LEARNING TO THINK FOR OURSELVES, AND

TO MIND OUR OWN BUSINESS.*

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: Were I only to consult my own feelings, in reference to appearing before an audience so highly respectable and intelligent as the one I now see around me, I should refrain from addressing you on this occasion, and ask some one of the many gentlemen now present to assume the task, and discharge the duty which your committee has assigned to me. But it always has been a maxim with me, that the object of living is to do good, and to do all the good we can; and, while entertaining these views of duty from man to man in the social state, I have not felt at liberty to decline the invitation to appear before you, this evening.

I most heartily approve of associations of this kind, for mutual benefit and improvement. They can scarcely fail to do good, in one form or another, by the information derived from these cheerful meetings, — the curiosity aroused to read, to hear, and to learn more and more, and by the spirit of self-respect and self-reliance which these unions of mechanics and reading working-men are calculated to nourish and sustain. I say, I am warmly in favor of these meetings for improvement, and am willing, therefore, to contribute my mite to the general stock of knowledge which your course of lectures is calculated to produce.

The subject to which I would ask your attention, for a brief space, is a very plain one, and, therefore, not often dwelt upon in lectures or addresses. It is one which more naturally calls for

* Address delivered before the Franklin Library Association, Hudson, New York, 1848.

practical than theoretical observations; and you will not, therefore, expect any high-wrought and showy language from me, but a few reflections of a practical kind, in the nature of land-marks, such as the subject and my own experience suggest to my mind. I propose to address a few words to all who would earn the title of true mechanics and business men, upon the value of the simple maxim, (( MIND YOUR BUSINESS."

The young mechanics of our country have every reason to be thankful for the privileges which they enjoy in this highly favored land. The iron hand of oppression can never trouble them, so long as they are true to themselves, and fulfil their high duties as sons, brothers and citizens. A comparison of the condition of the mechanics in England, France, or any other part of Europe and the eastern world, with your situation here, ought to fill your hearts with gladness, strengthen your hands, and nerve your arms to defend your high privileges, and to act well your part in the business of life. In England, for instance, the young mechanic, no matter how faithfully he has served out an apprenticeship to a trade, is obliged to continue in the parish where he was born; or, if he attempt to set up his trade anywhere else, he is compelled to degrade himself, by giving security that he will not become a pauper, and a charge to the parish.

Suppose, now, any one of the young mechanics I see here should go down to Catskill and commence business there, and the day he is all prepared, his sign up, and his hands busy at work, the supervisors of Greene should step in and ask him to give bonds that he will not become a pauper, what would he think of it? And yet, such is the law of England.

In France, the young mechanic, however industrious and worthy, can, in no case, set up business without a license, always hard to be obtained; while in Germany, no young man can set up as

master workman, in any trade whatever, except to supply the place of some one deceased, or some person retiring from business.

Thank God, my young friends,—and you cannot be too thankful, - that your lot is cast here, in this free and happy land, where no such cruel restraints are imposed, but where each one can pursue his own calling wherever he chooses to establish himself, with none to molest or make him afraid, and where every young man, who puts forth the necessary energy and perseverance, can assuredly succeed.

One would be apt to think, from the common talk of politicians and statesmen about our institutions, that the only improvement we have made, beyond other countries, is in adopting a free constitution, where every man has a voice in the government, is a part of it, and bears a part of the sovereignty in his own person. But it is not so; a greater even than that is the freedom which pervades the social state, which gives unrestrained scope to talent and industry, which promises encouragement and sure reward to labor, and which recognizes true worth, in whatever rank of life or fortune it is placed. It is this principle, which, more than anything else, keeps down the grasping spirit of the aristocracy of power and wealth, and prevents any man, or set of men, from acquiring an undue ascendency or control over our lives and fortunes.

In other countries, mechanics and working men are generally looked upon as an inferior class, as if industry and labor were something degrading, and to be ashamed of. Men who have happened to be born to a title, and to the possession of wealth, plume themselves upon the merit of their ancestors, for want of any of their own; while he who, by enterprise and energy, earns an independence for himself, and by integrity of character obtains the noblest of all titles, - that of an "honest man," is passed by, because he is a mechanic, or the son of a mechanic.

My friends, there is something in all this peculiar to monarchical systems; and we can pardon the man who conforms to a system that fills his pocket, and gives him power over others. There is something stately and imposing in the aristocracy of old England. It can boast of antiquity; it has sometimes done service to the state; and, though it crushes the people like the car of Juggernaut, it is their custom to look up to it, and they are fools enough to prostrate themselves beneath its crushing weight. But what shall we say of those who would assume to be a privileged class in our country? Of those who would ape the aristocracy of Europe, or the parvenus of our own country, of those who are weak enough and foolish enough to pretend to despise honest labor, and to neglect, or affect to undervalue, the industrious mechanic and laboring man, or the tiller of the soil, who furnishes food or raiment alike for us all? I need not express my opinion of such an absurdity. Such beings are really too contemptible to waste words upon. Your own opinion of all such pretenders to superior rank or station I am sure agrees with mine. I fear they too often live, after all, on the labor of others.

Happily, the number is small of those who ape the aristocracy of other countries; and, thanks to our free institutions and the republican tendencies of the age, they are every day growing less. The dignity of mechanical pursuits is not, I think, generally understood. To me it seems to be everywhere undervalued.

But, I would ask, is not mechanical labor, in fact, one of the highest and noblest pursuits of man? What pursuit, let me ask, has produced such great results? We hear of the old philosophers and astronomers; but did any of them find out how to make glass, or construct a watch or a water-wheel? No. Did any one of them discover the art of printing? Certainly not; they were buried so deep in their philosophy, that their principal labors consisted in casting nativities, or searching for the philosopher's stone, while

to practical men, to mechanics, the world owes these and other great discoveries.

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We read of the great Sir Isaac Newton, who developed the system of the universe, and counted some three millions of fixed stars through his telescope. But who made the telescope? who contrived the wonderful instrument which revealed to him these glories? A MECHANIC! Who, at a later day, enabled another great astronomer Herschel - to penetrate still further into the mysteries of the stars? Why, it was a practical mechanic, as well as a philosopher. Who made the great telescope which, turned towards the heavens, exhibited, as was estimated, two hundred and fifty thousand stars passing over its fields in a quarter of an hour? A mechanic. Without the aid of the mechanic, then, neither of these great men could have unfolded his sublime conceptions, or have secured the fame which the world has accorded to his discoveries. Look at the great discoveries; you will see that nothing succeeds, no discovery is made useful, unless the practical mind is there.

A poor barber of Bolton, in England, about a hundred years ago, conceived a plan of shortening the labor of spinning cotton,of making thread by machinery, which from the earliest times had been done by hand,—and, with the aid of a watchmaker of a neighboring village, he constructed the spinning-jenny, which has added millions to the wealth of England, and multiplied the comforts of the civilized world. The poor title of Knight was all the reward which the haughty aristocracy of England could concede to the mechanic Arkwright; but his name will live longer than the proudest of theirs,- as long as that of England herself.

To the skill of the mechanic the world owes the invention of the cotton-gin, which has tripled the value of the acres of the Southern States, and made fortunes by hundreds of millions to the planters and manufacturers of cotton. And yet I have looked in