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The French manufacturer justly considers that his pattern is the principal element of his success in trade; for the mere handiwork of weaving is a simple affair, with the improved Jacquard loom. He therefore visits the school, and picks out the boy who promises, by taste and invention, to suit his purpose the best. He invites him to his home, boards him, and gives him a small salary, to be gradually advanced. One gentleman told Dr. Bowring that he had three such youths in his employment; to the youngest of whom he gave one thousand francs, or forty pounds, [or one hundred and eighty-four dollars,] per annum. After three or four years, if the young artist's success be remarkable, he may have his salary raised to double or treble that sum; and when his reputation is once established, he is sure of the offer of a partnership. Such is the general history of many of the schoolboys of Lyons. Even the French weaver, who earns only fifteen or twenty pence a day, prides himself upon his knowledge of design; he will turn over several hundred patterns in his possession, and descant on their relative merits, seldom erring far in predicting the success of any new style. By this disposition, the minds of the silk-weavers in France become elevated and refined, instead of being stultified in gin-shops, as those of the English too frequently are. In flower patterns, the French designs are remarkably free from incongruities, being copied from Nature, with scientific precision. They supply taste to the whole world, in proportion to the extent of their exportations, which amount to one hundred and ten millions out of one hundred and forty. In the Lyons school, collections of silk fabrics may be studied, extending over a period of four thousand years, with explanations of the modes in which every pattern was produced, from the rude silk of the Egyptian mummies to the figured webs of the last year.

There are also weaving-schools, containing from sixty to eighty scholars. In these, a pattern being exhibited, they are required to exercise their invention,

immediately, as to the best means of producing the design on a piece of silk goods. The master removes such difficulties as are occasionally encountered, and leads them on to the successful accomplishment of the task.

Within a few years, a large legacy has been left by General Martin, for the purpose of establishing another institution, similar to the school of St. Peter.

Their superiority in art is turned to good account, in many other French manufactures. Notwithstanding the double price of the raw material in France, their fancy articles in iron and steel are exported in large quantities. Their bronze figures have made their way into all parts of the world, along-side of their silk goods; both being equally productions of fine taste, and therefore yielding profitable returns.

IV. PAGES 24 AND 260.

THE IMPORTANCE OF SCIENCE TO THE MECHANIC.

[Extracts from an Address delivered December 9, 1835, at the opening of the first course of Lectures before the Mechanics' Literary and Benevolent Society of Poughkeepsie, New York, by A. POTTER.]

I NEED hardly remind this assembly, that the commencement of such an enterprise is an event of some public importance. Though composed, for the most part, of mechanics, and to be conducted with a special view to their improvement, it by no means follows that this association is interesting or important only to them. In contributing to their welfare, it must contribute, in the same proportion, to the welfare of all. For, be it remembered, that the manufacturers, mechanics, and artisans, of this place, form its most numerous, and, I may add, its most useful and influential class. As the country supplies the raw materials of human subsistence,

and is occupied principally by an agricultural population; so it is in towns and cities that these materials are worked up into articles of use and luxury, by mechanics and artisans, who, with their families, constitute its principal inhabitants. They are the young mechanics and apprentices of a town, therefore, whose influence is to be most powerfully felt, a few years hence, on its industry and enterprise; at its local and general elections; in the support of its schools and churches, and on all occasions of public interest or emergency. If the town is to be improved, enlightened, elevated, who can do it, so effectually, as its most numerous and active citizens? and if it is to decline in morals, intelligence, and prosperity, believe me, that it is among this class that the leprosy will first break out, and its foul taint be most widely and fatally diffused. Tell me, of any town, the intellectual and moral condition of its mechanics and operatives, and I will tell you what the condition of the town itself is. Tell me the character of its apprentices, and I will tell you what its condition ere long must be.

In view of these facts, I must profess my amazement at the apathy which so generally prevails respecting the intellectual and moral welfare of mechanics; and my still greater amazement at the contempt (worthy only of a dark age) with which some are disposed to look down on this most useful, and in cities, most numerous and powerful, class. Who can observe the workings of the social system, or peruse the records of the past, without feeling that theirs is a commanding influence? What class, during the last seven centuries, occupies a more prominent place, in the history of civilization and of constitutional liberty? Where, amidst the dense darkness of the middle ages, first arose a taste for the comforts and refinements of life? Who first taught the feudal lord to encourage industry, instead of idleness; to substitute the improvement of his estate, and the embellishment of his castle, and the cultivation of personal refinement, in place of a coarse

and prodigal hospitality? Who first supplied commodities for modern commerce, thus opening friendly intercourse between distant, dissimilar, and hitherto hostile, nations, and making the inprovements and discoveries of one the common property of all? And, above all, who first rekindled the long-extinguished spirit of civil liberty? or, rather, let me say, who, for the first time, lit up that glorious spirit, which alone deserves the name of civil liberty,-a spirit which demanded written guarantees for individual rights, and taught that the state, instead of being what ancient republicans considered it,—a stupendous idol, to whose honor and aggrandizement the freedom and happiness of individuals were to be profusely sacrificed, was but an agent, or servant, appointed for the benefit of all, and responsible to all, alike, for its faithful stewardship? To these questions, History returns one and the same answer. It was from the free cities of Europe, founded, sustained, and enriched, by mechanics and tradesmen, that these blessings took their rise. It was these mechanics and tradesmen, who first conceived a taste for the arts and comforts of peace, who communicated this taste to the higher classes, and supplied commerce with its rich freights of wealth and utility. It was they, who first taught the lesson, not yet fully learned in Europe, of systematic and successful resistance to arbitrary power. Enterprizing and intelligent, knowing what was due to their industry and skill, and feeling that royalty itself looked for protection against the insolence of haughty and restless barons to their prowess and wealth, they claimed to be represented in the councils of the state. Thus arose the tiers etat, or third estate of the realm, which has for so many ages held the balance of power in Europe between the monarch and his nobles, and which, as the commons, or middling class, has been infusing more and more of freedom into the constitution of every civilized people.

In this land, above all others, it becomes us to make grateful and respectful mention of the services which

mechanics have rendered to the cause of liberty. Their enterprise, be it remembered, was among the causes which first excited the jealousy of the mother country towards her American colonies. It was by her oppressive and unnatural efforts to strangle that enterprise, that she contributed to weaken the ties of affection which bound them to her, and awoke on these shores a cry for independence. In the fearless remonstrances which were laid at the feet of royalty; in the negotiations which were opened; in the measures of retaliation which were concerted and put in execution; in the firm and enlightened policy which saw distinctly its object, and moved right onward to its attainment, who were more active or influential than the mechanics? And when, at length, the die was cast, and the tidings from Lexington and Bunker Hill proclaimed that there was no hope, but in arms and in the God of battles, who stood forth, conspicuous, in the field, in the cabinet, and at foreign courts? In the army of the Revolution, I can recall no name, Washington's only excepted, which occupies a prouder place in the memory and affections of a grateful people, than that of Nathaniel Greene, the blacksmith. In the deliberations of Congress, and in the negotiations with foreign powers, I see no worthier representatives of the cool, sagacious, inflexible, upright, and far-reaching statesman, than Benjamin Franklin, the printer, and Roger Sherman, the shoemaker. I need not add the names of others, scarcely less honored. If we would know what mechanics were, at the era of the revolution; and what, in point of influence, they must ever be, in a country like ours, let this suffice:-Of the committee of five, appointed to draw up the Declaration of Independence, two were mechanics.* Of the brave men who led our armies, he, whom Hamilton, while he honored Washington as the first man of the country,' did not hesitate to style even the first soldier of the Revolution,'+ * Benjamin Franklin and Roger Sherman.

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Nathaniel Greene. This fact is stated by Mr. Verplanck, in his

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