. His mind dwelt on
that side of every question which involved the interest and welfare of
the whole mass of mankind, and his religious philosophy was pure
Humanitarianism. His reverence for Comte was the result of his
intellectual conviction that in his altruistic teaching was to be
found the only remedy for the wrongs and sufferings of the world.

In personal intercourse Mr. Croly was suggestive, inspiring and
encouraging. It was always with a slight shock to preconceived
notions and prejudices that one listened to his comments on any
current movement or event, for he was sure to take an original and
characteristic view which could not be calculated.

From Mrs. Croly's Contribution to Her Husband's Memorial

Mr. Croly was in his twenty-seventh year when I first knew him, but as
yet had made no mark in journalism. He had not found his place in it.
He was employed as City Editor of the New York _Herald_--a position
which had not then developed the importance which attaches to it
to-day--and his duties consisted mainly of making out the "slate" for
the staff of reporters, and doing such reportorial work as it was the
province and habit of the City Editor to perform. This afforded little
scope for a man of Mr. Croly's latent power; and his dissatisfaction
and desire to find a new field was the cause of our going West within
three years after our marriage and starting a daily paper in a Western
town. Had the town been larger the story would have been different. As
it was, we spent our money, not without result; for Mr. Croly
discovered that his forte was not execution, but direction, and that
his fertility of brain only needed a sufficiently wide field to
develop powers capable of greater expansion.

He was the most utterly destitute of the mechanical or "doing" faculty
of any man I ever saw, and never used his own hands if he could
possibly help it. But ideas flowed freely upon all subjects in which
he was interested, and he distributed them as freely, knowing that the
reservoir though forever emptied was always full. This amazing
fertility was in some respects a detriment, for it led him into too
many projects, and made him careless whom he enriched, while his
dislike of the mechanism of his work made profit for others at his
expense. I know no other journalist in New York City, during my own
journalistic career of thirty-three years, who has made so many and
such diverse publications, or put so much original