Arizona republican. [volume] (Phoenix, Ariz.) 1890-1930, 1899-10-26
THE RISE AND GROWTH OF
WEALTH.
BY E. BENZ. ANDREWS D. D. Ii.
D., Superintendent of the Chicago
Public Schools.
First Installment.)

What is wealth? This is more of a
problem than might at first be suspect
ed. The difference between a rich man
and a poor man it is not difficult to
understand. But it is not individual
wealth, it is general wealth, that we
at first, seems to be quite familiar
thought. A plain person can appreci-
ate we'll enough for all practical pur-
poses what it means when the present
people of Illinois are called wealthy in
comparison with the Indians once resi-
dent here. Every one will attach d
more or less useful meaning to the Ian
guage on hearing it said that our ma
tional wealth is rapidly increasing. But
if we wish to make a closer study, to
see precisely what the idea of wealth
includes and excludes, we shall have to
exercise considerable patience and
mental activity. Still the effort will
be worth while.
1t will be a first step forward to say
that wealth consists in all those classes
of things, powers, rela and influ-
ences which result from human effort
and at the same time directly contrib
ute to human welfare in it's temporal
aspect. Wealth is made up, in part,
of things. in the corporeaI sense OF that
word, tangible things, articles. chattels
and goods, houses, mills, cattle, gold,
wheat, corn and the like-these. every
body sees, are forms of wealth. But
there is nonmaterial wealth. Trained
mental power in any useful direction
is wealth. There are relations, too.
which are wealth. as the good will of
physician or of a business house, which
can be sold for money. And there are
influences which are wealth. like the
credit of a banker. that he has indus
triously built up in the course of years.
with the view Of making his business
more successful.
There are writer's, I know, and their
idea has till recently been the preva-
lent one, who deny the name of wealth
to these powers, relations and infiu
ences-to everything, in a word, which
is not of material nature. It is of
course, not a strictly vital question
whether an accountants dexterity is
called an actual form of wealth or only
a condition helpful to the promotion of
wealth In either case students Of the
subject will have to consider it. But I
much prefer to name such things act
ual elements of wealth. What sense
is there, for instance, in ranking as
wealth a dose of medicine which cures
one patient, while excluding from the
category a physicians advice so sage
that it cures another patient without
medicine? Is not a doctors skill which
cures as valuable as a doctors pill
which cures? And if skill is to be
classed as wealth, credit ought to be
so classed, at least where it is the
product of thrifty purpose. as we'll as
those relations, of which 1 gave an
instance, between firms and customers,
which are the results of conscious and
deliberate effort. For such relations,
be it observed, in that they proceed
from human agency, considerably DIFF
fer in character from those in which
the general organization of society
consists, the latter being built up by
natural processes, as it We're. man
playing in them the part of a purpose
less instrument not that of a con-
scious agent. Wealth, then, includes
various sorts of immaterial things as
well as various sorts of material
things.
But that object, or that power, or
that relation, or that influence which
is properly rated as wealth must be-
long in class of realities that become
what they are by human labor. We
speak indeed of natural wealth, which
we say a nation possesses in fine har-
bors, navigable rivers, fertile land,
broad forests. abundant mines and sa-
luxurious climate. 1t is clearly better
to apply to these things the title con
ditions of wealth." factors in the pro-
duction of wealth. The savages had
all this as well as we, but the savages
were very poor. always on the verge
of starvation, and if we except the
forests and the waters the Savages
would have been nearly as we'll off
in land destitute of these natural re-
sources. Many things which are not
wealth have utility, a vital utility even.
Without air and sunshine we could not
live, yet air and sunshine, wind. water
for drinking, the ocean for Transport
tation, and so on, Indispensable as
they are to wealth, since they stand /
outside the list of labor produced
things, are not wealth. They are utili- !
ties, but not onerous utilities. Il is the
same in the non-material realm. Hon
asty and health, the moral, intellect
ual and physical chara cteristics of hui
man beings, so far as they are the pure
gifts of nature, ought not to be regard |
ed as wealth. They partake of that
character, if at ALL only so far as they
have originated in purpose and in Ia
Dor.
But wealth has a further mark. Not
every product of human effort IS
wealth. You may have labored long
to create an article which, when it is
done, will have no utility and hence not
be wealth. On the other hand, there
are many products of effort, marked
by the utmost utility in their way. !
which are not wealth because their
utility lies in a higher plane than that
of wealth The power to be unselfish, !
obliging, kind, loving ones self last, |
usually grows up only through effort !
but when it is grown it is not wealth;