The Butler weekly times. (Butler, Mo.) 1881-1918, 1909-09-02

When Brisbane Answered Harvey
From the San Francisco Star.
At dinner given some time ago in
honor of Lord Northcliffe, proprietor
of the London Times, Mr.. Arthur
Brisbane responded to toast. This
versatile fashioner of the popular
editorial had sat quietly for some time
listening to a corporation lawyer who
advised his hearers to beware of the
man who expresses sympathy for the
poor, and to Colonel George Harvey,
who stated a few words on the evils
of socialism and the blessings of
wealth. When Mr.. Brisbane was in
troduced he proceeded in his short,
snappy sentences to give his hearers
as straight talk as they ever listened
to in their lives. He evidently felt il
his duty at the Northcliffe dinner to
tell his self-satisfied and successful
audience that the great common peo-
pie, of which he is the self-appointed
spokesman, really exists. Mr.. Bris-
bane said in part:
"This is fine gathering of power
full men, big fortunes and great repu-
tations. want to say something for
the men that never had a million dol
lars, never got on the payroll of a
millionaire.
81 don't want Northcliffe to go
back to England believing that man
without a million in this country
might as well hide under the table or
jump off the dock.
''The real American nation, its real
resources, its real ability, are hidden
among those unknown seventy-nine
millions that never go to Delmonico's,
most of whom know as little about
terrapin as about birds nest soup.
"Mr. Harvey says very truly, The
great reward must go to the man of
great ability True. But what is the
great reward, and what do you call
great ability?
eff | scatter money in the street,
and a thousand eager men dive to get
it, l am holding up one kind of re-
ward, and | call forth one kind of
ability. But if a child is in danger Of
its life, and a man risks his life to
save it, that situation calls out a diff
ferent kind of ability, and reveals a
man who asks for higher reward
than cash.
1--WE are paying too much attention
here to the men that scramble fol
pennies, for dollars and for millions
They are able, strong men, but they
are not the American nation, nor the
best men in it.
Colonel Harvey says that if you
take ten thousand men out of thi:
countryside ablest ten thousand
the country will fall to pieces. HI
might as well say that if you take ter
apples off tree, the tree will withel
; and fall. Not a bit of it. You mel
: with money and power are the prett.
, shiny apples on the tree. The sun
/ light, the warmth, the praise, are fo
you, but you are only the passing
fruit The real tree is the thick trunk
: The real power is with those in tn
) roots hidden in the soil.
''And in this nation, the real power
the root of the nation, is the mass o
peope-too often, like the tree
roots, hidden below in the dark an,
cold. But from those roots, from tn
, people, comes all the real power.
!, "And when this nation, and yol
r prosperous, face a perilous situation
as you have done in the past and yo
/, will do in the future, you will find tn
: man to help you and to save you-no
S at this table, not at Delmonico's.
"There was trouble before tn
Civil war, serious trouble. Did tn
!. people call upon a rich corporatio
lawyer or a great banker? No. The
asked a little country lawyer, wit
u nothing but good name, and brai
and a heart to save the country
When that man, Lincoln, needed hel
S in his great work, to whom did h
d look? Did he find the man in Wa