The New Orleans crescent., 1868-03-01
rnHE ANr1c1pAr1vE FACULTY.

ence of this balance-wheel, regulating all the
other forces, is indispensable to the constitr-
ton of healthy and symmetrical natures.
The want of il in an individual is easily de-
tected. He is almost certain to overdo or un-
derdo every pursuit of business or of pleasure
to which he may address himself from choice,
and every labor, for himself or for others,
which circumstances may devolve upon him.
1t is mere accident if he happens to per-
ceive, strike for and hit the true mark 1t is
a mere accident, that is to say, if he attains
suficiency without superfuity, or if he avoids
superhuity without sinking to deficiency.
The pendulum of his existence vibrates be-
tween surfeit and famine, between food and
drouth And, his career finished, it is safe
to suppose that his whole life may be summed
up as continuous oscillation from one ex-
treme to another extreme, with disaster on
disaster filing up the interim.
The unanticipative man, to be sure, may
achieve success and glory. But beware of
trusting to the solidity of the one or to the
enduring brightness of the other. The sue
cess is apt TO be as insecure of foundation as
the unstable house of the sacred parable; and
the glory is apt to prove, like the evanescent
glare of a confagration, only the illumination
of imminent ruin. No matter what good i'm
pulses the unanticipatiye man may expert
ence, the moral integrity of his outward con-
duct is never assured. Intrusted with the
management of momentous public concerns,
however richly endowed he may be other
wise with special faculties and aptitudes, he
is like an infant, of supernatural strength but
of merely natural discretion for its age,
handling edged tools and deadly firearms.
He does not see the evils which crowd in the
path that he is pursuing, until he is directly
upon them and it is too late to retrace his
steps. And there is always more or less of
moral culpability in his blindness to the COM
ing catastrophe. Fearing that prudence
would be construed into timidity, or impa-
tient of the restraints of care and solicitude,
he goes on with false courage, brave only
by the weak trick of eluding the sight and
the thought of danger. The man of due
vigilance and forecast, the man in whom
there is a wholesome play of the anticipative
faculty, can never be thus surprised; but will
ever be forewarned, and, as far as the case will
admit, forearmed against disaster. The most
brilliant charlatans and criminals have invari-
ably, in the end, been found fatally wanting
in respect to the anticipative faculty. We
can only explain Cagliostro and John Law,
a Dick Turpin and Monroe Edwards, by re-
ferring them to a rare combination of talent,
audacity and unanticipative stupidity. In a
certain sense, fraud and meanness, all devia-
tions from moral rectitude in matters of trade,
are possible simply because some men are too
much stepped in stupid selfshness to antici-
pate prudentiy the consequences of their
actions. With them a habit of prudent anti
cipation would be the equivalent of moral in
tegrity. To teach them the value of such a
habit, and how to practice it, would be to
reform them. The difficulty is to get the
shrewd and clever, the so-called worldly wise,
to comprehend that they can not afford to be
crooked, tricky, and dishonest in their
courses. MIR. A. T. Stewart, of New York,
however an exception apparently to his class,
seems to have discovered this golden truth
and to have turned it to immense account
according to him, is that he has had no secret,
but has trusted implicitly to the results of
open and fair dealing Thus the case is stated
in his words:
People come to me and ask me for my secret of
success; why, have no secret, tell them. Ny
business has been matter of principle from the
start. That's all there is about it. If the golden
rule can be Incorporated into purely mercantile
affairs, it has been done in this establishment and
you must have noticed, if you have observed
closely, that the Customers are treated precisely
as the seller himself would like to be treated were
he in their place. That is to say, nothing is mis-
represented, the price is fixed aud for all at
the lowest possible figure and the circumstances
of the buyer not suffered to influence the sales
man 10 bis conduct in the smallest particular. |
think you will find the same principle OF Justice
throughout the larger tsnsactioLs of the house.
and especially in its dealings with employers. |
do rot speak of il as deserving of praise-we fad
it absolutely necessary. What we cannot afford
is violation Of principle.
Now, let US illustrate by a different exam
pie the maxim that immortality in trade can
not be justified on sound business principles.
One of the leading English journals points
out an instance of the disastrous conse luences
which has ultimately ensued from a species of
deceptious adulteration practiced in Eng
lish manufactures; a device considered allow
able, it seems, as judged by the average of
English trade morals. We are told that, ''for
several years the Lancashire cotton manufac-
turers and the London merchants have been
using an inferior cotton staple, and even using
short quantities Of that, in the fabrics sent to
market in other countries and especially to
India. The deficient weight and quality are
concealed by large additions of white clay in
corporated into the cloth at the mills, and this 1
makes it heavy and gives it a fair appearance
to the eye. But when it comes to be worn
and washed. IL heenres fimsv and woak
Sometimes it will hardly endure the effects of
a voyage by sea without turning rusty and
rotten. The East India natives have found
this out, and most of them now refuse to buy
even the good manufactures from England
The trade is in danger of being lost"
The London Times long ago uttered words
of warning on this subject, and, in conse-
quence of not needing them, the interest to
which they were addressed is now threatened