Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1915-08-06
Reading.
HI LOVE OF MONEY
War Has Made Men Judge Their Fell
lows by What They DO.

uSiIl CI odot III
lover the nature and effects of his pas
sion. If a man wants too much food,
he is evidently greedy. II a woman
wants too many clothes, she is evident
" vain. But money Is not a thing,
like clothes or food. that a be en-
joyed by itself. 1t is only a means OF
getting the things that can be en-
joyed; and so greed for money Is not
direct greed, but indirect. 1t Is q civil
lied means of conducting the struggle
for life, which to a great extent con-
ceals from those who use 1t the ugli-
ness and the animal nature OF that
struggle. 1t is, in fact, a kind Of di-
plomacy, politely conducted, behind
which there Is war; but the diplomats
often do not see the a They deal
only in documents, scraps Of paper;
and they are not aware, except at
second hand, what all these documents,
and the struggle about them. mean to
the mass Of men. The rich man who
Is greedy for money does not put It to
himself that he is greedy for the
things that money will buy. Although
money keeps its actual power, and Is
his own mind, to divorce 1t from Its
real meaning. 1t becomes to him a
symbol Of something much finer n
more romantic than 1t is. 1t infiames
his imagination and the imagination of
a great part Of the poorer world, too,
as If it were not merely a means Of
buying material things, but a personal
quality in the mar who possesses 1t.
Money, 1t is said, a be used for great
and noble purposes. which Is true;
but the man who is greedy for money
does not want to use 1t for such pur-
poses. Often he does not even want
to buy an inordinate number Of ma
terial things. His greed has become
abstract and romantic. 1t Is greed for
a symbol, forgetful Of what the symbol
implies. And this greed for a symbol
spreads among people no otherwise
greedy, who do manage by e Of
money to engage ruthlessly in the
struggle for life without ever being
aware that they are red Of tooth and
claw. The decorum Of money wraps
itself round them and hides from them
the character and the results of their
own greed. They see only lists of Sc
curities; they do not ven see heaps
Of gold; and, even If they do engage
in a quarrel about money with some
AVA alcA M lace oraa1y FOR ~ thora Ia
no open scramble and clutching, but
only a lawsuit decently conducted,
which may aus decent ruin to the
loser that the winner never sees. All
he knows is that he has got judgment
in his favor, which means Of course,
that he takes a certain number Of
material things from his opponent.
But it does not mean that to him. To
him it means a kind Of religious justi-
fication, giving him a moral as well as
a legal right to own the money he gets
through it.
That we do unconsciously ever
ence money more than the things we
get with it Is proved by two curious
facts. You can give a mar anything
except money without affecting your
relations with him; and a mans de-
%pendents may steal many things from
him without calling it theft, but they
know always that taking money is
stealing. Evidently, then, money is
more sacred than any other kind Of
material possession. But why? 1t
only differs from other material pos
sessions In that 1t Is a means Of get
ting them, that while you have money
you keep yonr power Of choice because
you have not yet chosen. So If you
give money you only give the power Of
choice, and If you steal money you
steal the power Of choice; and this
power seems to us more sacred than
any of the things that can be chosen
We do reverence the man who has a
great deal Of power, just because he
has not yet chosen, and because, per-
haps, he might choose nobly OF gener-
ously. But we may be sure that, IL
he is greedy Of the power, he will not
choose nobly or generously-in fact,
that the man who can ennoble money
is he who cares very little for it. The
war makes all these things palmer to
us than they were in time Of peace.
We now see greed for money as it is,
and we no longer reverence the rich
man because OF what he might do
with his money, since we have other
tests forced upon us than these pos
sibilities. We value a man for what
he does. not for what he might do;
for his actual personal qualities rather
than for his possessions. In that we
are like people on a sinking ship, for
whom all the customary social values
are destroyed and a man is a man
only if he proves himself one To us
now the private who wins the Victoria
Cross is really a better man than the
millionaire who cannot sleep at night
for fear Of bombs. The money test is,
for the time, almost abolished. We
know by our own experiences at last
that a man may be poor, not because
Nv 40 " iooi VI q "Vahtli6, Jul Siu
he cares for other things than money.
But shall we remember this when peace
comes again? Men commonly apply
this money test, not 81 much because
they are base in their own desires as
because it is easy to apply. We know
by heresay when a man is rich; we
have to find out for ourselves whether
he is simple and kindly and brave. But
our judgments are worth nothing to
ourselves Or any one else unless we
make them for ourselves, unless they
are based upon what a man does
rather thar on what he has; and there
is nothing which hinders us so much
from exercising our own judgement as
the reverence for money. 1t hides
from us u own greed and the greed
Of others. 1t spreads a fog of decorum
where there ought to be no decorum at
all; ii makes us think there is peace
where there is a sharp material war.