How different the results attending the labors of the intelligent agriculturist, guided by the lamp of learning, from those of the ignorant drudge who follows the barren formula of traditional precepts! As applied to manufactures and the mechanical arts, learning develops new powers of labor, and new facilities for subsistence and enjoyment.
Personal comforts of every kind are greatly increased, and placed within the reach of the humbler classes; while at the same time the "appliances of art are made to minister to the demands of elegant taste, and a higher moral culture." As applied to commerce, it not only greatly increases the facilities for the more general diffusion of civilization and knowledge, but is also vastly influential in harmonizing the conflicting interests of nations.
Nor is learning less humanizing and pacific in its influence when applied to the military art.

"During the dark ages which followed the wreck of the Roman power, the military science by which that power had been reared, was lost with other branches of learning.

When learning revived, the military art revived with it, and contributed not a little to the restoration of the empire of mind over that of brute force.

Then, too, every great discovery in the art of war has a life-saving and peace-promoting influence.

The effects of the invention of gunpowder are a familiar proof of this remark; and the same principle applies to the discoveries of modern times.