And Mr. Louis Post says in “The Public” of Chicago: “Our leisurely friends of Philadelphia, who are to be envied, by the way, and not sneered at, for being philosophical enough and sensible enough to keep so much unwholesome hustle out of their lives—these slow and sober people must have been ‘startled’ by the above ‘revelations’ of the Philadelphia North American, that ancient landmark, now in its 128th year.[2] It was undoubtedly an amazing surprise in view of its age that the answer of its readers was, as you see, ‘revolution and bloodshed.’ If similar questions were presented to the thinking public of the various cities of the United States, we might have thousands of like opinions and all of them would be conditioned by sufficient reasons. One of the most prominent thinkers of the city of Chicago[3] also quite recently said that “the Twentieth Century will bring to us the bloodiest revolution that human [SN: OPINIONS OF LEARNED MEN.] history ever witnessed.” And his assertion was not less amazing than was the affirmation of the substantial business men of Philadelphia. If it were honest and right to expose the names of men whose confidential conversations led to the same or similar assertions, I alone could make a long list of these names. They all admit that the nation, as an organism, has long been diseased; its nerves have long been abnormally strained. But, like the friends of Philadelphia, they speak about revolution and bloodshed which is but the last and most convulsive stage of any nation’s serious disease. And it is true that, when this stage is reached, it is impossible to avoid the most intolerable operation. But the amazing feature of such opinions is that different men agree in affirming that revolution and bloodshed is almost unavoidable; yet different men, as I know, [SN: CAUSES OF UNREST.] assign different causes for such an undesirable event.[4] Some say it must come because the population increases and the unemployed laborers increase. Others say that the trusts, combinations, and monopolies must ruin the nation. Still others say that progress and poverty, being very rapid in their diverse directions, must rapidly bring the wealthy and the poor into the state of cut-throats against each other. And only very few men understand that all these causes are but secondary, though working to the same horrible end. While the real, effective cause for revolution and bloodshed, with the nation, is the exceedingly unequal distribution of wealth, and its rapid concentration in a very few hands. It is this situation that our democratic people will not be able to endure, because they are born [SN: PEOPLE THINK THEY ARE BORN FREE.] free, whereas the storing up of wealth in a few hands makes them all economic slaves; deprives them of the privileges they enjoyed; makes them absolutely dependent upon the mercies of the rich, which, if shown to them, they may live; if withheld from them, they must starve to death.