Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1853-1862, 1854-04-09
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iI:5s F7..- o. From the Independent
The EnterpriZe Of MammOn.

foreigner just landed IN New Ork, II mlSt seem
4 that all the energies of the human mind in the
4 highest state of freedom and activity are eoncen-
trated upon the acquisition of wealth. in houses
and lands, in merchandise, in stocks, bonds mort
d cages, and other securities, which go to make up
real or personal estate:-that the whole heart and
soul and mind and strength are bent upon laying
1 up or increasing treasures upon earth No other
city in the world presents in this respect spec
tacle like Newly ork. No where else do YOU see
the same eagerness in look and action among all
classes of citizens; the same impetuous strife the
same restless anxiety the same intense devotion to
one and the same object It is as if the whole city
and each individual inhabitant were under the per-
petua charge of a galvanic battery of the highest
power. oass saa
There is wealth in other great capitals of the
world more wealth and greater population than
! here-but in none of them is there such enterprise
and such competition for wealth. In Paris the
general aspect is that Of gayety-tbe present en-
! ioyment of life in an ervarying round of pleas
ure. There life is a kaleidoscope in which, by
mere changes in the combinations of the same bril-
liant and rejecting surfaces, is produced an infinite
variety of beautiful colors and ingenious forms,
| ever pleasing and ever new. Instead of being I'M
pressed with the energy and activity of the people
| in procuring the means of subsistence, of enjoy
ment or of display, you wonder where they get the
means and how they take the time for such con-
stant peasuPe-seeking
In London the general aspect is that of substan-
tial comfort, of consolidated wealth, Of quiet,
easy regular, hearty life. Enterprise there is but
without enthusiasm; energy, but without haste
Houses and shops have settled quietly upon their
foundations, without fear of being overtopped or
undermined, Their size, shape, color, style, mate
! rial do not matter so much as their comfort and
use They ore not ashamed to look old and dingy.
| Their owners or occupants are not ashamed of
them on that account. Visitors and customers are
not ashamed of them. They belong to estab-
lished order of things The arrival of ten millions
of gold more or less from Australia, does not create
new city set the old one agos for improvements.
! 1t produces comfortable feeling that makes life
enjoyable. You feel every where that wealth is
around you; but il is wealth in use; the standard
of wealth is not capitol assets, but bona fde in
| come for lifes uses and enjoyments. Wealth is
sought, riehOs are priced, but the whole energy of
life is not spent upon eYpedients for moneygeting
nor life itself consumed in the haste to be rich.
| But here how different is the whole aspect of
things. The entire community is moved with
common impulse to get possession of earthly goods.
Life is planned with reference to this. The ar
rangement of the city is not primarily for comfort
for convenience for health for enjoyment, but for
| business and wealth. Every thing proclaims this
one idea;-the hurried step, the eager look the
rapid scanning of the morning advertisements, the
houses, the stores, the banks the hotels, the rail-
ways the shipping-all declare that the one thing
to be done in this city is to get money as fast as
possible and as much as possible.
This feeling grows in intensity; the impress of
MammOn upon society becomes more marked every
year To see this one does not need as Franklin
wished to sleep for fifty years, and then to awake
amid the stirring life of another generation;-a
few months absence, during which the mind has
been so far engrossed in other scenes that it has
made no note of changes at home and from which
1t returns to view these changes from the position
Of an outside spectator,-this temporary lu, amid
an old and stereotyped social order of that excite
ment which is constitutional to an American mind
will suffice for the working of changes mar
vellous than those produced by Aladdins lamp in
eastern fable.
In that brief interval one finds the highways of
the city converted into roads of iron that thread
its vast body like arteries conveying to the most
distant extremties the quick, rushing pulsation of
its heart, and pouring forth an incessant tide of
life from center which notwithstanding this dis
gorging, is always full to repletion;-one sees an
entire new city, large enough to be represented in
the natona, Congress, ready built and furnished
with streets and avenues houses and parks, schools
and churches all complete and occupied, and
claiming to be both the geographical and the NOR
al centre of all things appertaning to this present
creation and this nineteenth century; one sees also
whole blocks and acres of buildings that would be
thought good enough to make city in the old
world leveed to the ground-not by fire, or food
or war or earthquake nor by civil revolution OIL
the ruthless arm of avenging despotism, nor YET
crumbling on their foundations by the decay o.
time or tophng with the insidious grasp of ivy oil
their walls but torn down to make room for Others
more stately, more fashionable, and therefore yield
} ing better rent--the store Of FIVE or ten year
standing dstanced by its more ambitious neighbo
and therefore doomed to be demolished, upon th
sure calculation of greater incomes and all thi
new commercial city sold or leased before it is built
and the merchandise crOwdng the docks, that is t.
fill the unfinished lofts he sees the earth itself dis
!, emboweled and transformed into a vast catacoml
to bury not the dead but the living in vaults, ant
niches and subterranean areas, where the forces O
nature are imprisoned with human life to coin
wealth that natural mines and cavernS can no
yield; he sees palaces that would be the boast c
kings, rearing their polished fronts as an adver
tisement of some snowy tradesman, or Of some mil
! rored and tapestried hotel where the Dollar give
r as good patent to damask and gold as does Ro!
L atty itself. All this is the work of single yea
:; under the tasmanic touch Of Gold.
=. And the tendency is onward in the same dire
tlon; more lands more houses, more merchandls
Il more banks, more railways more stocks, more an
better securities, in one word more WEALTH. n
= body has any thought of resting satisfied; noboo
has business enough, or possessions enough; the eli
is not yet built nor is it likely soon to be- evel
I thing is just in its beginning; ship-buildng al
I'd ocean navigation are new arts yet to be develops
lie ;,, thar ralot;ooc antprnrisa n