued to put darkness for light —sophistry and cant;for knowledge
and truth-cunning and verbiage,for wisdom and virtue - tyranny
and outrage, for government and law-and to fill the world with
brute muscles and bones, in one class —luxurious, insolent and
useless nerves and brains, in another class, without either bodies
or souls, and to call the process by which the result, in the latter
ease, is reached, education. And from the possibility of such
an education as this, God has, in his mercy, hitherto sheltered his




14                 INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION..
defenseless poor, And if such hot-bed processes are,.alone, to be.
dignified with. the name of education, then, it is clearly impossibIe,
that the laboring, classes should ever- be educated: God has inter —
dicted it.  Or, even if no other system of education is ever to be
devised or attempted, except that alone which is most fit for the
professional and" the military man, it is equally clear that this
cannot be made available to any considerable portion of the in —
dustrial classes..
But the idea, has got abroad; in the world, that some practical,
liberal system of education for the industrial classes, suited at
once to their circumstances and their wants, can be devised, and
this idea is not likely soon to be stopped; it seems to work beneath
the surface of human thought with the energy of a volcanic fire,
and we think it will soon burst forth, into an out-birth to purify
what is goods and overwhelm and annihilate whatever there may
be that is evil in our present educational ideas and processes.
In order to: excite a proper interest in this department of education, the public are already aware that several conventions
have been held in this State.
The first convention, was held at Granville,. Putnam  County,
November 18th, 1851.
The report of this convention was, in due time, published by
the committee, and presented to the public. It has since been.
reprinted, and commented upon-in nearly all the leading agricultural and horticultural journals of the several States, and especially those of the North and West.  It was also copied into the
patent office reports at Washington, and has received the favorable regard of nearly all the leading minds in the agricultural and
mechanical classes, and their associations and institutes throughout the Union. While great numbers of addresses, resolutions, reports, and newspaper and periodical articles-all aiming to elucid
date the same general idea, have been presented to the public, in
all parts of the Union, showing: that this is the great felt want of the
mind and heart of the nation.
This report was as follows:




PROCEEDINGS'
OF THE
FA RMERS' CONVENTION AT GRANVILLE"
Held November 18, 1851.
In accordance with previous notice, a convention of farmers wa's
held at Granville, Putnam county, on Tuesday the 18th day of
November, 1851.  The attendance was quite large, and fromn.
various parts of the State.
The convention organized by appointing Hon. Oaks Turner, of
Hennepin, Chairman pro temrn., and Mr. M. Osman, of Ottawa,
Secretary pro tem.
Mr. Ralph Ware moved that a committee of three be appointed
by the chair to nominate permanent officers for the convention:
which was agreed to; whereupon the chair appointed Messrs. RalpLh
Ware, John Hise and Sidney Pulsifer said committee.
The committee, after a few minutes absence, returned and reported the following persons as permanent officers of the convention:i
Hon. Oaks Turner, President.
Hon. Wm. Reddick, of Ottawa, and Prof. J..B. Turner, of,
Jacksonville, Vice Presidents.
Mr.-M. Osman, Recording Secretary.
Mr. Ralph Ware, of Granville, Corresponding- Secretary.
On motion the report was adopted and the committee discharged.
The President then stated that he was not fully advised as to
the real objects of the convention, and suggested that some one
better qualified should make them known.
Mr. Ware then stated that,' according to the call, they had met
to take into consideration such measures as might be deemed most
expedient to further the interests of the agricultural community,
and particularly to take steps towards the establishment of an
Agricultural University.
On motion of Mr. Greble, a committee of three was appointed
to report business upon which the convention should act. The
committee consisted of Mr. John Gireble, Prof. J. B. Turner, and
Mr. Lewis Weston.
During the absence of this committee, short addresses were delivered by Messrs, Hise, Greble, Ware and others.




V6                  INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
The committee returned and stated that they would not be fully
-prepared to report before evening; and suggested that the afternoon be devoted to a general discussion of such subjects, pertaiaing to agriculture, as might present themselves.
A lively discussion was then commenced on various subjects, in
which Powell, of Mt. Palatine, Butler, of SpoonRiver, Greble, of
Putnam co., Weston, of La Salle co., Gilmer, of Granville, Reddick, of Ottawa, and others participated.
After which the convention adjourned until half past six o'clock
in the evening.
EVENING SESSION.
The convention was called to order by the chairman.
Prof. Turner, as chairman of the Committee on Business, reportfed the following resolutions for the future -action of the convention:
Resolved, That we greatly rejoice in the degree of perfection
tq-whicr-our various institutions, for the education of our brethren
engaged in professional, scientific, and literary pursuits, have
already attained, and in the mental and moral elevation which
those institutions have given them, and their consequent preparation and capacity for the great duties in the spheres of life in
which they are engaged; and that we will aid in all ways consistent, for the still greater perfection of such institutions.
Resolved, That as the representatives of the industrial classes,
including all cultivators of the soil, artisans, mechanics and merchants, we desire the same privileges and advantages for ourselves,
our fellows and our posterity, in each of our several pursuits and
callings, as our professional brethren enjoy in theirs; and we
admit that it is our own fault that we do not also enjoy them.
Resolved, That, in our opinion, the institutions originally and
primarily designed to meet the wants of the professional classes
as such, cannot, in the nature of things, meet ours, no more than
the institutions we desire to establish for ourselves could meet
tleirs.  Therefore,
Resolved, That we take immediate measures for the establishment of a University, in the State of Illinois, expressly to meet
those felt wants of each and all the industrial classes of our State;
that we recommend the foundation of high schools, lyceums, institutes, &c., in each of our counties, on similar principles, so soon
as they may find it practicable so to do.
Resolved, That in our opinion such institutions can never
impede, but must greatly promote, the best interests of all those
existing institutions.
After reading the above resolutions, Prof. Turner proceeded,




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                17
in an able and interesting manner, to unfold- his plan for the establishment and- maintenance of the Industrial University.
The convention then adjourned till 9 o'clock to-morrow morning.
WEDNESDAY MORNING, Nov. 19.
Met pursuant to adjournment.
On motion, the resolutions were again taken up and read, and,
after some deliberation, severally adopted.
Mr. Hise offered the following resolutions:
Resolved, That we approve of the general plan for an Illinois
State University for the Industrial Classes, presented by Prof. J.
B. TURNER, and request him to furnish the outlines of his plan,
presented to this Convention, to the Committee of Publication, for
publication in the Prairie Farmer, and all other papers in thisState which will-publishthe same; and that one thousand copies be
published in pamphlet form for gratuitous distribution.
Resolved, That W. A. Pennell, M. Osman, L. L. Bullock and
Ralph Ware, be a Committee of Publication.
Resolved, That the Committee of Publication forward to each
editor in every county in the State a copy of the publications of
this convention, with a request that they should republish the same;
and, also, send a copy to our Governor, Senators and Representatives and State Officers, and to all others who may be interested
in the same.
Resolved, That each member of this convention do all in his
power to promote the circulation and reading of the above publications, and through this and other means,to secure, as far as practicable, speakers to lecture on the subject in each of the counties in
the State.
Resolved, ThatMessrs. J. B. Turner and Marcus Morton, of
Morgan county; James McConnell, Elijah Iles, and David L.
Gregg, of Sangamon co.; John Davis, of Decatur; John Woods,
of Quincy; John Hise, of La Salle, co.; Aaron Shaw, of Lawrence
co.; John Dougherty, of Union co.; L. S. Pennington, of Whiteside co.; W. J. Phelps, of Elm Wood, Peoria co.; and Dr. Ames,
of Winnebago co., be a Central Committee to call a State Conyention, to meet at Springfield at an early hour of the next session
of the Legislature, or at such other time and place as they and the
friends of the cause may deem most expedient.
Resolved, That this Convention earnestly solicit the Governor of
this State to enumerate in the call for an extra session of the
Legislature, should one be held before the next regular session, the
objects of this convention in the establishment of an Industrial
University, as business to be acted upon by that body at that time.




13 ~INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
Resolved, That a memorial and petitions be prepared and furnished by the publishing committee for the purpose of petitioningthe Legislature upon this subject.
D)uring the discussion of these resolutions. the Convention adjourned till 1 o'clock, P. M.
AFTERNOON SESSION..
Met pursuant to adjournment.
Mr. Hise's resolutions were again taken up and severally passed.
Mr. Lofflin introduced the following resolution,which was adopted:
Resolved, That we earnestly solicit the people of this State to
meet in their primary assemblies and discuss the objects of this
convention as shall be made known by our published proceedings,
andjoin with us in asking the Legislature to grant to.the people of
this State, the fund which belongs to them, to aid them in establishing an institute for the industrial classes of this State, instead
of dividing that fund among the different colleges, now in the
State, as contemplated by those institutions.
In compliancewith a request made by Mr. Thomas Ware, and.
others, Prof. Turner gave a short history of a number of experiments he had made in reference to the blight upon fruit trees.
The Convention then adjourned sine die.
M. OSMAN, Sea'y.             OAKS TURNER, Pres'lt




PLAN FOR AN INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY,
FOR THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.
To THE COMMITTEE OF PUBLICATION OF THE GRANVILLE CONVENTION:
GENTLEMEN:-I have endeavored to prepare an outline of my views of an
Industrial University for the State of Illinois, as perfect as the short time allowed me, and my own feeble health would permit. Notwithstanding my total
inability to do justice to the subject, I trust yourmay find it useful in directing
the mind of the people of this State to the most important interest ever proposed
for their consideration, and in eliciting from  them an early and intelligent expression of their views and wishes in regard to it.
I have the honor to be, gentlemen, most respectfully, yours,
JACKSONVILLE, November, 1851.                    J. B. TURNER.
All civilized society is, necessarily, divided into two distinct cooperative, not antagonistic, classes:-a small class, whose proper
business it is to teach the true principles of religion, law, medicine,
science, art, and literature; and a much larger class, who are engaged in some form  of labor in agriculture, commerce, and the
arts.  For the sake of convenience, we will designate the former
thoPROFCSSIONAL, and the latter the INDUSTRIAL class; not implying that each maiy not be equally  industrious: the one in their
intellectual, the other in their industrial pursuits. Probably, in no
case would society ever need more than five men out of one hundred
in the professional class, leaving ninety-five in every hundred in
the industrial; and, so long as so many of our ordinary teachers
and public men are taken from the industrial class, as there are
at present, and probably will be for generations to come, we do not
really need over one professional man for every hundred, leaving
ninety-nine in the industrial class.
The vast difference, in the practical means, of an APPROPRIATE
LIBERAL EDUCATION, suited to their wants and their destiny, which
these two classes enjoy, and ever have enjoyed the world over,
must have arrested the attention  of every thinking man.  True,
the. same general abstract science exists in the world for both classes
alike; but the means of bringing this abstract truth into effectual
contact-with the daily business and pursuits of the one class does
exist, while in the other case it does not exist, and never can till it
is new creat ed.
The one class have schools, seminaries, colleges, universities,




-  INDUSTRIAL EDZUCATIOTN 
apparatus, professors, and multitudinous appliances for educating
and training them for months and years, for the peculiar profession which is to be the business of their life; and they have already
created, each class for its own use, a vast and voluminous literature, that would well nigh sink a whole navy of ships.
But where are the universities, the apparatus, the professors,
and the literature, specifically adapted to any one of the industrial
classes? Echo answers, where? In other words, society has become, long since, wise enough to know that its TEACHERS need to
be educated; but it has not yet become wise enough to know that its
woR KERS  need education just as much.  In these remarks I have
not forgotten that our common schools are equally adapted and
applied to all classes; but reading, writing, &c., are, properly, no
mnore education than gathering seed is agriculture, or cutting shiptimber navigation.  They are the mere rudiments, as they are
called, or means, the mere instrument of an after education, and if
not so used they are, and can be' of little more use to the possessor
than an axe in the garret or a ship rotting upon the stocks.
Nor am I unmindful of the efforts of the monarchs and aristocrats of the old world in founding schools for the "fifteenth cousins" of their order, in hopes of training them into a sort of genteel
farmers, or rather overseers of farmers;,nor yet, of the several
"back fires" (as the Prairie Farmer significantly designates them)
set by some of our older professional institutions, to keep the rising
and blazing thought of the industrial masses from  burning too
furiously.  They have hauled a canoe alongside of their huge professional steamships and invited all the farmers and mechanics of
the State to jump on board and sail with them;. but the difficulty
is, they will not embark. But we thank them even for this pains
and courtesy.  It shows that their hearts are yearning toward us,
notwithstanding the ludicrous awkwardness of their first endeavors
to save us.
But an answer to two simple questions will perhaps sufficiently
indicate our ideas of the whole subject, though that answer, on the
present occasion, must necessarily be confined to a bare outline.
The first question, then, is this:
I.  WHAT DO TH.Z INDUSTRIAL CLASSES WANT?
II.  HOW CAN THAT WANT BE SUIFLIED?
The first question may be answered in few words.  They want,,and they ought to have, the same facilities for understanding the'true- philoophy-the science and the art of their several pursuits,
(their life-business, ) and of efficiently applying existing knowledge thereto and widening its domain, which the professional classes




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                 21
have long enjoyed in their pursuit. —Their first labor is therefore,
to supply a vacuum from fountains already full, and bring the
living waters of knowledge within their own reach.  Their second
is, to help fill the fountains with still greater supplies.  They desire to depress no institution, no class whatever; they only wish to
elevate themselves and their pursuits to a position in society to
which all men acknowledge they are justly entitled, and to which
they also desire to see them aspire.
II.  How THEN CAN THAT WANT BE SUPPLIED?
In answering this question, I shall endeavor to present, with all
possible frankness and clearness, the outline of impressions and
convictions that have been gradually deepening in my own mind,
for the past twenty years, and let them pass for whatever the true
friends of the cause may think them worth.
And I answer,first, negatively, that this want cannot be supplied
by any of the existing institutions for the professional classes, nor
by any incidental appendage attached to them as a mere secondary
department.
These institutions were designed and adapted to meet the wants
of the professional classes, as such —especially the clerical order;
and they are no more suited to the real wants of the industrial
class than the institution we propose for them, would be suited to
the.professional class.
Their whole spirit and aim is, or should be, literary and intellectual-not practical and industrial; to make men of books and
ready speech-not men of work, and industrial, silent thought.
But, the very best classical scholars are often the very worst practical reasoners; and that they should be made workers is contrary
to the nature of things-the fixed laws of God. The whole interest, business, and destiny for life of the two classes, run in opposite lines; and that the same course of study should be equally
well adapted to both, is as utterly impossible as that the same pursuits and habits should equally concern and befit both classes.
The industrial classes know and feel this, and therefore they.
do not, and will not, patronize these institutions, only so far forth
as they desire to make professional men for public use.  As a
general fact, their own multitudes do, and willforever, stand aloof
trom them; and, while they desire to foster and cherish them for.
their own appropriate uses, they know that they do not, and cannot,fill the sphere of their own urgent industrial wants. They need a
similar system of liberaledutcation for. their own class, and adapted to their own p-ursuits; to create for them an INDUSTRIAL LITERATURE, adapted to their professional wants, to raise up for them
teachers and lecturers, for subordinate institutes, and to elevate




22                 tNiT3SUTRtAL EDUCATTONI.
them, their pursuits, and their posterity to that rclative position in
human society for which God designed them.
The whole history of education, both in Protestant and Catholic countries, shows that we must begin with the higher institutions,
or we can never succeed with the lower; for the plain reason, that
neither knowledge nor water will run up hill.  No people ever had,
or ever can have, any system of common schools and lower seminaries worth anything, until they first founded theirhigher institutions and fountains of knowledge from  which they could draw
supplies of teachers, &c., for the lower.  We would begin, therefore, where all experience and common sense show that we must
begin, if we would effect anything worthy of an effort.
In this view of the case, the first thing wanted in this process, is
a NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE, to operate as the great central
luminary of the national mind, from which all minor institutions
should -derive light and heat, and toward which they should, also,
reflect back their own. This primary want is already, I trust, supplied by the Smithsonian Institute, endowed by James Smithson,
and incorporated by the U. S. Congress, at Washington, D. C.
To  co-operate with this noble Institute, and enable the Industrial classes to realize its benefits in practical life, webneed a
University for the Industrial Classes in each of the States,
with their consequent subordinate institutes, lyceums, and high
schools, in each of the counties and towns.
The objects of these institutes should be to apply existing knowledge directly and efficiently to all practical pursuits and professions
in life, and to extend the boundaries of our present knowledge in
all possible practical directions.
PLAN FOR THE STATE UNIVERSITY.
There should be connected with such an institution, in this State,
a sufficient quantity of land of variable soil and aspect, for all its
needful annual experiments and processes in the great interests of
Agriculture and Horticulture.
Buildings of appropriate size and construction for all its ordinary and special uses i a complete philosophical, chemical, anatomical, and industrial apparatus; a general cabinet, embracing everything that relates to, illustrates, or facilitates any one of the in(istrial arts; especially all sorts of animals, birds, reptiles, insects,
trees, shrubs, and plants found in this State and adjacent States.
Instruction should be constantly given in the anatomy and physiology, the nature, instincts and habits of all animals, insects,




IDIDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                 2a
trees and plants; their laws of propogation, primogeniture, growth,
and decay, disease aid health, life and death; on the nature, composition, adaptation, and regeneration of soils; on the nature,
strength, durability, preservation, perfection, composition, cost,
use, and manufacture of all materials of art and trade; on political, financial, domestic, and, manual economy, (or the saving of
labor of the hand,) in all industrial processes; on the true principles
of national, constitutional, and civil law; andsthe true theory and art
of governing and controlling, or directing the labor of men in the
State, the family, shop, and farm; on the laws of vicinage, or the
laws of courtesy and comity between neighbors,as such, and on the
principles of health and disease in the human subject, so far at
least as is needful for household safety; on the laws of trade and
-commerce, ethical, conventional, and practical; on book-keeping
and accounts; and in short, in all those studies and sciences, of
whatever sort, which tend to throw light upon any art or employment, which any student may desire to master, or upon any duty
he may be called to perform; or which may tend to secure his
moral, civil, social and industrial perfection, as a man.
No species of knowledge should be excluded, practical or theoretical; unless, indeed, those specimens of "organized ignorance"
found in the creeds of party politicians, and sectarian ecclesiastics
should be mistaken by some for a species of knowledge.
Whether a distinct classical department should be added or not,
would depend on expediency. It might be deemed best to leave
that departmenrt to existing colleges astheir more appropriate
work, and to form some practical and economical connection with
them for that. purpose: or it might be best to attach a classical
department in due time to the institution itself.
To facilitate the increase and practical application and diffusien
of knowledge, the professors should conduct, each in his own department, a continued series of annual experiments.
For example, let twenty or more acres of each variety of grain,
(each acre accurately measured,) be annually sown, with some
practical variation on each acre, as regards the quality and preparation of the soil, the kind and quantity of seed, the time and mode of
sowing or planting, the time and modes and processes of cultivation
and harvesting, and an accurate account kept of all costs, labor,&c.,
and of the final results. Let analogous experiments be tried on all
the varied products of the farm, the fruit yard, the nursery, and the
garden; on all modes of crossing, rearing and fattening domestic
animals, under various degrees of warmth and of light, with and
withiout shelter; on green, dry, raw, ground, and cooked food, cold
and warm; on the nature, causes; and cure of their various diseases,




24                INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
both of those on the premises and of those brought in from abroadr
and advice given, and annualreports made on those and all similar
topics.  Let the professors of physiology and entomology be ever
abroad, at the proper seasons, with the needful apparatus. for seeing all things'visible and invisible, and scrutinizing the latent
causes of all those blights, blasts, rots, rusts and mildews which
so often destroy the choicest products of industry, and thereby
impair the health, wealth, and comfort of millions of our fellow
men. Let the professor of chemistry carefully analyze the various
soils and products of the State, retain specimens, give instruction, and report on their various qualities, adaptations, and
deficiencies.
Let similar experiments be made in all other interests of agriculture and mechanic or chemical art, mining, merchandize- and
transportation by water and by land, and daily practical and experimental instruction given to each student in attendance in his
own chosen sphere of research or labor in life.- Especially let
the comparative merits of all labor saving tools, instruments,
machines, engines and processes, be thoroughly and practically
tested and explained, so that their benefits might be at once enjoyed, or the expense of their cost avoided by the unskillful and unwary.
It is believed by many intelligent men, that from one-third to
one-half the annual products of this State are annually lost from
ignorance on the above topics.  And. it can scarcely be doubted
that in a few years the entire cost of the whole Institutionwould be
annually saved to the State in the above interests alone, aside
from all its other benefits, intellectual, moral, social, and pecunatry.
The APPARATUS required for such a work is obvious. There
should be grounds devoted to a botanical and common garden, to
orchards and fruit yards, to appropriate lawns and promenades, in
which the beautiful art of landscape gardening could be appropriately applied and illustrated, to all varieties of pasture, meadow,
and tillage needful for the successful prosecution of the needful
annual experiments. And on these grounds should be collected and
exhibited a sample of every variety of domestic animal, and of.
every tree, plant, and vegetable that can, minister to the health,
wealth, or taste and comfort of the people of the State; their nature,
habits,merits, production, improvement, culture, diseases, and
accidents thoroughly scrutinized,; tested, and made known to the
students and to the people of the State.
There should, also, be:erected a sufficient number of buildings
and out-buildings for all the purposes above indicated, and a




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.-                25
REPOSITORY, in which all the ordinary tools and implerfients of tile
institution should be kept, and models of.all other useful implements and machines from time to time collected, and tested as they
are proffered to public use. At first it would be for the interest of
inventors and vendors to make such deposits.  But, should similar
institutions be adopted in other States, the general government
ought to create in each State a general patent office, attached t(o
the Universities, similar to the existing deposits at Washington,
thus rendering this department of mechanical art and skill more
accessible to the great mass of the people of the Union.
I should have said, also, that a suitable industrial library should
be at once procured, did not all the world know such a thing to be
impossible, and that one of the first and most important duties of
the professors of such institutions will be to begin to create, at this
late hour, a proper practical literature, and series of text books for
the industrial classes.
As regards the PROFESSORS, they should, of course, not only
be men of the most eminent, practical ability in their several departments, but their connexion with the institution should be rendered so fixed and stable, as to enable them to carry through such
designs as they may form, or all the peculiar benefits of the system
would be lost.
Instruction, by lectures and otherwise, should be given mostly
in the colder months of the year; leaving the professors to prosecute
their investigations, and the students their necessary labor, either
at home or on the premises, during the warmer months.
The institution should be open to all classes of students above a
fixed age, and for any length of time, whether three months or
seven years, and each taught in those particular branches of art
which he wishes to pursue, and to any extent, more or less. And
all should pay their tuition and board bills, in whole -or in part,
either in money or necessary work on the premises-regard being
had to the ability of each.
Among those who labor, medals and testimonials of merit should
be given to those who perform their tasks with most promptitude,
energy, care, and skill; and all who prove indolent or ungovernable, excluded at first from all part inilabor, and speedily, if not
thoroughly reformed, from the institution itself; and here again
let the law of nature instead of-the law of rakes and dandies be
regarded, and the true impression ever made on the mind of all
around, that WORK ALONE IS HONORABLE, and indolence certain
disgrace if not ruin.
At some convenient season of the year, the Commencement, or
ANNUAL FAIR of the University, should be holden through a suc



-26                INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION-.
cession of days.  On this occasion the doors of:the institution, with
all its treasures of art and resources of knowledge, should be thrown
open to all classes, and as many other objects of agricultural or
mechanical skill, gathered from the whole state, as possible, and
presented by the people for inspection and premium on the best of;each kind; judgment being rendered, in all cases, by a committee wholly disconnected with the institution. On this occasion, all
the professors, and as many of the pupils as -are sufficieatly advanced, should be constantly engaged in lecturing and explaining
the divers objects and interests of their departments. In short,
this occasion should be made the great annual GALA-DAY of the
Institution, and of all the industrial classes, and all other classes
in the State, for the exhibition of their products and their skill,
and for the vigorous and powerful diffusion of practical knowledge
in their ranks, and a more intense -enthusiasm in its extension and
pursuit.
As matters now are, the world has never adopted any efficient
means for the application and diffusion of even the practical
knowledge which does exist. True, we have fairly got' the primer,'the spelling book, and the newspaper abroad in the world, and we
think that we have done wonders; and so, comparatively, we have.
But if this is a wonder, there are still not only wonders, but, to
most minds, inconceivable miracles, from new and unknown worlds,of light, soon to break forth upon the industrial mind of the world.
Here, then, is a general, though very incomplete, outline of
what such an institution should endeavor to become. Let the reader contemplate it as it will appear when generations have perfected it, in all its magnificence and glory; in its means of good to
man, to all men of all classes: in its power to evolve and diffuse
practical knowledge and skill, true taste, love of industry, and
sound morality-not only through its apparatus, experiments, instructions, and annual lectures and reports, but through its thous-'ands of graduates, in every pursuit in life, teaching and lecturing
in all our towns and villages; and then let him seriously ask
himself, is not such an object worthy of at least an -effort, and
worthy of a state which God himself, in the very act of creation,
designed to be the first agricultural and commercial state on the
face of the globe?
Who should set the world so glorious an-example of educating their
sons worthily of -their heritage, their duty, and their destiny, if
not the people of such a state?- In our country we have no aristocracy, with the inalienable wealth of ages and constant leisure
and means to perform all manner of useful experiments for.their
own amusement; but we must create our nobility for this purpose,




USTRIkAL, ESDUCATION.                  27
es we elect our rlers, from  our own ranks, to aid and serve, not
to domineer eover and control us. And this done, we will not only
beat England, and beat the world in yachts,and locks,and reapers,
but in all else that contributes to the well being and true glory of
man.
I maintain that, if every farmer's and mechanic's son in this
state could now visit such an institution but for a single day in
the year, it would do him more good in arousing and directing the
dormant energies of mind, than all the cost incurred, and far more
good than many a six months of professed study of things he
will never need and never want to know.
As things now are, our best farmers and mechanics, by their
own native force of mind, by the slow process of individual experience, come to know, at forty, what they might have been taught
in six months at twenty; while a still greater number of the less
fortunate or less gifted, stumble on through life, almost as ignorant of every true principle of their art as when they begun. A
man of real skill is amazed at the slovenly ignorance and waste he
everywhere discovers, on all parts of their premises; and still more
to hear them boast of their ignorance of all "bookfarming," and
maintain that "their children can do as well as they have done;"'
and it certainly would be a great pity if they could not.
The patrons of our University would be found in the former, not
in the latter class. The man whose highest conception of earthly
bliss is a log hut, in an uninclosed yard, where pigs of two species
are allowedequal rights, unless the four-legged tribe chance to get
the upper hand, will be found no patron of Industrial Universities.
Why should he be?  He knows it all already.
There is another class of untaught farmers who devote all their
capital and hired labor to the culture,on a large scale, of some single productlwhich always pays well when so produced on a fresh soil,
even in the most unskillful hands.  Now such men often increase
rapidly in wealth, but it is not by their skill in agriculture, for they
have none; their skill consists in the management of capital and
labor, and, deprive them of these, and confine them to the varied
culture of a small farm, and they would starve in five years, where
a true farmer would amass a small fortune. This class are, however, generally, the fast friends of education, though many a
looker-on will cite them as instances of the uselessness of acquired
skill in farming, whereas they should cite them only -as a sample
of the resistless power of capital even in comparatively unskillful
hands.
#Such institutions are the only possible remedy for a caste education, legislation, and literature.  If any one class provide for




28 3LDUSTRIAN EDUCATION.
their. own liberal education, in the state, as they should do, while
another class neglect this, it is as inevitable as the law of gravitation, that they should form a ruling caste or class by themselves,
and wield their power more or less for their own exclusive interests
and the interests of their friends.
If the industrial were the only educated class in the state, the
caste power in their hands would be as much stronger than it now
is, as their numbers are greater.  But now industrial education
has been wholly neglected, and the various industrial classes left
still ignorant of matters of the greatest moment pertaining to their
vital interests, while the professions have been- studied till trifles
and fooleries have been magnified into matters of immense importance, and tornadoes of windy words and barrels of innocent ink
shed over them in vain.
This, too, is the inevitable result of trying to crowd all liberal,
practical education into one narrow sphere of human life. It crowds
their ranks with men totally unfit by nature for professional service.  Many of these, under a more congenial culture, might have
become, instead of the starving scavengers of alearned profession,
the honored members of an industrial one.  Their love of knowledge was indeed amiable and highly commendable; but the necessity which drove them from their natural sphere in life, in order to obtain it, is truly deplorable.
But such a system of general education as we now propose, would
(in ways too numerous now to mention) tend to increase the respectability, power, numbers, and resources of the true professional
class.
Nor are the advantages of the mental and moral discipline of
the student to be overlooked: indeed, I should have set them down
as most important of all, had I not been distinctly aware that such
an opinionis a most deadly heresy; and, Itremble at the thought or
being arraigned before the tribunal of all the monks and ecclesiastics of the old world, and no small number of their progeny in
the new.
It is deemed highly important that all in the professional classes should become writers and talkers; hence they are so incessantly
drilled in all the forms of language, dead and living, though it has
become quite doubtful whether, even in their case such a,course is
most beneficial, except in the single ease, of the professors of literature and theology, with whom these languages form the foundation
of their professions and the indispensable instruments of their future art in life.
No inconsiderable share, however, of the mental discipline that
is attributed to this peculiar course of study, arises from daily




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                 2D
intercourse, for years, with minds of the first order in their teachers and comrades, -and would be produced under any other course,
if the parties had remained harmoniously together.  On the other
hand, a classical teacher, who has no original, spontaneous power
of thought, and knows nothing but Latin and Greek, however perfectly, is enough to stultify a whole generation of boys and make
them all pedantic fools like himself. The idea of infusing mind,
or creating,or even materially'increasing it by the daily inculcation
of unintelligible words-all this awful wringing to get blood out of
a turnip-will, at any rate, never succeed except in the hands of
the eminently wise and prudent, who have had long experience in
the:process; the plain, blunt sense of the unsophisticated will never
realize cost in the operation.  There are, moreover, probably, few
men who do not already talk more, in proportion to what they really
know, than they ought to. This chronic diarrhoea of exhortation,
which the social atmosphere of the age tends to engender, tends far
less to public health than many suppose.   The history of the
Quakers shows, that more sound sense, a purer morality, and a
more elevated practical piety can exist, and does exist, entirely
without it, than is commonly found with it.
At all events, we find, as society becomes less conservative and
pedlantic, and more truly and practically enlightened, a growing
tendency, of all other classes, except the literary and clerical, to
omit this supposed linguistic -discipline, and apply themselves directly to the more immediate duties -of their calling; and, aside
from some little inconvenience at first in being outside of caste,
that they do not succeed quite as well in advancing their own interests
in' life and the true interests of society, there is no sufficient proof.
Indeed I think the exclusive and extravagant claims set up for
ancient lore, as a means of disciplining the reasoning powers, simply ridiculous, when examined in the light of those ancient worthies
who produced that literature, or the modern ones who have been
most devoted to its pursuit in this country and in Europe. If it
produces infallible practical reasoners, we have a great many
thousand infallible antagonistic truths, and ten thousand conflicting paths of right, interest, duty, and salvation.-If any man will
just -be at: the trouble to open his eyes and his ears, he can per-ceive at a glance how much this evasive discipline really does and
has done for the reasoning faculty of man, and how much for the
power-of sophistical cant, and stereotyped nonsense; so that if
obvious facts, instead of verbose declamation, are to have any
weight in the case, I am willing to join issue with the opposers of
the proposed scheme, even on the bare ground of its superior
adaptation to develope' the mental power of its pupils.




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION,
The most natural and effectual mental discipline possible for any
man, arises from setting himn to earnest and constant thought
about the things he daily does, sees, and handles, and all their
connected relations and interests. The final object to be attained,
with the industrial class, is to make them THINKING LABORERS;
while of the professional class we should desire to make LABORIOUS
THINKERS: the production of goods to feed and adorn the body
being the final end of one class of pursuits, and the production of
thought to do the same for the mind, the end of the other. —But
neither mind nor body can feed on the offals of preceding generations.  And this constantly recurring necessity of reproduction,
leaves an equally honorable, though somewhat different, career of
labor and duty open to both; and, it is readily admitted, should
and must vary their modes of education and preparation accordingly.
It may do for the man of books to plunge at once amid the catacombs of buried nations and languages, to soar away to Greece,
or Rome,or Nova-Zembla,Kamtschatka, and the fixed stars, before
he knows how to plant his own beans, or harness his own horse, or
can tell whether the functions of his own body are performed by
a heart, stomach, and lungs, or with a gizzard and gills.
But for the man of work thus to bolt away at once from himself
and all his pursuits in after life, contravenes the plainest priiciples of nature and common sense. No wonder such educators
have ever deemed the liberal culture of the industrial classes au
impossibility; for they have never tried nor even conceived of any
other, way of educating them except that by which they are rendered totally unfit for their several callings in after life. —How
absurd would it seem to set a clergyman to plowing and studying
the depredations of blights, insects, the growing of crops, &c., &c.,
in order to give him habits of thought and mental discipline for the
pulpit; yet, this is not-half as ridiculous, in reality, as the reverse
absurdity of attempting to educate the man of work in unknown
tongues, abstract problems and theories, and metaphysical figments
and quibbles.
Some, doubtless, will regard the themes of such a course of education as too sensuous and gross to lie at the basis of a pure and
elevated mental culture. But the themes themselves cover all possible knowledge and all modes and phases of science, abstract,
mixed, and practical.  In short, the field embraces all that God
has made, and all that human art has done, and if the created
Universe of God and the highest art of man are too gross for our
refined uses, it is a pity the "-morning stars and the sons of God"
did not find it out as soon as the blunder was- made.  But, in my




INDUSTRI.L EDUCATION;.                  3
opinion, these topics are of quite as much consequence to, the well-.
being of man and the healthful development of mind, as the concoction of the final nostrum in medicine or the ultimate figment in
theology and law, conjectures about the galaxy or. the Greek
accent; unless, indeed, the pedantic professional trifles of one man
in a thousand are of more consequence than the daily vital interests
of all the rest of mankind.
But can such an institution be created and endowed?  Doubtless
i can be done, and done at once, if the industrial classes so decide.
The fund given to this state by the general government, expressly
for this purpose, is amply sufficient, without a dollar from any other
source; and it is a mean, if not an illegal perversion of this fund,
to use it for any other- purpose.  It was given to the people, the
whole people of this state —not for a class,. a party, or- sect, or
conglomeration of sects; not for common schools, or family schools,
or classical schools; but for "An University," or seminary of a
high order, in which should of course be taught all those things
which every class of the citizens most desire to learn —their own
duty and business for life.  This, and, this alone, is an University
in the true, original sense of the term. - And if an Institution
which teaches all that is needful only for the three professions of
law, divinity, and medicine,is,therefore, an University, surely one
which teaches all that is needful for all the varied professions of
human life, is far more deserving' of the name and the endowments.
of an University.
But in whose hands shall the guardianship and oversight of this
fund be placed, in order to make it of any real use for. such a
purpose.?  I answer, without hesitation and without fear, that this
whole interest should, from the first, be placed directly in the:hands
of the people, and the whole people, without any mediators or advisers, legislative or ecclesiastical, save only their' own appointed
agents, and their own jurors and courts of justice, to which,.of'
course, all alike must submit. It was given to the people, and is
the property of the people, not of legislators, parties, or sects, and
they ought to have the whole control of it, so far as is possible
consistently with a due security of the funds and needful stability
of plans of action and instruction.  This control I believe they
will be found abundantly able to exercise; and more than this no
Wfellinformed man would desire.
The reasons for placing it at once and forever beyond all legislative and ecclesiastical control, are obvious to all.  For if under
the former, it will continually exist as the mere tool of the dominant
party, and the object of jealous fear and hatred of their opponents-;
or else it will become the mere foot ball of all parties, to be kick



~.2                INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
ed hither and thither as the party interests and passion of the hour
may dictate.  We well know how many millions of money have
been worse than thrown away by placing professed seminaries of
learning under the influence of party passion, through legislative
control.  And it is surely a matter of devout gratitude that our
legislators have had wisdom enough to see and feel this difficulty,
and that they have been led, from various causes, to hold this fund
free from all commitment to the present hour, when the people
begin to be convinced that they need it, and can safely control it;
and no legislator but an aristocrat or a demagogue would desire'to see it in other hands.
The same difficulty occurs as regards sects.-Let the institution
be managed ever so well by any one party or sect, it is still certain their opponents will stand aloof from it, if not oppose and
malign it for that very reason.  Hence, all will see at once, that
the greatest possible care should be taken to free it from,not only
the reality, but even from the suspicion of any such influence. —
Should the party in power, when the charter may be granted, appoint a majority of the board of trustees from the parties in the
minority, it would show a proper spirit, and be in all coming time,
an example of true magnanimity, which their opponents could not
fail to respect and to imitate, and which the people at large would
highly approve.  A victorious hero can afford to be generous as
well as brave-none worthy of a triumph can afford to be otherwise.
In all future appointments, also, the candidates should be elected
with such an evident regard to merit, and disregard of all political
and sectarian relations, as to ever carry the conviction that the
equal good of the whole alone is sought.  There can be no great
difficulty in accomplishing all this, if it is well known in the outset
that the people will keep their eye closely upon that man, whoever he may be, who by any bargaining for votes, or any direct
or indirect local, sinister, or selfish action or influence, or any
evasion or postponement, or by any. desire to tamper and amend,
merely to show himself off to advantage, shall in any way embarrass or endanger this greatest of all interests ever committed to a
free state-the-interest of properly and worthily educating all the
sons of her soil.  Let the people set on such a man, if the miscreant wretch lives, for all future time, a mark as much blacker
than the mark set on Cain, as midnight is darker than noon-day.
This is a question, above'all others, that a man who is a man, will
desire to meet openly and frankly, like a man.  Will our legislators do it?  I, for one, believe they will.   I shall not believe the
contrary till it is proved; and I will even suggest, in general,.a
mode by which the great end may be safely gained.  Let others,




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                 3,3
however, suggest a better one, and, I will cheerfully accord with it.
Let the Governor of the State nominate a board of trust for
the funds of the Institution. Let this board consist of five of the
most able and discreet men in the State, and let at least four of
them be taken from each of the extreme corners of the State, so,
remote from all proximity to the possible location of the Institution, both in person and in property, as to be free from all suspicion of partiality. Let the Senate confirm such nomination.
Let this board be sworn to locate the Institution from  a regard
to the interests and convenience of the people of the whole State.
And when they have sd done let, them be empowered to elect twelve
new members of their own body, with perpetual power of filling
their own vacancies, each choice requiring a vote of two-thirds of
the whole body, and upon any failure to -elect at the appointed annual meeting, the Governor of the State to fill the vacancy for one
year, if requested by any member of the board so to do.  Let
any member of the board who shall be absent from any part of its
annual meetings, thereby forfeit his seat, unless detained by sickness, certified at the time, and the board on that occasion fill the
vacancy, either by his re-election, or by the choice of some other
man.  Let the funds then, by the same act, pass into the hands
of the trustees so organized, as a perpetual trust, they giving proper bonds for the same, to be used for the endowment and erection
of an IndustrialUniversity for the State of Illinois.
This board, so constituted, would be, and ought to be,, responsible to no legislature, sect, or party, but directly to the people
themselves-to each and every citizen, in the courts of law and
justice, so that, should any trustee of the institution neglect, abuse,
or pervert his trust to any selfish, local, political, or sectarian end,
or show himself incompetent for its exercise, every other member
of the board and every citizen at large should have the right of
impeaching him before the proper court, and, if guilty, the cout.
should discharge him and order his place to be filled by a more
suitable man. Due care should be taken, of course, to guard
against malicious prosecutions.
Doubtless objections can be urged against this plan, and all
others that can be proposed. Most of them may be at once anticipated, but there is not space enough to notice them here. Some,
for example,, cherish an ardent and praiseworthy desire for the
perfection of our common schools, and desire still longer to use
that fund for that purpose. But no one imagines that it can long
be kept for that use, and if it could, I think it plain that the lower schools of all sorts would be far more benefitted by it here than
in any otherplace it could be put.
3




34                 INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
Others may feel a little alarm, when, for the first time in the
history of the world, they see the millions throwing themselves aloof
from all political and ecclesiastical control, and attempting to
devise a svstem of liberal education for themselves: but on mature
reflection we trust they will approve the plan: or if they are too old
to change, their children will.
I shall enter upon no special pleas in favor of this plan of disposing of our State fund. I am so situated in life that it cannot
possibly do me any personal good; save only in the just pride of
seeing the interests of my brethren of the industrial class cared for
and promoted, as in such an age and such a state they ought to
be. If they want the benefit of such an institution they can haveit. If they do not want it, I have not another word to say. In
their own will, alone, lies their own destiny, and that of their
children.
Respectfully submitted,
J. B. TUBRER.




SPRINGFIELD CONVENTION.
The SECOND CONVENTION was held at Springfield, June 8, 1852.
A controversy there arose between the members of the Industrial
Convention, and the advocates and representatives of some few of
the old classical and theological colleges, who were admitted by
courtesy to participate in the debates of the convention, which
consumed most of the time of the convention, and but little, if any,
impression for good, was made upon the public mind.
These colleges desired to be made, themselves, the instruments
through which the funds of the State should be applied to the education of the industrial classes.  This, the representatives of these
classes have at all times, in all their conventions, unanimously and
steadfastly. opposed.
At that meeting, however, the following memorial was presented
to the Legislature:
ILLINOIS INDUSTRIAL CONVENTION.
Memorial of the Industrial Convention to the Senate and House of
Representatives of the State of Illinois.
The Convention of the friends of the Industrial University, proposed to the conslderation of the people of Illinois, by the Granville convention, whose report is alluded to in the message of the
Governor of the State, beg leave to submit to the consideration of the
Senators andRepresentatives of the people, the following memorial:
But three general modes have been publicly proposed for the use
of the College and Seminary funds of the State.
I.  The perpetualcontinuance of their use for common school
purposes, is not seriously expected by any one, but only their temporary use as a loan for this noble object.
II. The equal distribution of their proceeds among the ten or
twelve colleges in charge of the various religious denominations of
the State, either now in existence or soon to arise and claim their
share in these funds, and the equally just claim of Medical and
other-Institutions for their share, it is thought by your memorialists, would produce too great a division to render these funds of
much practicea value either to these Institutions or to the people
of the State. Nor do they consider that it would make any practioal differente, in this regard, whether the funds were paid directly




4,6               INDU STRIAL EDUCATION,
by the State over to the Trustees of these Institutions, or disbursed
indirectly through a new board of overseers or Regents to be called
the University of Illinois. The plan of attempting to elect by State
authority, some smaller number of these Institutions to enjoy the
benefit of the funds, on the one hand, to the exclusion of others,
o)r attempting to endow them all so as to fit them for the great
practical uses of the industrial classes of the State, we trust your
honorable bodies will see at once to be still more impracticable and
absurd, if not radically unequal and unjust in a free State like
ours.
III. Your memorialists therefore desire not the dispersion by
any mode, either direct or indirect, of these funds; but their continued preservation and concentration for the equal use of all classes of our citizens, and especially to meet the pressing necessities
of the great industrial classes andinterests of the State, in accordance with the principles suggested in the message of his Excellency the Governor of the State, to your honorable bodies;, and
also in the recent message of Governor Hunt of New York, to the
legislature of that State, and sanctioned by the approval of many
of the wisest and most patriotic statesmen in this and other States,
The report of the Granville Convention of farmers, herewith
submitted and alluded to, as above noticed in the message of our
Chief Magistrate, may be considered as one, and as only one, of
the various modes in which this desirable end may be reached, and
is alluded to in this connexion as being the only published document
of any convention on this subject, and as a general illustration of
what your petitioners would desire, when the wisdom of the Senators and Representatives of the people shall have duly modified
and perfected the general plan proposed, so as to fit it to the present resources and necessities of the State.
We desire that some beginning should be made, as soon as our
statesmen may deem prudent so to do, to realize the high and
noble ends for the p)eople of the State, proposed in each and all
of the documents above alluded to. And if possible on a sufficiently
extensive scale, to honorably justify a successful appeal to congress, in conjunction with eminent citizens and statesmen in other
States, who have expressed their readiness to co-operate with us,
for an appropriation,o  public lands for each State in the Union
for the appropriate endowment of Universities for the liberal education of the Industrial Classes in their several pursuits in each State
in the Union.
And in.this rich, and at least prospectively, powerful State,
acting in co-operationwith the vast energies and resources'of this
mighty confederation of united republics, even very small begin



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                37
nings properly directed, may at no very remote day result in consequences more wonderful and beneficent than the most daring
mind would now venture to predict or even conceive.
In the appropriation of those funds your memorialists would
especially desire that a department for normal school teaching, to
thoroughly qualify teachers for county and district schools, and
an appropriate provision for the practical education of the destitute orphans of the State, should not be forgotten.
We think that the object at which we aim must so readily commend itself to the good sense and patriotism, both of our people,
rulers and statesmen, when once fully and clearly understood, that
we refrain from all argument in its favor.
We ask only that one institution for the numerous Industrial Classes.the teachers and orphans of this State, and of each State, should
be endowed on the same general principles,and to the same relative
extent as some one of the numerous Institutions now existing in eaclh
State for the more especial benefit of the comparatively very limited classes in the three learned professions. If this is deemed immoderate or even impracticabie we will thankfully accept even less.
As to the objection that Statescannot properly manage literary
institutions, all history shows that the States in this country, anl
irt Europe, which have attempted to manage them by proper methods, constituting a vast majority of the whule, have fully succeeded in their aim.  While the few around us which have attempted
to: endow and organize them on wrong principles-condemned by
all experience, have of course failed.  Nor can a State charter
and originate Railroads or manage any other interest, except by
proper methods and through proper agents.  And a people or c
State that cannot learn in time, to manage properly and efficiently
all these interests, and especially the great interests of self education, is obviously unfit for self-government, which we are not willing as yet to admit in reference to any State in the Un on, andt
least of all our own.
With these sentiments deeply impressed on our hearts, and or
the hearts of many of our more enlightened fellow citizens, your
memorialists will never cease to pray your honorable bodies for
that effective aid which you alone can grant.
Respectfully submmitted,
By order of the Committee of the Convention,
J. B. TURNER, Chairman.
The THtRD CONYVENTION was held at Chicago, Nov. 24, 1852.
At this convention much important business was transacted, and
many ihteresting views suggested, and speeches thereon, made and
reportecd.




38                 IN]DUSTRIAN EDTJCATIO01.
Amorng other things; it was resolved to organize' "THE  IND'U
TRIAL LEAGUE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS," which has since been
chartered by our Legislature, empowered to raise a fund, by subscriptions from the members, of ten cents each, per annum, and
by voluntary contributions, to be applied to the forwarding of the
objects of the convention, and promoting the interests of the
industrial classes.
1st. "By disseminating information both written and printed on
this subject."
2d. "By keeping up a concert of action among the friends of
the industrial classes."
3d. "By the employment of lecturers, to address citizens in all
parts of the State." "iProf. J. B. Turner, of Jacksonville was
appointed principal Director."
"John Gage, of Lak6 county, Bronson Murray, of La Salle co. 
Dr. L. S. Pennington, of Whiteside co., J. T. Little, of Fulton
co., and Wim. A. Pennell, of Putnam co., Associate Directors."
It was also "resolved, that this Convention memorialize Congress for the purpose or obtaining a grant of public lands to establish and endow Industrial Institu{ions in each and every State in the
Union.-"
"The plan for an Industrial University, submitted by Prof,
Turner to the Granville Convention," (reprinted above,) "was
then called for, and a motion passed to discuss its principles by
sections; whereupon, after thus reading and discussing of its various sections, the general priiciples of the plan were approved."
It was also "voted unanimously, that a department for the
education of common-school teachers be considered an essential
feature of the plan."
"Prof. J. B. Turner, of Jacksonville, Winm. Gooding, of Lockport, and Dr. John A. Kennicott, of Northfield, were appointed a
committee to report a plan to the next convention, and to memorialize the Legislature for the application of the college and seminary funds to this object, in accordance with the acts and ordinances of Congress, &c."'" J. B. Turner, L. S. Bullock and Ira L. Peck, were also
appointed a committee to prepare an address to the citizens of this
State, onthe subject of Industrial Education, and the establishment of an Industrial Institution."'
The FOURTH CONVENTION was holden at Springfield on the 8th
of January, 1853.
- At this meeting, also, a great many items of a miscellaneous
character were brought before the Convention, and discussed and
decided upon; in almost every case by a unanimous vote.




INDUStRIAL EDUCATION.                 39
The greatest harmony and good feeling prevailed among all the
members and delegates, and the representatives and executive
officers of the people, in the Legislature; many of whom, from all
parts of the State, took the deepest interest in the subject, and
-made noble and eloquent speeches at their evening session, in the
Senate chamber in its behalf.  It was.
Resolved, That inasmuch as, any detailed plan of public instruction can only be decided and acted upon by the Trustees, Directors
or other officers of the desired Institution, when created, it is not
expedient to attempt to fix upon any such details in any preliminary conventions of the people; and that the committee appointed
to report on that subject, be discharged from further duty.
The duties and terms of office of the League, were, also, pre-scribed by this convention.
After the adjournment of the convention, the following memorial
was written, at the request of the committee, by the author and
signed by the President of the convention and presented to the
legislature in accordance with a resolution passed by the convention:
1T EIM 0 R I AL
OF THE FOURTH INDUSTRIAL CONVENTION OF THE STATE OFL
ILLINOIS.
To the Honorable Senate and Houtse of Representatives ofj
the State of Illinois:
We would respectfully represent:  That we are members of the
industrial classes of this state, actively and personally engaged il.
agricultural and mechanical pursuits.  We are daily made to feel
our own practical ignorance, and the misapplication of toil and labor, and the enormous waste of products, means, materials, aald
resources that result from it.  We are aware that all this evil ti,
ourselves and our country, results from a want of knowledge o'
those principles and laws of nature that underlie our various pro -
fessions, and of the proper mean. of a practical application of ex -
isting knowledge to those pursuits. We rejoice to know that olbrethren in the several learned professions have to a good degre"
availed themselves of these advantages, and have for years e:njoyed their benefit.  They have universities and colleges, with apparatus, libraries voluminous and vast, able and learned profe,sors and teachers, constantly discovering new facts, and applying
all known principles and truths directly to the practical uses of their:
several professions and pursuits. This is as it should be. But whave neither universities, colleges, books, libraries, apparatus, or
teachers, ~dapted or designed to cncentrate and apply even,JI




40                 INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
existing knowledge to our pursuits, much less have we the means
of efficiently exploring and examining the vast practical unknown
that daily lies all around. us, spreading darkness and ruin upon our
best laid plans, blighting our hopes, diminishing our resources,
and working inevitable evil and loss to ourselves, to our families
and to our country. Some think one half —no intelligent man
thinks that less than one-third or 6ne-fourth of the entire labor
and products of our state, are made an annual sacrifice to this
needless ignorance and waste.  Knowledge alone, here, is power,
and our relief is as clearly obvious as our wants.  We need the
same thorough and practical application of knoweldge to our pursuits, that the learned professions enjoy in theirs, through their
universities and their literature, schools and libraries that have
grown out of them. For even though knowledge may exist, it is
perfectly powerless until properly applied, and we have not the
means of applying it. What sort of generals and soldiers
would all our national science (and art) make if we had no military academies to take that knowledge and apply it directly and specifically to military life?
Are our classic universities, our law, medicine, and divinity
schools adapted to make good generals and warriors? Just as
well as they are to make farmers and mechanics, and no better.Is the defence, then, of our resources of more actual consequence
than their production? Why then should the state care for the
one, and neglect the other?
According to recent publication only 1 in 260 of the population
of our own state are engaged in professional life, and not one in
200 in the Union generally. A great proportion even of these never enjoyed the advantages of our classical and professional schools.
But there are in the United States 225 principal universities, colleges and seminaries, schools, &c., devoted to the interest of the
professional classes, besides many smaller ones, while there is not
K: single one, with liberal endowments, designed for the liberal
and practical education of the industrial classes. No West Point
as yet beams upon the horizon of their hope; true, as yet, our
boundless national resources keep us, like the children of Japhet
emigrating' from the Ark, from the miserable degredation anti
want of older empires; but the resources themselves lie all undeveloped in some directions, wasted and misapplied in others, and rapidly vanishing. away as centuries roll onward, under the ignorance,
orunskillfulness that directs them.  We, the members of the industrial classes are still compelled to work empriically and blindly,
without needful books, schools or means, by the slow process of that
individual experience that li" and dies with the man.  Our pro



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                 41
fessional brethren, through their universities, schools, teachers.
and libraries, combine and concentrate the practical experience of':ages in each man's life. We need the same.
In monarchial Europe, through their polytechnic and agricultural schools, some successful effort has been made, in some departments and classes, to meet this great want of the age.
But in our democratic country, though entirely industrial and
practical in all its aims and ends, no such effort has been efficiently made.  We have in our own State no such institutions, and no.
-practical combination of resources and means, that can ever produce one worthy of the end.  We have not even a "Normal
School" for the education of our teachers, nor half a supply of
efficient teachers even for our own common schools; and never can
-have without more attention to the indispensable means for their
production.  Hence, our common schools are, and must continue to
be, to a great extent, inefficient and languishing, if not absolute
nuisances on our soil, as in some cases they now  are.  But the
common school interest is the great hope of our country; and we only
desire to render it efficient and useful, in the only way it can b;e
done; by rearing up for it competent and efficient teachers, in the
normal department of our industrial universities.  Knowing that
knowledge, like light and water, runs downward, not upward,
through human society, we would begin with the suns and fountains, and not with the candles and puddles, and pour the light
and water of life down through every avenue of darkness below,
and not begin with the darkness and drought, and attempt to
evolve and force it upward.  No state ever did or ever will succeed by this latter process. The teacher is the first man sought,
and the life and light of the whole thing, from the university downward.
To this end, concentration is the first indispensable step. Leaving all our common school funds untouched, as they now are, the
-proposed distribution of our university fund, amounting to about
$150,000, Will illustrate this point.  The annual interest of this,
at 6 per cent., is about $9,000. If this should be divided amoncg
ours ten or fifteen colleges, it would give them  only from $600 to
$900 each, per annum. Divided among our hundred counties,
it would give $90 to each county, for a high school or any other
purpose. Divided as it now is among the million of our people, i;
gives 9 mills, or less than one, cent to each person.  Concentrated,
upon an industrial university, it would furnish an annual corps o?:
skillful teachers and lecturers, through its normal school, to goi
through all our towns and counties, create, establish and instruct
lyceums, high schools and common schools, of all sorts, arej




42                  tNDUSTRIA  EDUCATIOR.
through its agricultural and mechanical departments, concentrating
and diffusing the benefits of practical knowledge and experience
bver all our employments and pursuits, our farms and shops.
Here as elswhere, the sun must exist before the diamonds and dewdrops can shine.  The mountain heights must send down their rills
and their torrents, gathered from their own flood and the boundless resources of the ocean and the sky, before the desert can
blossom   as  the  rose.   Money, however much  or little,
concentrated in logs, clapboards and brick, enclosing a herd of
listless, uneasy, and mischievous children, cannot make a common school.  Theliving teacher must be there —living not dead;
for dead teachers only make dead scholars the more dead.  Nor
can grammar, language, metaphysics, or abstract science, however accurate, voluminous and vast, ever diffuse new life and new en-:rgy into our industrial pursuits.  There, practical apparatus, the
thorough and accurate needful experiments, as well the living and
practical teachers are needed, in order even to begin the great work.
This is necessarily expensive, quite beyond even the anticipated
resources of our existing institutions.  Hence again, we need concentration, and not a miserable useless and utterly wasteful diffussion of our resources and means.
Throughout our State, and throughout the whole civilized world,
in all ages,where there has been most neglect of universities and high
seminaries, and most reliance placed by the people in the miserable pittance doled out to them by the state, like so many paupers,
for the support of common schools, precisely there the common
school will be found, for the inevitable reasons above indicated,
most inefficient, weak and worthless, if not positive nuisances to
society, and, whenever the reverse is found, the reverse influences
of life, light, animation and hope beam forth from the schools
at once.
We repeat it, the common school is our great end, our last
hope and final joy. But we would reach and reanimate it under
the guidance of practical common sense, as all experience shows
it must be done, as it only can be done, and ve would reach the
vital, practical interests of our industrial pursuits, by precisely -the
Fame means, and on precisely the same well known and thoroughly tried plans and principles.  We seek no novelties.  We desire
no new principles.  We only wish to apply, to the great interest of the common school and the industrial classes, precisely
the same principles of mental discipline and thorough scientific
practical instruetion, in all their pursuits and interests, which are
now applied to the professional and military classes.
The effect this must have in disciplining, elevating and refining




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.'43
the minds and morals of our people, increasing their wealth and
their power at home, and their respect abroad, developing not only the resources of their minds, but their soil and treasures of
mineral, and perfecting all their materials, products and arts
cannot but be seen by every intelligent mind.
No other enterprise so richly deserves, and so urgently demands
the united effort of our national strength.
VWe would, therefore, respectfully'petition the honorable Senate
and House of Representatives of the State of Illinois, that they present a united  metnorial to the Congress now assembled at Washington
to appropriate to each State in the Union an amount of public lands
not less in value than five hundred thousand dollars, for the liber-'al endowment of a system  of industrial universities; one in each
state in the Union:, to co-operate with each other and with the'Smithsonian Institute at Washington, for the more liberal and
practical education of our industrial classes and their teachers, in
their various pursuits, for the production of knowledge and literature needful in those pursuits, and'developing to the fullest and
blost paerect extent the resources of our soil and our arts, the virtue and intelligence of our people, and the true glory of our common country.
We would further petition that the executive and legislature of
our sister States, be invited to'co-operate with us in this enterprise, and that a copy of the memorial of this legislature be forwarded by the governor to the governors and Senates of the sever,
al States.
We would also. petition that the University fund of this State, if
not at once applied to these practical uses, be allowed to remain
where it now is, and its interest applied to present uges, until such
time as the people shall be prepared to direct it to some more
efficient use.
By order of the convention.
BRONSON MURRAY, President.
A similar memorial was submitted to the convention by the committe consisting of his Excellency Gov. French, Hon. David L.
Gregg an4 Dr. L. S. Pennington, appointed by the Chicago Convention and accepted and forwarded to Congress, as ordered by
tlhat Convention.
These memorials were presented to the Senate and Representatives of Illinois then in session, and the merits of the plan fully
discussed by able and eloquent advocates, and the following resolutions were unanimously passed by both houses and received the
approbation of the executive.




44                 INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION;
RESOLUTIONS
Of' the General assembly of the State of Illinois, Relative
to the Establishment qf Industrial Universities, and fo0r
the Encouragement of Practical and General Education
among the People- Unanimously ddopted.
WrHEREAS, The spirit and progress of this age and country demand the culture of the highest order of intellectual attainment in
theoretic and industrial science:  ind whereas, it is impossible that our commerce and prosperity will continue to increase
without calling into requisition all the elements of internal thrift
arising from the labors of the farmer, the mechanic, and the
manufacturer, by every fostering effort within the reach of thegovernment:  and whereas, a system of Industrial Universities,
liberally endowed in each State of the Union, co-operative wit!i
each other, and the Smithsonian Institution at Washington, would
develop a more liberal and practical education among the people,
tend the more to intellectualize the rising generation, and eminenty, conduce to the virtue, intelligence and true glory of our comnmon
country  therefore, be it
Resolved, by the House of Representatives, the Senate
concurring herein, That our Senators in Congress be instructed, and our Representatives be requested, to use their best exertions to procure the passage of a law of Congress donating to each,
State in the Union an amount of public lands not less in value that,
five hundred thousand dollars, for the liberal endowment of a
svstemn of Industrial Universities, one in each State in the Union,
to co-operate with each other, and with the Smithsonian Institutiori
at Washington, for the more liberal and practical education o.
our industrial, classes and their teachers; a liberal and varied education adapted to the manifold want of a practical and enterprising people, and a provision for such educational facilities, beinr
in manifest concurrence with the intimations of the popular will.,
it urgently demands the united efforts of our national strength.
Resolved, That the Governor is hereby authorized to forward a
copy of the foregoing resolutions to our Senators and Represent:ttives in Congress, and to the Executive and Legislature of eac-.
of our sister States, inviting them to co-operate with us in th[;i
meritorious enterprise.            JOHN REYNOLDS,
Speaker of the Houve of Representatives.
G. KOERNER,
Speaker of the Senate.
APPROvXD, February 8, 1853.    J. A. MATTESON.
A true copy: Attest,
ALEXANDER STARNE, Sec'y of State.




rINDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                45
We give the following as a sample of the sentiments of the
press, at home and abroad upon the above resolutions:
"EDUCATION FOR THE PEOPLE.)"-The New York Tribune of
Feb. 26th, has the following remarks, subjoined to the joint resolutions passed by our General Assembly, relative to the establishment of Industrial Universities, and for the encouragement of
practical and general education among the people:
"Here is the principle contended for by the friends of practical education abundantly confirmed, with a plan for its immediate
realization. And it is worthy of note, that one of the most extensive of public land (or new) States proposes a magnificent donation of public lands to each of the States, in furtherance of
this idea.  Whether that precise form of aid to the project is most
judicious and likely to be effective, we will not here consider.
Suffice it that the legislature of Illinois has taken a noble step
forward, in a most liberal and patriotic spirit, for which its membels will be heartily thanked by thousands throughout the Union.
We feel that this step has materially hastened the coming of scientific and practical education for all who desire and are willing
to work for it.  It cannot come too soon.-Ill. Jour.'
The "Central Illinois Times," a newspaper published at Bloom'
ington, gives utterance to the following, affixed to the resolutions
respecting the establishment of Industrial Universities:
"The above is undoubtedly of more interest and importance to
the people of this State, than any measure which came before the
legislature during the late session, It contains a wholesome principle of prosperity and advancement, which will, if fully carried out,
tend to elevate and improve the condition of the honest hard working farmer. We have always held that the first object of governmient is to afford protection to the working classes, for in them
lies the strength and glory of the nation.  Without protection
they will become weak, inactive and careless, with it they are encouraged at every step, and reap reward abundantly to satisfy
every want.
The resolutions meet our approbation fully, and we hope that
other States, and Congress, may well consider the matter, and finally mould it into a law."
It may not be improper here to give a few extracts, showing
how the enterprise is regarded by the public press, and by able
and influential divines and statesmen in other States.  The testimonials on hand are very numerous, but space here can be spared for only a very few extracts, as specimens of the whole.
It will be needless to remark upon the sentiments of the press




460                INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION,
at home, or in the West, generally, as that is sufficiently well known
to all.
Says Governor Hunt, in his message to the New York legisla.ture.
"Much interest has been manifested for some years past in favor of creating an institution for the advancement of agricultural science and of knowledge in the mechanics arts. The views in
favor of this measure expressed in my last annual communication remain unchanged.  My impressions are still favorable to the
plan of combining in one college two distinct departments for instruction in agricultural and mechanical science; I would respectfully recommend that a sufficient portion of the proceeds of the
next sale of lands for taxes be appropriated to the erection of an
institution which shall stand as a lasting memorial of our munificence, and contribute to the diffusion of intelligence among the
producing classes, during all future time."
Similar sentiments expressed by our own late Chief Magistrate,
Governor French, will be remembered by all.
Says the Hon. Marshal P. Wilder, before the Berkshire Agricultural Society, Mass.:
"For want of knowledge, millions of dollars are now, annually
lost by the commonwealth, by  the misapplication of capital and
labor in industry. On these points we want a system of experiments
directed by scientific knowledge.  Are they not important to our
farmers? Neither the agricultural papers, periodicals or societies,
or any other agents now in operation, are deemed sufficient for all
that is desirable.
We plead that the means and advantages of a professional education should be pla?ed within the reach of our farmers.
This would not only be one of the most important steps ever
taken by the commonwealth  for its permanent advancement and
prosperity, but would add another wreath to her renown for the protection of our industry and the elevation of her Sons.
Said Rev. Mr. Hitchcock, president of Amherst Collge, —whiloe
advocating the endowments ot such institutions before the Massachusetts Board of Agriculture, 1851:
" I have been a lecturer on chemistry for twenty years.  I have
tried a great many experiments, in that time, butT do not know
of any experiments so delicate or so difficult as the farmer is trying every week.  The experiments of the laboratory are not to be
compared to them. You have a half dozen sciences which are
concerned in the operation of a farm. There is to he a delicate
balancing of all these, as every farmer knows. To suppose that
a manis going to be able, without any knowledge of these sciences
~lrur   r ru.1~ ~C1v




INDUsTMAL EDUCATION..:                47?
tomake improvements in agriculture by haphazard experiments, is,
it seems to me, absurd.
He spoke of the 350 similar schools of which he gave some account on his return from Europe, mostly of recent origin, and
says:
"This subject has made such rapid progress in Europe, within
a few years, that 1 was perfectly amazed to find the facts develop
themselves as they did, one after another.  I do not believe there
is a class of students of any kind, in our country, who would be
able to answer one-tenth of the questions which those young men
answered very readily," (that is in the European agricultural
schools, )-"and  going out, as they do, to take charge of other
schools, they will accomplish much for the benefit of their country,
as well as by their example in applying their principles for other
farmers.  The people miust do this thing-if the people are not
ready to force government to help them, it will do no good.  It
nmust be a weighty concern; and individuals,-one would suppose, would sink under it."
Sucl are the suggestions of one of our most able and experienced scientific teachers, who has, probably, taken more pains to inve3tigate the subject practically, especially during his tour in Europe, than any other man in the country.
At thi: meeting, after a most thorough discussion of the subject
by eminent scientific and practical men present, the Massachusetts
Board of Agriculture "resolved that a thorough systematic course
of education, is as necessary to prepare the cultivator of the soil,
for pro-eminence in his calling, as to secure excellence in any of
the schools of science or art:  that for want of such an education,
millions of dollars, and a vast amount of time, and energy are
annually lost to the commonwealth, and that the yeomanry have a
right to claim from the government the same fostering care, which
is extended to other great interests of the community."
In the memorial to the legislature of Massachusetts, the memorialists say:  "Your memorialists are not aware, that it is any
more easy to get a thorough knowledge of husbandry by individual exertion and private study, than it is to acquire, in that way,
a competent knowledge of law, medicine or divinity, and your memorialists know of no iway by which that knowledge can be attained,
bat by a regular course of instruction."
This memorial is signed by some of the most eminent scholars
and civilians of Massachusetts. Among them appear the names
of the Honorable MARSHAL P. WILDER,Honorable EDWARD EVaRITT, Honorable HENRY W. CUSHiMAN, and JOHN W. LINCOLN, &c.
Do these gentlemen know anything about scholarship, education,




48                     INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
practical life and social want, or are they also mere visionary
enthusiasts, seeking to turn the world upside down?
MASSACHUSETTS LEGISLATURE.-We find the following in the
proceedings of the Legislature of Massachusetts.  The proposition
of Mr. Pomeroy was received with marked satisfaction, and was
read and ordered to be printed.
Mr. Pomeroy, of Southampton, on leave given, introduced the
following:
RESOLVES CONCERNING AGRICULTURE.
Whereas, In view of the increased attention devoted to theoretical and practical agriculture, Massachusetts earnestly desires that there be increased facilities
afforded for acquiring a more complete and liberal agricultural education, and
Whereas, This and every other State in the Union is largely interested in efforts
to develop our agricultural resources to an extent worthy of a nation of farmers,
therefore
Resolved, That Massachusetts deems it expedient and just that Congress appropriate a portion of our public lands to establish and endow a Nactional Normnal
~.gricultural College, which shall be to the rural sciences, what the West Point
Acadenly is to the military, for the purpose of educating teachers and professors
for service in all the States of the Republic.
Resolved. That copies of these resolutions be sent by his Excellency, the Governor, to our Senators and Representatives at Washington, with the request that
the subject be brought before the two houses of Congress.
A convention on the subject of a practical national system of
university education, was held at Albany, also, Jan. 26, 1853.
This convention was numerously attended by the great and illustrious luminaries of the State, the church and colleges of the North
and East. A committee of twenty-one was appointed to report
a plan.
Among these appear the names of the venerable President Wayland, of Brown University, Bishop Potter, of Pennsylvania, Washington Irving, Gov. Hunt and Senator Dix of New York, President Hitchcock, of Amherst College, Professors Webster, Dewey,
Henry, Bache, Mitchell, of Cincinnati, Pierce of Cambridge, &c.
Rev. Dr. Kennedy spoke of "'the want that had long been felt
for institutions different from  those already established."
Professor C. S. Henry said, "the welfare of our country was in
a great degree dependent upon what should be done in regard to
the proposed university."   Rev. Ray Palmer said," there was lack
of opportunity for scientific men to perfect themselves in their
various pursuits,' and desired that this want should be supplied to
all parts of the country.'"
Rev. Dr. Wykoff said, "the first desideratum  to the establishment of the institution was a conviction of its importance. When
the souls of men are fired up, the money will not be wanting. He




INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                 49
believed that the proper spirit was abroad-a feeling that would
Tedound to the honor and benefit of the peorle, and that the work
would be done.  The enterprise was one for the masses.  It would
open the path of knowledge "or all the youth in the land, and from
the common school to the highest university, he would like to see
our educational institutions thrown freely open to all."
Prof. Henry said, "he would bid the enterprise God speed! HIe 
deprecated the idea of attempting to establish a university at a
moderate outlay.  One fitted for the wants of this country,
should throw open its lecture rooms freely, to all who should wish
to avail themselves of their advantages. It should be the complete development of the principle which lies at the foundation of
eur' common schools."
Rev.- President Wayland said,'" such an establishment in New
York would be an example, which, ho believed, would be followed
in other States. A university with a thousand students would
abundantly sustain itself; and he thought the needed expense
would not be so great as some gentlemen anticipated."
Again —do these gentlemen know anything about the practical
subject of education in this countlvy?
Said the lamented Downing, in thelast number of the Horticulturist he ever edited, "The leaven for the necessity for education
among the Industrial Classes, begins to work, we are happy to
perceive, in many parts of the country. At a Farmers' Convention in Illinois, our correspondent, Prof. Turner, of that State,
submitted a plan for such an educational institution, which has
-since been published in pamphlet form.
We think the importance of the subject a sufficient apology for
allowing the Professor to be heard by a large audience.
It is not often that the weak points of an ordinary collegiate
ieducation are so clearly- exposed, arid the necessity of workingmen's universities so plainly demonstrated." He then republishes
the plan. See Horticulturist, July 1852, p. 306.
Said the editor of the N. York Tribune, in the editorial prefacing his republication of the same plan, "the great idea of a higher
or thorough education for the sons and daughters of farmers, mechanics and laborers, is everywhere forcing itself on the public
attentionri.  Our race needs instruction and discipline to qualify
them for working, as well as for thinking and talking.  They ieed
something more than the hireling picks up at hap-hazard in the
course eof his daily toils.
For want of this knowledge in every department of rural industry, millions of dollars are annually wasted.
Prof. -J3 B. Turner, of Jacksonville, in behalf of a convention at
4




.iaJ               IND)USTRIAL EDUCATION-.
Granville, has put forth a plan of an industrial university, whicl
sets forth the pressing and common need, so forcibly, that we copy
the larger portion of it."-[N. Y. Tribune, Sept. 4.'52.
An editorial in the North American, (the oldest paper in Philadelphia,) on education and agriculture, said to be written by
Judge Conrad, says:  "We have been  gratified by the perusal
of an address delivered by Prof. J. B. Turner, of Jacksonville,
Ills., before a convention of farmers held in that State, in support
of the establishment of a university, in which agriculture and the
sciences shall be made a special branch of study. His suggestions
are urged with zeal and ability, and his arguments are convincing,
as to the need and importance of such institutions.  There is no
subject more worthy of the highest effort of the human intellect,
nor one which has been, till recently, so culpably disregarded, if
not condemned.
To secure the diffusion and practical application of agricultural
science, it seems necessary that it should be interwoven with general education, and its acquisition made an object of early pride
and animated ambition.
Were this result attained by such institutions, as are suggested
by Prof. Turner, the consequences would be not only an early
application of science to agriculture, but valuable additions to the
stock of knowledge, induced by stimulated enquiry and experiments.
It cannot be doubted that with the advance of agricultural science
we should witness an almost incredible increase qf production.
The condition of the farmer would be improved to opulence, and
the increased means would be attended with enlarged ability and
leisure, that encourage devotion to the pursuits and tastes that
elevate and refine the intellect and character.
The triumph of a republic can only be successfuly achieved and
permanently enjoyed by a people, the mass of whom, are an emn
lightened yeomanry,the proprietors of the land they till,Too INDEPENDENT TO BE BOUGHIT, TOO ENLIGHTENED TO BE CHEATED, AND
TOO POWERFUL TO BE CRUSHED.
The proposition of Prof. Turner, seems to be entitled to peculiar and favorable consideration, and it is urged with a force of
argument and eloquence that cannot fail to secure it.  His address
displays a full acquaintance with the subject, and his views are
practical as well as profound, and are conveyed with elevation of
style and earnestness of purpose. It is impossible to read his remarks without realizing the importance of connecting agriculture,
as a special subject with the course of American study.  It is desirable as a corrective of the delusion, that induces so geineral a
ruih into what are termed-notfrom any pecuniary promise-the




ITDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.                 51'liberal professions.  Agriculture cultivated to its highest capacity,
demands a mind as large and well stored as the liberal professions,
and is at least equal to any human pursuit in intellectual and
moral elevation. Liberally taught, it ixould become an object of
ambition to those youths who nowayearly swell the unhappy hosts
that over-crowd the professions. By making agriculture a liberal
pursuit; by connecting it with science, (as it is already associated
with all that is most beautiful in literature;) by elevating and
refining it, it would be rendered a noble amusement to the luxurious
-a noble distinction to the earnest and ambitious. This has already been done to some extent: it remains that a system of education should render it general."
Says Dr. Lee, the able and talented editor of the Southern
Cultivator, the leading monthly periodical of the Southern planting interest, published at Augusta, Georgia, in reply to a letter
enquiring for some practical agricultural school for the sons of the
planters, which letter he says, he publishes as a " fair sample of
scores of similar letters received every month:" "There is not a
good agricultural school in the United States. The truth is, the
American people have yet to commence the study of agriculture as
the combination of many sciences. Agriculture is the most profound and extensive profession that the progress of society and
the accumulation of knowledge have developed.  This is why the
popular mind is so long in grasping it.  Whether we consider the
solid earth under our feet, the invisible atmosphere which we
breathe, the wonderful growth and decay of all plants and animals,
or the light, the heat, the cold, or the electricity of heaven, we
contemplate but the elements of rural science.  The careful investigation of the laws that govern all ponderable aald imponderable
agents, is the first step in the young farmer's education. To facilitate his studies, he needs, as he pre-eminently deserves, a more
comprehensive school than this country now affords. We notice
a plan for an industrial university &c., by Prof. J. B. Turner, of
Jacksonville, Ills.'This subject is beginning to take a strong hold
upon the minds of the people, and we are glad to see gentlemen
of the talents and influence of Prof. Turner, lending a helping
hand to put a ball in motion, which, ultimately, will sweep down
all opposition. This plan of Prof. Turner, is full of valuable
practical suggestions, and the memorial which accompanies it, or
a similar one, should be forced upon the attention of the General
Government, and of every State in the Union."
But these extracts must suffice to show both. the interest taken in
the general subject abroad, and also, in that particular aspect it
has assiimed in this State, as presented in the report of the irt
convention held at (Granville.




TNDUSTRIAL EDUCATION..
Does any one now doubt that we are encouraged to go forward?
With what unexpected and almost fearful velocity, the darkness
has sped away before the light in one short year! The interest of
mechanics and mechanical institutes and associations in this matter, is no less intelligent, marked and decisive, than that of their
agricultural brethren, though they have fewer organs and advocates. Why should we halt in our career?  What have we to
fear?  We and our cause, are at this moment stronger than all.
the legislatures,and congresses,and colleges on the continent, even
if they were all pitted against us. But the great majority of them
a-re most warmly and efficiently for us. They are our ablest and
most valued advocates and friends.  There may be "old fogies"
among them: so there are among us: these fossil remains of a
prior formation always will exist everywhere. It is well they do;
for without them we should never be able to demonstrate the floods
of darkness and prejudice that have, in past ages, deluged the
human mind. In this case there are no more of these old conservatives, now extant, than will be really needed by our new universities as cabinet specimens of a monkish age just gone by.  They
will serve as a connecting link between the mummies of the catacombs, and the whirling, buzzing, living, lightning world of our
own time.  Some few of these philosophic owls affect to be greatly
distressed lest a war of classes and professions should be provoked
in this effort, because, forsooth, we are obliged to speak distinctly
and decidedly of the peculiar wants, duties and rights of the different classes of society.  Now  the'history of the whole world
shows there never was and never could be such a war of classes
incited by any means whatever, in any State or community, unless
there was ample and justifiable reason for it; and whenever such
reasons may exist, the sooner such a war comes, the better, if the
unjust causes are not at once removed.  Do these alarmists, then,
pretend that any such causes exist in this country, connected with
the scheme of industrial and professional education? We do not
believe it: such an assumption is a slander upon the institutions of
the country, as well as the men in it.  So far from it, no other
single subject could be named, to which the whole heart of all the
freemen of this Republic, of all classes and professions, would so
spontaneously and unequivocally respond.  Let those who always
take a step in advance, as though the whole continent were paved
with rotten eggs, tread as carefully as they please: but let those
who are men, advance like men, with fearless step, as if on the
green, solid earth, amid brave and generous freemen like themselves.
That such a measure should in any possible respect injure and




IN-DUSTEIAL ED)UCATIONT,retard.any other institution or interest of any value to mankind,
is, clearly impossible': but that it should necessarily increase the
means and instruments, and exalt the utility and power of good in
all such institutions and interests, is equally evident, and is seen
and felt by all the best minds in all classes in the nation.
That there are always great and eminent dangers attending their
incorporation, all thinking men well know. If consigned to corruption, imbecility and folly in any of the several States, ( as some similar institutions, doubtless have been,) the money expended in the
endowment will be, of course, perverted, or lost.  But is this necessary?  Is there not wisdom enough, and patriotism enough in
Congress and in the several States combined, to preclude the probability, if not the possibility of any such perversion or abuse?
Or, if errors should occur, and loss and damage in some cases
ensue, would not experience, and the example of other States correct the evil, and, ultimately, each free State learn to control, wisely, the means indispensable to its own education, development
and welfare? If not, then, they are obviously not yet fit for self
government, which, necessarily, implies self education.
In the grant of lands, Congress has the right, and doubtless,
ought to prescribe some uniform, wise and patriotic conditions to
the grant, which should, as far as possible, place it, in all coming
time, beyond the reach of all partisan, local and sinister passions,
interests and impulses, and leave it only in the hands of the "sober, second thought," of the people of the several States, through
the proper Courts and Commissioners, or regents appointed for
the purpose, and well qualified for the trust.
It appears, from the report of President Hitchcock, of Amherst
College, to the Massachusetts Legislature, that there are, in Europe, 352 such institutions; many of which he visited, and all o4f
which exert a powerful and salutary influence, by the diffusion of
intelligence, and by the improvement of these time honored arts.
In France there are 75 under government patronage. To one of these
she made appropriations, in 1849, of half a million dollars.  Another has already graduated 600 well educated agriculturalists,
who immediately found honorable and lucrative situations at the
head of their professions.  Monarchial Russia has 68 of these
schools, some of which are of a high order, and superior to those
in other lands! Cannot each of our confederated republics afford
one such institution?
The Hon. M. P. Wilder, in the same address quoted above, estimates the annual loss of the single State of Massachusetts in the
one product of her cereal grains, for want of the knowledge and
skill which such institutions alone can impart,, at two millions of
dollars.




54                  INDUSTRIAL EDUCATI0N.
This would give to the Union, at the same rate, on this single
product, an annual loss of, at least, sixty millions of dollars.
A gentleman who has great practical experience, in the line of
stock, dairy, &c., in Massachusetts, reports the loss through the
same ignorance and unskillfulness in these interests of Massachusetts, alone, at 15 millions of dollars.
(See Patent Office Reports 1851, page 28.)
This would give to the thirty States, if Massachusetts be taken
as an average, an annual loss of 450 millions of dollars, in another single department.
In other departments of agriculture, and in all our buildings,
improvements and use of mechanical skill and labor, it is no better, and in many respects, even worse, as every intelligent man
will admit.  Surely, then, if these things are so, is it true that
"for lack of knowledge the people perish," as well in their temporal as their eternal interests.  Both are governed by the same law
and are bound to the same fate, like the bodies and souls of men.
PROPOSED PLAN OF ACTION.
Let every Agricultural Society and every Mechanics'Institute,every
State and every neighborhood, at once procure Resolves of their
corporations, or the signatures of their friends, and forward to
Congress the following petition or one of similar form, and adopt
suitable petitions for and from their State Legislatures, and for-vard to the Chief Executor of the League a copy of the same.
The      - Would respectfully petition your honorable body for
a grant of Congress Lands to each State in the Union to endow
therein an Industrial University for the liberal and practical education of the Industrial classes in their several pursuits and professions in life.  Said grant to be not less in value than five hundred thousand dollars to each State, and to be held in trust for the
above uses, accompanied by such conditions and restrictions in the
terms of, the grant, as shall in the wisdom of Congress, be needful
in order to secure this trust forever to the uses aforesaid, and to
prevent as far as practicable in all coming time the possibility oIE
such trusts being diverted from  their proper object; or made sub,
servient to any local, partisan, or- sectarian end inconsistent with
the appropriate use of such trust.




INDUITRISAL EDUCATION.
MIEMORIAL
To the Honorable the Members of the Senate and Hotuse of
Representatives of the State of Illinois:
The undersigned, citizens of this State, regarding with admiration the facilities which the civilized world at present affords for
the liberal education of the members of the learned and military
professions, and justly appreciating the benefits which they have
derived therefrom in their pursuits in life, desire the same blessing
for ourselves, and our children, and for each and all the memrbers
of the industrial classes of this State.  We, therefore, would
humbly pray your honorable bodies so to dispose of the Fund given by the General Government to this State for the advancement
of learning, that a State University may be endowed with ample
means for the liberal and practical education of all classes in society, each in their own several pursuits in life; and that these
funds maybe immediately committed to a Board of Trustees for
this purpose in general accordance with a plan of the Convention
already approved by large numbers of our most intelligent and
patriotic citizens.
DE SIGN
OF THE INDUSTRIAL LEAGUE OF ILLINOIS,
OFFICERS.
PRINCIPAL DIRECTOR,
J. B. TURNER, Jacksonville.
ASSOCIATE DIRECTORS,
JoHN GAGE, Lake Co.           BRONSON MIRRAY, La Salle co.
IL, S. PENNINGTON, Whiteside co. J. T. LITTLE, Fulton Co.
WVM. A. PENNEL, Putnam  County.
I. There are now in the hands of the State of Illinois, $150,000 in money, and about seventv-two sections of land selected at
an early period, and probably worth as much more.
II.  The land and money, was donated by the General Government, to this State, as a trust fund, apart from and indepen-dent of the Common School Fund.
III. With this fund the State is required by Congress to estab-lish a STATE UNIVEiSITY.Or High Seminary of learning.
IV.  The members of this industrial league are such, and such
-only, of the inhabitants of the State of Illinois, as desire-that when




D6        ~         INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.
this State Seminary is established, it shall be upon the following
rational and impartial principles:
V. It shall be designed to furnish to the great Industrial classes of
the State, our Farmers, Merchants and Mechanics, each in their own
sphere, the same thorough, liberal and practical education in those
various sciences underlying their several pursuits, and in all processes, principles, and arts connected therewith, as our colleges and
professional schools now  afford to their students of Theology,
Medicine, Law, and the art of War; and shall be provided with
all needful apparatus, lands, grounds, gardens, animals, drawings,
models, instruments and engines, for the proper elucidation of the
same-as other schools are provided with their necessary apparatus.
To combine the friends of this interest, THE INDUSTRIAL LEAGITU
OF ILLINOIS was incorporated by the Legislature, February 1853.
1st. With a capital of $20,000, to be raised by members,
fees and donations;
2d. With a Board of one chief Director and five associates; whose,office it shall be
3d.  To print and distribute books, pamphlets, and papers, explaining the advantages and necessity of this systemef education.
4th.  To employ lecturers to visit all parts of the State for the
same purpose, and to appoint agents for making collections, &c.
5th. To circulate, and present, to the Legislature and to Congress, petitions, urging the adoption of this plan for a University
and the liberal endowment thereof by Congress lands and by State
funds in each State in the Union.
6th.  To receive from each member ten cents admission, and ten
cents annual subscription, with fee for diploma and such voluntary
donations as may be contributed.
7th. The funds so collected to be applied to the payment of lecturers,agents, and officers,(other than Associate Directors,who shall
receive no compensation for services,) to the payment of printing
and such incidental expenses as shall be approved by the Board:
and on the establishment of a, University as herein contemplated,
any surplus funds in the treasury to be paid over to the treasury
of such University.
8th. Members of the Industrial League, who desire it, may
withdraw from their membership upon giving notice to any agent
of the Board, provided their dues are all paid, including those for
the year in which they withdraw.
9th.  The year of the League commences with the first day ot
each January.
('The undersigned hereby enter their names as members of the' Indust.rial
League of Illinois," from;ite dyIte set opposite their names.]