Year: 1873

entitled to so many shares of some far-of
bank, or that some railroad will pay him
certain sum some thirty years hence.
In fact, looked at with Roman eyes, our
millionaire seems to be possessed of little
or nothing, and likely to be puzzled about
his daily bread.


Now, this wonderful change in the
character and incidents of property may
be said to be the work of the last century,
and it may be said to consist in the sub;
stitution OF an agency wholly moral for
an agency wholly material in the work of
exchange and distribution. For the Civ
ing and receiving of gold and silver, we
have substituted neither more nor less
than faith in the honesty and industry,
and capacity of our fellow-men. There
is hardly one of us who does not literally
live by faith. We lay up fortunes, marry,
eat, drink, travel, and bequeatb, almost
without ever handling cent; and the
best reason which ninety-nine out of
every hundred of us can give for
feeling secure against want, or hav-
ing the means of enjoyment or of
charity, is not the possession of anything
of real value, but his confidence that GER
tain thousands of his fellow creatures,
whom he has never seen and never ex-
poets to see, scattered, it may be, over the
civilized world, will keep their promises,
and do their daily work with fidelity and
efficiency. This faith is every year being
made to carry a greater and greater load.
The transactions which rest on it increase
every year in magnitude and complexion.
1t has to extend itself every year over a
large portion of the earth's surface, and
to include greater variety of race, and
creed, and custom. London, and Paris,
and Berlin, and Vienna, now tremble
when New York is alarmed. We have, in
short, to believe every year in a greater
and greater number of people, and to de-
pend for our daily bread on the successful
working of vast combinations, in which
human character is after all the main ele-
ment


The consequence is that, when, for any
reason a shade of doubt comes over mems
minds that the combination is not work
ing, that the machine is at some point
going to give way, that somebody is not
playing his part fairly, the solid ground
seems to shake under their feet, and we
have some of the phenomena resulting
from an earthquake, and among Others
blind terror. But to any one who under
stands what this new social force, Credit,
is, and the part it plays in human affairs,





dom, but that it stands so firm; that these
hundreds of millions of laborers, artisans,
shopkeepers, merchants, bankers, and
manufacturers hold so firmly from day to
day the countless engagements into which
they enter, and that each recurring year
the result of the prodigious effort which
is now put forth in the civilized world
in the work of production, should be dis
tributed with so much accuracy and hon
esty, and, on the whole, with so much
wise adjustment to the value of each
mans contributions to civilization.


There is one fact, however, which
throws around credit, as around so many
others of the influences by which
our lives are shaped, a frightful
mystery Its very strength helps to work
ruin. The more we believe in our fellow
toilers, and the more they do to warrant
our belief, the more we encourage them
to work, the more we excite their hope
fulness; and out of this hopefulness come
"panics" and crashes" Prosperity breeds
credit, and credit stimulates enterprise,
and enterprise emoarks IN labor which,
about ten years in England, and every
twenty years in this country, it is found
that the world is not ready to pay for.
Panics have occurred in England in 1897,
1907, 1917, 1926, 1887, 1S47, 1857, and there
was near being very severe one in 1866.
In this country we have had them in 1915,
1886 and 1857, and by panics we do not
mean such local whirlwinds as have
desolated Wall street, but widespread
commercial crises, affecting all branches
of business. This periodicity is ascribed,
and with much plausibility, to the fact
that, inasmuch as panics are the result of
certain mental conditions, they recur as
soon as the experience of the previous one
has lost its influence, or, in other words,
as often as new generation comes into
the management of affairs which is about
every ten years in the commercial world,
both in England and here. The fact that
this country seems to be only half as
liable to them as England, is perhaps due
to the fact that the extent of our resources
and the greater ratio of increase of popu-
lation make it much harder to overdo in
the work of production here than in En-
gland, and to this must be added the
greater strength of nerves produced by
greater hopefulness. In spite of the
enormous abundance of British capital,
and the rashness of the owners in making
investments, there hangs over the London
money market a timidity and doubtful
ness about the future which is unknown
on this side of the water, and which very
slight accidents develop into distrust and
terror. If this theory be correct, our next
great panic will be due about the year
1877, Immediately after the Centennial
Exposition. Let us hope, however, that
the present slight attack may inspire
enough prudence and good sense to ward
it of.-NelD York Nation.