oks are the index of
their folly. They waste their years in a vain pursuit, which they cannot
resist. They exclude from their lives all that makes life worth living,
that they may acquire innumerable specimens of a precious metal. Gold
is their end, not the gratification it may bring. Mr Rockefeller will go
out of the world as limited in intelligence, as uninstructed in mind,
as he was when he entered it. The lessons of history and literature are
lost upon him. The joys for which wise men strive have never been his.
He is the richest man on earth, and his position and influence are the
heaviest indictment of wealth that can be made. His power begins and
ends at the curbstone of Wall Street. His painfully gathered millions
he must leave behind. Even the simple solace of a quiet conscience is
denied to the most of his class. Is there one of them who is not haunted
in hours of depression by the memory of bloody strikes, of honest men
squeezed out, of rival works shut down?

In a kind of dread they turn to philanthropy. They fling from their
chariots bundles of bank-notes to appease the wolves of justice.
Universities grow ignobly rich upon their hush-money. They were
accurately described three centuries ago by Robert Burton as "gouty
benefactors, who, when by fraud and rapine they have extorted all their
lives, oppressed whole provinces, societies, &c., give something to
pious uses, build a satisfactory almshouse, school, or bridge, &c, at
their last end, or before perhaps, which is no otherwise than to steal
a goose and stick down a feather, rob a thousand to relieve ten." If
America were wise she would not accept even the feather without the
closest scrutiny. Money never loses the scent of its origin, and when
the very rich explain how much they ought to give to their fellows, they
should carry back their inquiry a stage farther. They should tell us why
they took so much, why they suppressed the small factory, why they made
bargains with railways to the detriment of others, why they used their
wealth as an instrument of oppression. If their explanation be not
sufficient, they should not be permitted to unload their gold upon a
stricken country; they should not buy a cheap reputation for generosity
with money that is not their own.

It may be said that the millionaire decrees the punishment for his own
crimes. That is true enough, but the esteem in which America holds him
inflicts a wrong upon the whole community. Where