The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-10-19
VIRTUE IN WALL STREET.


New York Mail and Express.
A man who has gone TO business In the
Wall-street district every business day
in the year for thirty years. with the
exception or six weeks vacation every
summer. chatted TO an old friend who had
come over a thousand miles to visit him,
along this line:
when you telegraphed me you were
coming 1 watched the calendar until I
saw you. Your coming cast no shadow
before. 1 remember some fifteen or twenty
years ago when / used TO dread opening
your letters. as well as those OF others
whom / knew. / do not think we realized
then how uncertain our business methods
from some quarter. AT one time i remem-
Der We were carrying nearly 1880 GUS
toners. whose combined profits would not
nave enriched an ice-cream festival. The
malls became too slow, and we looked 10 the
wires for reports OF failures.
Il am not as optimistic as some OF my
friends. still believe that some must
watch while some must sleep. But IL Is
something TO have lived to see the time
when L am not afraid to open my mall.
There will always be unfortunate specu-
lationS. There Will always be notes 10
pay or protest, and mortgages TO burn or
foreclose, and receivers to be appointed
But you and / will not live long enough
TO see any panics such as swept over
this country in our time. The business con-
ditions OF the world. the methods on which
business is conducted will not permit the
national depressions you and I encountered
The monetary affairs of our country have
passed the stage where chicanery, sharp
dealing and luck are the controlling factors.
Business has been reduced to a science, and
back of that il a high standard OF integrity
which acts as a safety valve.
81 expect TO see, and 1 know i shall see,
corporations and individuals. too, who will
attempt TO reach the heights by the hog
path. IL you will pardon a homely smile.
but the ultimate and lasting good which is
to benefit the whole is to be reached only
by the open highway, where every man
what others are doing. III 1 swindle you
to-day there are enough combinations in
the conditions to enable you TO get on YOU
feet tomorrow, IL you are honest.
DO you remember the times when our
teacher Whole the copy for Us. Honesty
is the best policy?' He meant well. But
what that Is from a business
point. as business Is done to-day! a man
to succeed now must not be honest for
policy. but honest because IL is right TO be
honest.
You know there used to be an unwrit-
ten law that a man was TO be honest at
home and In his church, and that be-
tween the two places he could waylay his
neighbor and skin him.. We have lived to
see the time when a business mar has got
to be as fair with the fellow he meets in
the road as he is at home. / am not ex-
pecting any halo TO be handed out. we
won't see wings on anybody this side the
swelling flood. But whatever differences
come I'D in business will be adjusted In
the open. I am not planning any cunning
game to save my hide. but 1 am giving
you the conclusions of a man who has
made a mighty close investigation of exist
Us that the spirit of Wall street," asked
the caller.
ut is. 1t is the spirit of the country"
'"Then I'll go back to Kansas and say TO
the grasshoppers, hop on, and TO the cy-
clones, blow on-you can't scare me-"