The long and short of the matter is that the sudden creation of wealth in the United States has been too much for our people. We are personally dishonest. The people of the United States are notably and peculiarly dishonest in financial matters. The effect of this on government is but one of the forms in which the ruling passion is manifest. “What is there in it for me?” is the state of mind in which our people have been existing. Out of this come the popular philosophy, the social life, the architecture, the letters, the temper of the age; all tinged with the passion. * * * * * Let us look at the popular philosophy of the day. An almost ludicrous disbelief that any one can be really disinterested is met at once. Any one who takes an intelligent interest in public affairs becomes a “reformer.” He is liked, if it can be reasonably inferred that he is advancing his own interests. Otherwise he is incomprehensible. He is respected, because it is impossible not to respect him, but he is regarded as a mistaken fellow, a man who interferes with things that are not his business, a meddler. The unspoken religion of all sensible men inculcates thrift as the first virtue. Business thunders at the young man, “Thou shalt have none other gods but me.” Nor is it a weak threat, for business, when it speaks, means business. The young doctor in the small town who advocates reform loses practice for two reasons: first, because it is imagined that he is not a serious man, not a good doctor, if he gives time to things outside his profession; second, because the carriage-maker does not agree with him and regards it as a moral duty to punish him. The newsdealer in the Arcade at Rector Street lost custom because it was discovered that he was a Bryan man. The bankers would not buy papers of him. Since the days of David, the great luxury of the powerful has been to be free from the annoyance of other persons’ opinions. The professional classes in any community are parasites on the moneyed classes; they attend the distribution. They cannot strike the hand that feeds them. In a country where economic laws tend to throw the money into the hands of a certain type of men, the morality of those men is bound to affect society very seriously. The world-famous “timidity” of Americans in matters of opinion, is the outward and visible sign of a mental preoccupation. Tocqueville thought it was due to their democratic form of government. It is not due to democracy, but to commercial conditions. In Tocqueville’s day it arose out of the slavery question, solely because that question affected trade.