Show how the people who produce these things are dependent upon your wants for their livelihood.
Show that you are dependent upon other people for your education; for recreation. Are other people dependent upon your education for their welfare? Are others dependent on you for their recreation?
INDEPENDENCE OF THE PIONEER
The farmer's life is often spoken of as an independent life. His independence was certainly much more complete in pioneer days than it is now. In regard to the early days of Indiana, it has been said:
Give the pioneer farmer an axe and an auger, or in place of the last a burning iron, and he could make almost any machine that he was wont to work with. With his sharp axe he could not only cut the logs for his cabin and notch them down, but he could make a close-fitting door and supply it with wooden hinges and a neat latch. From the roots of an oak or ash he could fashion his hames and sled runners; he could make an axle-tree for his wagon, a rake, a flax brake, a barrow, a scythe-snath, a grain cradle a pitchfork, a loom, a reel, a washboard, a stool, a chair, a table, a bedstead, a dresser, and a cradle in which to rock the baby. If he was more than ordinarily clever, he repaired his own cooperage, and adding a drawing knife to his kit of tools, he even went so far as to make his own casks, tubs, and buckets. He made and mended his own shoes. [Footnote: Quoted in Pioneer Indianapolis, by Ida Stearns Stickney, p. 11 (Bobbs-Merrill Co., Indianapolis).]
We also read that in early New England:
Every farmhouse was a manufactory, not of one kind of goods, but of many. All day long in the chamber or attic the sound of the spinning-wheel and loom could be heard. Carpets, shawls, bedspreads, tablecovers, towels, and cloth for garments were made from materials made on the farm. The kitchen of the house was a baker's shop, a confectioner's establishment, and a chemist's laboratory. Every kind of food for immediate use was prepared there daily; and on special occasions sausages, head cheese, pickles, apple butter, and preserves were made. It was also the place where soap, candles, and vinegar were manufactured. Agricultural implements were then few and simple, and farmers made as many of them as they could. Every farmhouse was a creamery and cheese factory. As there were no sewing machines, the farmer's wife and daughters had to ply the hand needle most of the time when they were not engaged in more laborious pursuits. During the long evenings they generally knit socks and mittens or made rag carpets. [Footnote: Nourse, Agricultural Economics, p 64, from "The Farmer's Changed Conditions," by Rodney Welsh, in the Forum, x, 689-92 (Feb., 1891).]
THE PRICE OF INDEPENDENCE
But even under such conditions as those described, the farmer and his family were not wholly independent. Even Robinson Crusoe on his lonely island was dependent upon the tools and equipment that he saved from shipwrecks, and that were the product of other men's labor. So, also, the pioneer farmer had to maintain some kind of relation, however infrequent and slight, with the outside world. Moreover, he had to pay for his comparative independence by many privations. He had all the wants described in the preceding chapter, but he had to provide for them in the simplest way possible, and often they were hardly provided for at all.