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Heuvy S. Maley Papers, 13s4H%— |tuo
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Dole 7/034
Two Blades of Gvase
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TWO BLADES OF GRASS
SPEECH BY
HENRY S. MANLEY
OVER WGY
on JUNE 7, 1934
From very early times the production of food has
been a principal concern of mankind. To that purpose
man has devoted much thought and labor, but always
his success has depended largely upon natural forces,
He has studied seasons and soils and prayed for sun-
shine and rainfall in due proportions. If the crops
were continuously blessed by these forces beyond his
control there was abundant food, but any sudden
drought or flood or hail or frost or wind or plague
of insects or plant disease could render all of man’s
work unavailing and condemn him to a year of famine.
No wonder that early man worshipped the forces of
nature and sought their blessings upon his agriculture.
Today he knows more about the natural forces in-
volved, but he is just as dependent upon them.
Through thousands of years and throughout all the
world there has grown up in the hearts of men a fecl-
ing that seedtime and harvest are part of a divine
plan; that man is blessed when he works in harmony
with the plan and subject to punishment when he
works against it,
You can trace this intuition from the mythology
and customs of ancient and primitive peoples down
through the philosophy of our grandfathers and grand-
mothers. There is probably no tribe and no nation
that has not observed in some form an invocation of
Heaven’s blessing at the time of planting, and a feast
of thankfulness at harvest time. Primitive religion
gave important place to gods and godesses who
watched over the growing fruits and grains. The
Greeks knew of Demeter and Persephone, the Romans
of Ceres and Pomona, and the Germanic peoples wor-
shipped the Corn-mother. The Iroquois Indians, our
predecessors in agriculture in this State, believed that
the corn and beans and squash had spiritual person-
alities, known to them as the “Three Sisters”; they
invoked a blessing upon each planting and. observed
the harvest feasts. Our own New England Thanksgiv-
ing for three hundred years has been largely an ex-
pression of thankfulness for divine blessing manifested
through the success of our agriculture.
The language of the Bible is rich with expressions
of the thought that the production of food is a bless-
ing, and that to waste it is wrong. There are refer-
ences to a land flowing with milk and honey, and to
the kindly fruits of the earth. It is said to be good that
swords be beaten into ploughshares and spears into
pruning-hooks, and that the desert be made to rejoice
and blossom as the rose. There are references to green
pastures, and the cattle upon a thousand hills, and
butter in a lordly dish. Man is adjured to learn dili-
gence from the ant, and no limitation of hours is sug-
gested. “In the morning sow thy seed, and in the eve-
ning withhold not thine hand.” It is said that a man
diligent in his business shall stand before kings.
Wastefulness is forbidden because “God gave the in-
crease.” At the end of the miraculous feast of loaves
and fishes it was directed, “gather up the fragments
that remain, that nothing be lost.”
Those religious precepts were at the root of the
New England tradition of diligence and thrift. I had
a grandmother whose example will always keep them
in my mind, for she abominated waste and destruction
in every form. Calvin Coolidge exemplified those tra-
ditions in the White House,
I doubt if that ancient tradition has been reversed
in a single year. It still seems good to produce and
wicked to destroy, and the new economic teaching of
restriction and destruction is very new. In 1930 Pro-
fessor Rexford G. Tugwell published a text on agricul-
ture, and in it were several chapters on increased pro-
ductivity through modern machinery and other de-
vices, but I find no hint there that he then regarded
inerease as anything but a blessing, making possible
a higher standard of living than had been known to
any previous generation.
The Greeks believed that a curse would come upon
any man or any people who worked against the pro-
cesses of nature. They called this offense “hybris,”
from which may be derived the word “hybrid.” Of
this much we can be sure, that whatever is the divine
plan will prevail, and men will lose any treasure they
expend in working against it. It is quite probable that
we shall come back to the ancient truth, proclaimed
two hundred years ago in Gulliver’s Travels:
“Whoever can make two ears of corn, or
two blades of grass to grow upon a spot
of ground where only one grew before,
deserves better of mankind and does more
essential service to his country than the
whole race of politicians put together.”
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