The Newtown bee., 1880-11-24
American Wealth.

It IS 8 stock remark that Americans
 love the dollar. The saying. like most stock sayings, misses the point; the real point is, not that Americans love money more than other people, but that they | love comparatively few things besides money. We have fewer objects of serious pursuit than other Western | nations have; we do not, as 8 people, pursue the fine arts, or literature, or scholarship, or society with the zeal or the fruitfulness that we find in European 1 communities, and so we are regarded as still being somew hat deficient in our duties as civilized nation. We love | these things less than the old world communities love them. We do not love money more than they-probably | indeed. not so much as they. 1t is the | exclusiveness, not the zeal, of our pur- suit of money that is the thing to be regretted. Some day, perhaps, we shall | try to do better than this; meanwhile, most of US pursue the dollar without thinking of stopping much for rest until we take rest where no work is. No community thinks so little about Irest l from work as ours.
 We seek money and we find it; yet do we love it either well or intelligently enough to use it fruitfully, to keep it sa ely, or to bequeath it wisely? First let us glance at the wealth we possess as nation. Let us sec what place century of money making has given us. We call ourselves rich people; how rich a people are wep And first. where do we stand as to the total valuation of the national wealth.
 We stand near the head of the list third on the list of all the W estern nations. The United Kingdom of Great | Britain and Ireland heads the list with capital valuation of S44, AGO. .000, ,000 then France with S36 TOO, 000 G00 the United States with $32 O00, GOO, ,000, Rus sia with SIS GOO GOO. .000, and the Low Countries with SIl, l50, ,000, 900 of capital collectively. These are the valuations made by those countries of their entire resources. What is the average annual income per inhabitant in the various l countries? We come to the front in this comparison. The average annual in come in the United Kingdom is $I65; in the United States, $l65 also; in the Low Countries, Sl30; in France, $l25; in the British colonies $90; in Germany and also in Scandinavia, S65. In this reckon ing, Russia, with her 90, 100000 of peo- pie, is out of sight as yet; she will not be very long.
 Once more, taking the question from another point of view, let us ask: What is our annual accumulation of wealth, as compared with the annual accumula- tion of other nationsp And here we step far in advance Of any community which gives us full estimates; it should be borne in mind, however, that the rate of interest for agricultural capital, with us, is double the average rate for | Europe.
 The annual accumulation of wealth, then, in Germany, $20O, ,000, ,00O; it is S325. .O0O, ,OOO in the United Kingdom, $375, 900 GOO in France; in the United States S825, ,OOO, 900. Our increase ot national wealth since 1880, says good English aut hority, would be enough to purchase "the whole German empire, with it's farms, cities, banks, shipping, manufacturers, etc. The annual accu- mutation has been Ss25, ,00O,t co, and therefore each decade adds more to the wealth of the United States than the capital value of Italy or Spain. Every day the sun rises upon the American people it sees an addition of S2, 300,0 ,0O0 | 10 the wealth of the republic"
 These are figures to make a poor man expect wealth; but let us hasten to say that they do not prove us any happier or wiser, or more estimable in the sight of l the world, than many sanother poorer nation is. What these figures prove is 8 different thing; they prove the bounty of | nature toward an energetic race; they 1 do not prove what we sometimes take | for granted on the strength of them, that our nation is great or admirable in | the greatest and most admirable things. | No; we have been busted with necessary | things; in great and admirable things our record is still, for the most part to be made- HGT1eT'S MGQGzine,