And I knew that you were a demanding boss, expecting the best. At least I maintained last year's business. I kept expenses enough in line, controlled inventory sufficiently, and made enough sales that we were flat against last year. He was released on the spot without even the hope of drawing unemployment. The stewardship of a company was placed into their hands, and using what they had been given, two men doubled their businesses.
Talent is a unit of money equal to the annual salary of a working man for twenty years.
No matter how you figure it, each man was placed in trust of a sum of money, far greater than he could immediately hope to possess, and the appropriation was based entirely on his own personal abilities. Each man had the tools to be a successful trustee of his master's money. And that is what this story is about, not equality of gifts, but the individual faithfulness with which we develop our individual capabilities. The managers who used their abilities to increase the size of their master's holdings did not treat the money as if it belonged to them. Each understood that they had been placed in trust and trust demands an accounting.