Page:The collected works of Theodore Parker volume 7.djvu/196

192 cast, stimulate men to great exertions, and produce a consequent development of the faculties called out. Social distinction depends almost wholly on wealth; that never is accumulated by mere manual industry, such is the present constitution of society, but it is acquired by the higher forms of industry, in which the powers of nature serve the man, or he avails himself of the creations of mere manual toil. Hence there is a constant pressure towards the higher modes of industry for the sake of money; of course, a constant effort to be qualified for them. So in the industrial departments the mind is more active than the hand. Accordingly it has come to pass that most of the brute labour of the free States is done by cattle, or by the forces of nature—wind, water, fire—which we have harnessed by our machinery, and set to work. In New England most of the remaining work which requires little intelligence is done by Irishmen, who are getting a better culture by that very work. Men see the industrial handiwork of the North, and wonder; they do not always see the industrial head-work, which precedes, directs, and causes it all; they seldom see the complex forces of which this enterprise and progress are the resultant.

There is no danger that we shall be sluggards. Business now takes the same place in the education of the people that was once held by war; it stimulates activity, promotes the intercourse of man with man, nation with nation; assembling men in masses, it elevates their temperature, so to say; it leads to new and better forms of organization; it excites men to invention, so that thereby we are continually acquiring new power over the elements, peacefully annexing to our domain new provinces of nature—water, wind, fire, lightning—setting them to do our work, multiplying the comforts of life, and setting free a great amount of human time. It is not at all destructive; not merely conservative, but continually creates anew. Its creative agent is not brute force, but educated mind. A man's trade is always his teacher, and industry keeps a college for mankind, much of our instruction coming through our hands; with us, where the plough is commonly in the hands of him who owns the land it furrows, business affords a better education than in most other countries, and develops higher qualities of mind. There is a marked