Morning journal and courier., 1881-05-16
Sentiment ina B u xiness.
From the New York Times l

! It is to the credit of humanity that its acts I are often better than it's aphor1sms, which are | apt to be spiced with satire or pointed with 1 cynicism, in order to make them striking and 1 easily remembered. The proverbs of nation 1 frequently express the opposite of it's charac- ter Sententiousness Is so at variance with l sympathy and sensibility that these must be l ignored in it's employment. An epigram can never be more than partially true if it were wholly true it's import would be obvious, and l it's quality, therefore, commonplace. Very selfish men are fond of supporting perhaps of excusing. their selfshness by the quotations l of maxims which exhibit our common nature l at it's worst. and give them. in consequence, ] a certain semblance of moral sustainment. One of the commonest of common saws, 1 continually heard in all commercial capitals, l is, ''There is no sentiment in business" l This, in way, is true enough, and proper enough; sentiment and business generally do not, and cannot agree they spring from different sources, and have totally different aims. The first and direct meaning is that 1 the two things can never be associated; that one drive the other out that any attempt to ! reconcile them would begin in folly and end l in failure. But the phrase has secondary and indirect meaning, seldom taken and never implied. There is 8 sentiment in busi- ness and, indeed business in sentiment. Every large, prosperous business has senti- ment, and must have it; intelligent men would
 
 out cegree of sentiment. which helps out, if it does not maintain, all sorts of enterprises Beyond given point at particular stage, sentiment is always introduced and is indis- pensable. Some of the oldest and strongest
 houses in the world have grown to be what they are by a judicious admixture of sentl- ment They grant it and accept it, and by
 such interchange get much of their reputa- tion, permanence and profit. If any firm of consequence should try to exclude sentiment from it's affairs it would have sorry time. If it shouldrigorously exclude sentiment it would be pretty sure to exclude success also. The active competition that exists everywhere in
 business evokes consideration, delicacy, pol iteness management of the finest kind, and into these sentiment must enter more or less The assumption that business is commercial indifference, financial independence, simple
 ruggedness; that it may say to the I1blic in
 effect, 'I do not care for you; you do not care
 for me. If you can do better with me than anybody else you will give me your custom,
 otherwise not. I treat everybody alike. I would not turn to the right or the left except for my own interest. You see what 1 have, what offer, what do. Come or go5 take or leave; 1t is all the same to me. There is no sentiment in business" This would be fully carrying out the common aphor1sm,
 but any house that should put itself on such basis would be forced ere long to close it's doors for want of patronage.
 Occasionally there is a man who treats others having business relations with him as if they were devoid of feeling, of their private share of prejudice, self-love, egotism as if in short, they were mere machines. He is usually man with abundant vanity and weakness, though he never suspects as much. He imagnes himself a pattern Of his kind, model of justice, an incarnation of the true business principle; and under this illusion, he is not only rude and unjust, but cruel at 1, hr11%o al Ia ma "a a h11S iY1nc man of the abstract order, albeit very unlike
 the concree examples that most of. us know.
 He has TO sympathy, no sentiment; conse-
 auently they who are obliged to deal with
 him despise or hate him. He makes number
 less enemies and is likely in the end to be quited for his hardness, his coldness, his spiritual tyranny. He probably fatters him. self that he is good business man, but he errs egregiously. He is very bad business man. as all brought into contact with him are unpleasantly aware. As he plays despot to those who feel that they cannot afford to re- tive insolence, he in turn plays sycophant to persons above him, to these that may advance him or grant him favors. But he usually miscalculates and by constant pur- suit of thoroughly selfish policy, based on the no sentiment-in business idea his most cherished plans soon or late miscarry.
 The amount ofsentiment in business is dem onstrated daily by the unwillingness of firms to dismiss clerks, accountants, salesmen who are really incapable of earning the sara ries they receive They hinder more than they help; their intentions may be excellent,
 but their performance is indequate; they can not be enlightened or improved. If they go away of their own free will it would be great relief. Yet they not discharged, because they have families or because they could not it is thought, get another situation; because they are, in word, incompetent. They are kept from pure benevolence, from charity Hardly an old house in any city can be named in which there are not employees who retain their places from the fact that they are unworthy to fill any place, from the fear that if turned away they might come to want. Many prominent firm here and elsewhere is virtually an eleemosynary institution, the diff ference between it and the regular institutions
 being that the firm is not proclaimed as chari- table, and the pride of those cared for is not wounded by presentation of the truth.
 More old and faithful servants continue to be salaried in nwell-regulated houses when they
 have ceased, through age or infrmities to be
 valuable. What they have done in the past is remembered to their advantage after their active and fertile days have gone by. If there were no sentiment in business they would be summarilly sent away and told to shift for themselves. They formerly rendered an equivalent for the money paid them but as they can no longer do so they must pack of.
 The contract between employer ana
 employe is at an end when the
 parties thereto cannot meet all it's
 requirements, Suppose this course should be
 adopted, what would be said of it's adopters?
 Could firm that would be so commercially
 just-so cruelty unjust in truth-preserve it's
 own self-respect or the support of it's cus-
 toners? It would be summed by people of
 every class. Nevertheless, we are doomed to
 hear perpetually, 'There is no sentiment in
 business"
 The more we know of business the more
 we see how closely and inseparably it is inter-
 woven with sentiment. They who utter the
 phrase must be conscious that it is false, but
 they may wish to hide from the general pub- lie the amiable, tender weakness that keeps
 them human amid the struggle for existence comforting to think that we are better than our words; that the bustling, feverish, driv- saG {