Random Reminiscences of Men and Events
Here again I would venture to utter a word of caution to business men.
Let them study their own affairs frankly, and face the truth. If their
methods are extravagant, let them realize the facts and act
accordingly. One cannot successfully go against natural tendencies,
and it is folly to fail to recognize them. It is not easy for so
impressionable and imaginative a people as we Americans are to come
down to plain, hard facts, yet we are doing it without loss of
self-esteem or prestige throughout the world.
CHAPTER VI
THE DIFFICULT ART OF GIVING
It is, no doubt, easy to write platitudes and generalities about the
joys of giving, and the duty that one owes to one's fellow men, and to
put together again all the familiar phrases that have served for
generations whenever the subject has been taken up.
I can hardly hope to succeed in starting any new interest in this
great subject when gifted writers have so often failed. Yet I confess
I find much more interest in it at this time than in rambling on, as I
have been doing, about the affairs of business and trade. It is most
difficult, however, to dwell upon a very practical and business-like
side of benefactions generally, without seeming to ignore, or at least
to fail to appreciate fully, the spirit of giving which has its source
in the heart, and which, of course, makes it all worth while.
In this country we have come to the period when we can well afford to
ask the ablest men to devote more of their time, thought, and money to
the public well-being. I am not so presumptuous as to attempt to
define exactly what this betterment work should consist of. Every man
will do that for himself, and his own conclusion will be final for
himself. It is well, I think, that no narrow or preconceived plan
should be set down as the best.
I am sure it is a mistake to assume that the possession of money in
great abundance necessarily brings happiness. The very rich are just
like all the rest of us; and if they get pleasure from the possession
of money, it comes from their ability to do things which give
satisfaction to someone besides themselves.
LIMITATIONS OF THE RICH
The mere expenditure of money for things, so I am told by those who
profess to know, soon palls upon one. The novelty of being able to
purchase anything one wants soon passes, because what people most seek
cannot be bought with money. These rich men we read about in the
newspapers cannot get personal returns beyond a well-defined limit for
their expenditure. They cannot gratify the pleasures of the palate
beyond very moderate bounds, since they cannot purchase a good
digestion; they cannot lavish very much money on fine raiment for
themselves or their families without suffering from public ridicule;
and in their homes they cannot go much beyond the comforts of the less
wealthy without involving them in more pain than pleasure. As I study
wealthy men, I can see but one way in which they can secure a real
equivalent for money spent, and that is to cultivate a taste for
giving where the money may produce an effect which will be a lasting
gratification.
A man of business may often most properly consider that he does his
share in building up a property which gives steady work for few or
many people; and his contribution consists in giving to his employees
good working conditions, new opportunities, and a strong stimulus to
good work. Just so long as he has the welfare of his employees in his
mind and follows his convictions, no one can help honouring such a
man. It would be the narrowest sort of view to take, and I think the
meanest, to consider that good works consist chiefly in the outright
giving of money.
THE BEST PHILANTHROPY
The best philanthropy, the help that does the most good and the least
harm, the help that nourishes civilization at its very root, that most
widely disseminates health, righteousness, and happiness, is not what
is usually called charity. It is, in my judgment, the investment of
effort or time or money, carefully considered with relation to the
power of employing people at a remunerative wage, to expand and
develop the resources at hand, and to give opportunity for progress
and healthful labour where it did not exist before. No mere
money-giving is comparable to this in its lasting and beneficial
results.
If, as I am accustomed to think, this statement is a correct one, how
vast indeed is the philanthropic field! It may be urged that the daily
vocation of life is one thing, and the work of philanthropy quite
another. I have no sympathy with this notion. The man who plans to do
all his giving on Sunday is a poor prop for the institutions of the
country.
The excuse for referring so often to the busy man of affairs is that
his help is most needed. I know of men who have followed out this
large plan of developing work, not as a temporary matter, but as a
permanent principle. These men have taken up doubtful enterprises and
carried them through to success often at great risk, and in the face
of great scepticism, not as a matter only of personal profit, but in
the larger spirit of general uplift.
DISINTERESTED SERVICE THE ROAD TO SUCCESS
If I were to give advice to a young man starting out in life, I should
say to him: If you aim for a large, broad-gauged success, do not begin
your business career, whether you sell your labour or are an
independent producer, with the idea of getting from the world by hook
or crook all you can. In the choice of your profession or your
business employment, let your first thought be: Where can I fit in so
that I may be most effective in the work of the world? Where can I
lend a hand in a way most effectively to advance the general
interests? Enter life in such a spirit, choose your vocation in that
way, and you have taken the first step on the highest road to a large
success. Investigation will show that the great fortunes which have
been made in this country, and the same is probably true of other
lands, have come to men who have performed great and far-reaching
economic services--men who, with great faith in the future of their
country, have done most for the development of its resources. The man
will be most successful who confers the greatest service on the world.
Commercial enterprises that are needed by the public will pay.
Commercial enterprises that are not needed fail, and ought to fail.
On the other hand, the one thing which such a business philosopher
would be most careful to avoid in his investments of time and effort
or money, is the unnecessary duplication of existing industries. He
would regard all money spent in increasing needless competition as
wasted, and worse. The man who puts up a second factory when the
factory in existence will supply the public demand adequately and
cheaply is wasting the national wealth and destroying the national
prosperity, taking the bread from the labourer and unnecessarily
introducing heartache and misery into the world.
Probably the greatest single obstacle to the progress and happiness of
the American people lies in the willingness of so many men to invest
their time and money in multiplying competitive industries instead of
opening up new fields, and putting their money into lines of industry
and development that are needed. It requires a better type of mind to
seek out and to support or to create the new than to follow the worn
paths of accepted success; but here is the great chance in our still
rapidly developing country. The penalty of a selfish attempt to make
the world confer a living without contributing to the progress or
happiness of mankind is generally a failure to the individual. The
pity is that when he goes down he inflicts heartache and misery also
on others who are in no way responsible.
THE GENEROSITY OF SERVICE
Probably the most generous people in the world are the very poor, who
assume each other's burdens in the crises which come so often to the
hard pressed. The mother in the tenement falls ill and the neighbour
in the next room assumes her burdens. The father loses his work, and
neighbours supply food to his children from their own scanty store.
How often one hears of cases where the orphans are taken over and
brought up by the poor friend whose benefaction means great additional
hardship! This sort of genuine service makes the most princely gift
from superabundance look insignificant indeed. The Jews have had for
centuries a precept that one-tenth of a man's possessions must be
devoted to good works, but even this measure of giving is but a rough
yardstick to go by. To give a tenth of one's income is wellnigh an
impossibility to some, while to others it means a miserable pittance.
If the spirit is there, the matter of proportion is soon lost sight
of. It is only the spirit of giving that counts, and the very poor
give without any self-consciousness. But I fear that I am dealing with
generalities again.
The education of children in my early days may have been
straightlaced, yet I have always been thankful that the custom was
quite general to teach young people to give systematically of money
that they themselves had earned. It is a good thing to lead children
to realize early the importance of their obligations to others but, I
confess, it is increasingly difficult; for what were luxuries then
have become commonplaces now. It should be a greater pleasure and
satisfaction to give money for a good cause than to earn it, and I
have always indulged the hope that during my life I should be able to
help establish efficiency in giving so that wealth may be of greater
use to the present and future generations.
Perhaps just here lies the difference between the gifts of money and
of service. The poor meet promptly the misfortunes which confront the
home circle and household of the neighbour. The giver of money, if his
contribution is to be valuable, must add service in the way of study,
and he must help to attack and improve underlying conditions. Not
being so pressed by the racking necessities, it is he that should be
better able to attack the subject from a more scientific standpoint;
but the final analysis is the same: his money is a feeble offering
without the study behind it which will make its expenditure effective.
Great hospitals conducted by noble and unselfish men and women are
doing wonderful work; but no less important are the achievements in
research that reveal hitherto unknown facts about diseases and provide
the remedies by which many of them can be relieved or even stamped
out.
To help the sick and distressed appeals to the kind-hearted always,
but to help the investigator who is striving successfully to attack
the causes which bring about sickness and distress does not so
strongly attract the giver of money. The first appeals to the
sentiments overpoweringly, but the second has the head to deal with.
Yet I am sure we are making wonderful advances in this field of
scientific giving. All over the world the need of dealing with the
questions of philanthropy with something beyond the impulses of
emotion is evident, and everywhere help is being given to those heroic
men and women who are devoting themselves to the practical and
essentially scientific tasks. It is a good and inspiring thing to
recall occasionally the heroism, for example, of the men who risked
and sacrificed their lives to discover the facts about yellow fever, a
sacrifice for which untold generations will bless them; and this same
spirit has animated the professions of medicine and surgery.
SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH
How far may this spirit of sacrifice properly extend? A great number
of scientific men every year give up everything to arrive at some
helpful contribution to the sum of human knowledge, and I have