We should seek to comprehend the relations of the government, the

principles on which it is founded; and, while we justly complain of its
defects, and seek to remedy them, we ought also to compare it with other
systems that exist, or that might be established
We should seek to comprehend the relations of the government, the
principles on which it is founded; and, while we justly complain of its
defects, and seek to remedy them, we ought also to compare it with other
systems that exist, or that might be established. This proposition
involves an intelligent realization by the people of the character of
their institutions; and I am thus led to express the apprehension that
the popular political education of our day is inferior to that of the
revolutionary era, and of the age that immediately succeeded it.

The problem lying before each individual who would enter fully into this

rich world of environment, then, is to discover at first hand just as
large a part of the material world about him as possible
The problem lying before each individual who would enter fully into this
rich world of environment, then, is to discover at first hand just as
large a part of the material world about him as possible. In the most
humble environment of the most uneventful life is to be found the
material for discoveries and inventions yet undreamed of. Lying in the
shade of an apple tree under the open sky, Newton read from a falling
apple the fundamental principles of the law of gravitation which has
revolutionized science; sitting at a humble tea table Watt watched the
gurgling of the steam escaping from the kettle, and evolved the steam
engine therefrom; with his simple kite, Franklin drew down the lightning
from the clouds, and started the science of electricity; through
studying a ball, the ancient scholars conceived the earth to be a
sphere, and Columbus discovered America.