Russell H. Conwell, founder of the Institutional church in America : $b the work and the manBurr, Agnes Rush
Religion
Russell H. Conwell, founder of the Institutional church in America : $b the work and the man
Burr, Agnes Rush
Conwell, Russell H., 1843-1925; Minneapolis (Minn.) -- Biography
higher work or work longer; that is a dangerous thing, and in order to
get every laboring man free and every American equal to every other
American, let the laboring man ask what he is worth and get it--not
let any capitalist say to him: "You shall work for me for half of what
you are worth;" nor let any labor organization say: "You shall work for
the capitalist for half your worth." Be a man, be independent, and
then shall the laboring man find the road ever open from poverty to
wealth. The other difficulty that the labor union has to consider, and
this problem they have to solve themselves, is the kind of orators who
come and talk to them about the oppressive rich. I can in my
dreams recite the oration I have heard again and again under such
circumstances. My life has been with the laboring man. I am a laboring
man myself. I have often, in their assemblies, heard the speech of the
man who has been invited to address the labor union. The man gets up
before the assembled company of honest laboring men and he begins by
saying: "Oh, ye honest, industrious laboring men, who have furnished
all the capital of the world, who have built all the palaces and
constructed all the railroads and covered the ocean with her
steamships. Oh, you laboring men! You are nothing but slaves; you are
ground down in the dust by the capitalist who is gloating over you as
he enjoys his beautiful estates and as he has his banks filled with
gold, and every dollar he owns is coined out of the hearts' blood of
the honest laboring man." Now, that is a lie, and you know it is a
lie; and yet that is the kind of speech that they are all the time
hearing, representing the capitalists as wicked and the laboring men
so enslaved. Why, how wrong it is! Let the man who loves his flag and
believes in American principles endeavor with all his soul to bring
the capitalist and the laboring man together until they stand side by
side, and arm in arm, and work for the common good of humanity.
He is an enemy to his country who sets capital against labor or labor
against capital.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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