Rich men did not implant in the human heart the all but universal passion for progress. Rich men did not put into the human skull the marvelous mechanism of the human mind. Rich men did not endow that mind with the body to carry out its will. Wealth has not made the great pictures or paintings, has not written the great books nor achieved the great discoveries, nor erected the great institutions, nor evolved any of the glories of the emancipation of man, social, political, industrial, intellectual. _All_ these we owe to men in whom the wealth-getting instinct was at most a shriveled rudiment. Wealth did not build this Republic in its present majesty; Pliny the younger said--and said truly--that wealth had ruined Rome. Concentrated wealth, breeder of parasitism and patronage, has shriveled and rotted--always, everywhere. If history had not been written by snobs and persons tainted with aristocratic error, this fact would be as clear as print could make it. The real wealth, the real riches of humanity are these capable minds and capable bodies, the creators of intelligent, progress-producing thought and action. The value of civilization, of an orderly social system, is great to, and is keenly felt by, the rich. But that value is just as great to, just as keenly felt by, the masses. Are they not wholly dependent upon it for well-being, just as are the rich--no more, no less? And the work of preparing the oncoming generation for the preservation and improvement of the social structure is done in each generation not by the rich, not by generosity and benevolence, but by the masses themselves in a myriad of homes, in a myriad of schoolhouses, in the hourly personal and helpful intercourse of a myriad intelligent, aspiring men, women and children. It is not concentrated wealth that places the resources of the world at the disposal of the masses. It is the intelligence of the masses, demanding those resources, that enables concentrated wealth to gain its too often hideously unjust demands. Concentrated wealth may to a limited extent promote progress; but that is overbalanced by the fact that concentrated wealth still more heavily penalizes progress. If civilization, freedom, love of order, were dependent for their existence or spread in any large degree upon the rich philanthropist and his fellow-millionaires, cataclysm would be a mild word for what would be about to befall us. As for the “spirit of commercialism and greed,” what reason is there to suppose it stronger now than in the past? Because the wealth-producing capacity of the masses has enormously increased, because the opportunities for earning comfort have infinitely multiplied, because millions are striving for prosperity now where the few once monopolized it all--are these reasons for accusing us to-day of being greedy and growing greedier?