Commerce is an increasing factor in the business world. It includes both exchange and transportation and stands next in importance to production. Production comes first, but production could only be conducted on a limited scale without the exchange of merchandise. To desire to gain an honorable distinction in this department of labor is a worthy ambition. He who improves the instruments of trade by bringing purchaser and consumer nearer together, thus facilitating exchange, may count himself a real benefactor. But even here there are temptations to be avoided. Let me suggest three. First, speculation. I do not mean to say that the element of chance can be entirely eliminated from any kind of business. The farmer takes his chances upon the seasons; the merchant takes his chances upon the market; the railroad owner takes his chances upon both the season and the market; and we all take our chances upon sickness and death. Uncertainty enters into every human calculation, but a distinction can be drawn between those uncertainties which are unavoidable and those uncertainties which are of the very essence of the transaction. There is a legitimate work for the stock exchange and for the chamber of commerce, but there is an illegitimate and vicious speculation on the stock exchange and the produce market which has lured many business men to their fall. The ordinary methods of accumulation are necessarily slow when competition is left free to regulate profits, while the gambler is spurred on by the hope of quickly realizing a large profit upon a small investment. It is not strange that many are charmed by the siren song of the stock ticker, but it means ruin, and to the extent that a man yields to the temptation his morals are weakened. There is but one sure measure of rewards, viz., one that compensates each in proportion as he serves society. The securing of something for nothing by a lucky turn of a card, or by a sudden change in the market paralyzes one's purpose, and, in time, renders him unfit for patient and persistent effort. I might emphasize the fact that gambling in stocks and farm products often leads to embezzlement, larceny and suicide, for these are the fruits of speculation when it becomes a disease. But I prefer to put my argument against gambling upon the broader ground that it is, in all cases, a demoralizing influence, whether the gambler wins or loses. I might dwell upon the evil effects of speculation upon innocent parties whose property is juggled up or juggled down by the manipulations of the market, but I would appeal, not only to the innocent outsider, but to those who may be tempted by the profits promised to the inside ring. I would suggest, however, that those who by cornering the market suspend the law of supply and demand, add crime to vice and defraud those who are induced to invest in a "chance" which has no actual existence.