on finds
the preparation of a patient who is to go under the knife as important
as the operation itself. My readers, unacquainted with the intricate
details of finance and confused by the angry outcries and denials of
those I had attacked, required education _en route_ to be able to absorb
and digest the hard facts and strong statements I was dealing out to
them in monthly instalments. My publishers agreed with me as to the
necessity of dealing in some radical way with the emergency, and devoted
to my service additional pages in the back of _Everybody's Magazine_.
Here I decided to begin a department to be called "Lawson and His
Critics" in which I would solve the knotty problems my correspondents
presented to me, set right their misunderstandings, and reply fully to
those critics who had aspersed my motives or were attempting to
discredit my message.

I began the department in October, 1904, and though I have been most
seriously pressed for time, and in many instances have dealt imperfectly
with the problems treated, I must say that the task I set myself has
proved interesting and agreeable, and the letters the department evoked
have been a tremendous source of inspiration and encouragement to me
along the hail-stony road I had set myself to travel.

The bulk of the department during the months of 1904 was devoted to the
subject of insurance. In an early chapter of my story I said that the
three great insurance corporations, the New York Life, the Equitable,
and the Mutual Life of New York, were an integral part of the "System,"
and especially instanced the New York Life as one of the most pliable
tools of the "Made Dollar" makers. This statement, so mild and so vague
in view of subsequent developments, was the first move in the historic
controversy that has resulted in the extraordinary exposures that are
being made as this book goes to press. When that first pebble was
thrown, the surface of the insurance pond was as placid as a mountain
lake, unruffled by a ripple, and in it were reflected the benignant
faces of the noble philanthropists who consented to spend their days
conserving the interests of the widows and the orphans of America. The
people had grown so accustomed to regarding the McCalls, the Perkinses,
the Hydes, the McCurdys, and the Alexanders, whose eminent physiognomies
looked out at them from their insurance policies, as lofty and generous
souls far removed from thoughts of pelf or self-aggrandizement