Prometheus, bringing fire to mortals, did in a more primitive way what
they have done who have led forth the oil of the rocks (petroleum) to
light the lamps of the earth. Orpheus, who sang so entrancingly that
mortals forgot their punishments and followed him, and Amphion, who drew
the stones into their places in the walls by his music, performed no more
of a miracle than a lad who tips a Bessemer converter. Hercules is
remembered as a hero of the garden of the Hesperides for all time, whereas
he probably but imported oranges from Spain to the eastern Mediterranean,
and is hardly to be mentioned by the side of such a Mississippi Valley
transporter and importer as Mr. Hill.
But let us follow more particularly the producers of the fields, whom we
call the farmers there, the men whom the son of Sirach had in mind when he
said in the ancient days: "How shall he become wise that holdeth the
plough, that glorieth in the shaft of the goad, ... and whose discourse is
of the stock of bulls?" It was a farmer's son who invented the harvester,
and four-fifths of the men (whom the writer, to whom I am indebted for
many of these facts about the farmer, calls "harvester kings")--along with
the plough kings and wagon kings of whom democracy has been dreaming-were
farmers' sons.
Pages:
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
491
492
493
494
495
496