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partments of work is unobserved and siletit in its march,
but it is none the less steady and sure.
The establishment of Agricultural Colleg-es inau-
g-urated a change in the method of instruction and in the
trend of education. The dead languages, so long en
throned in places of honor and preferment in our Colleges
and Universities, have been, to a great extent, supplanted
by studies more closely allied to the particular business
the student is expected to follow and they are taught only
when necessary to a correct knowledge of special subjects
prescribed in the course of study.
We endeavor to combine theory and practice and to
put theoretical knowledge to practical use. The estab
lishment of institutions of this kind, by the people, was a
recognition of the value of practical experience as a neces
sary part of an education. Theory without practice is
like faith without works—it is dead. Therefore, while
we are training the mind to think accurately, we try to
give the student a sufficient amount of experimental knowl
edge of work in the line of his studies to enable him to
enter upon and pursue his chosen calling, after leaving
college, with as little interruption as possible in prepara
tory work.
People unacquainted with the method of instruction in
technical schools and colleges are disposed to discredit its
practical value, but those who, either by experience or
observation, have had opportunity to determine its worth,
know that the graduate in the Science of Agriculture or
in the Mechanic Arts, like the graduate in literature, law