The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1873-02-04
The Accumulation of Wealth

The Accumulation of Wealth.
Is anything more needed than money?
That the poor need it is certain but is 1t
any the less needed by those who have
competency For, needed or not the
passion for its possession and rctcntion is
the master passion of the age 1t is so
in this country. That money is of real
value, an important acquisition, conven-
lent instrument as representative OF val
ues, and as therefore the readiest means
- ~1,;~;n, oil o'hor things ovccnt wis
dom aud virtue, and is even an import
ant means Of attaining these even, no one
can deny. Thus, for the good which it
may secure, for the evil it may avert,and
for the convenience it affords, money is
an Indispensable clement in the practical
economies OF life.
To have enough of it is desirable; but
to know when one has enough of it is diff
iicult. How much will do? What is a
competency? With how much are men
satisfied? That every man should have
enough, we admit, but how much is that ?
Who can answer? We're We to look for
an answer at the common practices, and
the ruling idea around US, what solution
Of the question should we arrive az? Ger
tainly at nothing satisfactory For the
trouble is, that when we make money we
are scarcely ever its masters. The yell
low slave becomes the imperial tyrant.
Instead of possessing their wealth, it pos
sesses them. 1t becomes a god,and what
crowds worship according to the mean
service vf its iduatry.
The lure viii; it exerts over and upon
us,s wonderfully seductive. 1t leads Us to
outrun all precedent and wise limitation.
1t punges US on in wild career of reck-
less enterprises II We reach n just CON-
potency, who Of US can stop at that and
rest satisfied in proper appreciation OF
it? The truth is, when We gain that
point, that fatal love of money which
Paul characterized as "the root OF all evil"
usually is formed, even if it were not so
at the outset To that competency we
must add surpusage after surpusage, and
these, having augmented the perils of our
position, demand, with an exacting per-
sistency, additional securities. The race
becomes feariuly heated. Prudent coun-
sells are disregarded. Daring specula-
tions and vicious expenditures, and reck-
less schemes alone fill up the measure of
the excited mania. From being means,
money becomes an end-an end at once
imperious and destructive. And then we
are as veritably its slaves, its shackled
minions, its iguoble subjects, as ever man
Was made by passion or power. In all
this its revenges are fearful Erie, with
its jim Fisks and Jay Goulds, and Con-
gress with its Credit Mobliers, and the
extensive stealings of Tweed & Co., and
fraudulent delalcatoDs, robberies, frauds
counterieiting, aud crimes Of deeper hue
stand forth as the exactest commentary
Of its deadly power
What vice does avarice become A
hopeless terrible vice None holds its
victims more securely than Mammon.
Few, who yield to his seductive spell, ev-
er regain self.control, ever are able to
throw off and hurl away his golden tet-
tiers. Avarice is an insidious passion. 1t
glides into the soul like serpent ilto a
wall or thicket, aud wraps its massive
folds around its interior life. The man
himself yields to its fascinating power.
The eye itself succumbs. Yet we do not
disparage wealth. By its legitimate use
the individual faculties are developed, and
at the same time mutual dependence is
promoted. The enterprises and minis
tries Of benevolence employ it. 1t feeds
the hungry, clothes the naked, shelters
the houseIess, erects hospitals, consoles
the afflicted, diffuses education, aids rel
igion, builds houses of worship, is mis-
sionary, both at home and abroad.
BY so wide a use of its instrumental
ty, it enables men of capital to perform
deeds, which shall live after then, diffus-
ing blessings through all future time.
Such men, TO whom God has given the
faculty Of amassing wealth, possess a
higher power than genius can furnish, and
may fill grander opportunities of useful
ness, and may call forth from the world
more grateful membranes.
The official census shows that, in 1850
the amount of property, real and person
al, in the United States,wa 81 900, OO0,-
600; by 1850 it advanced to more than
sl6,000,0OO,0O0; by 1870 to 10000
100000. What nation can show great
err advance? What one has the means
of showing it? In ten years, our aggre-
gate property much more than doubled
in twenty years, it much more than quad
ruplcd. The present generation has wit
messed this vast and rapid accumulation,
and that in about two-thrds The time Of
a generation.
Now couple this fact with what we
have said of the peculiarly ensnariDg
power of money, which other nations and
other times, as well as our own, illustrate,
especially when wealth leads inevitably