"Paid in Advance."
Miss Grace Dodge, that noble woman whose life of self-sacrifice was a constant example to all of us and especially to those who, like her, are rich, once uttered these fine words: "Those who inherit wealth are paid in advance for the service they are expected to render to mankind."
The truth that is involved in that sentence would end every strike, would remove the friction between labor and capital, and would diminish some of the sorest ills of the world. If rich men would only heed it, they would add immeasurably to their own happiness and to the welfare of others.
For there is no doubt of the debt in which the rich who inherit their wealth are placed. Say what you will with regard to the sorrows of the wealthy, there are few philosophers but would gladly change places with them. They have their share, to be sure, of the common ills of life. They are not exempt from death. Sickness visits them occasionally. Ingratitude, bitterness, doubt, temptation, poison their lives. But it is easier to be good when one has an assured income, and the ability to command the most skillful physicians and nurses and the most comfortable surroundings for our loved ones when they are sick is a priceless blessing. Yes, money, to say the least, is not an unmixed curse; it has its alleviations!
The man who has obtained his wealth through some great benefaction to mankind, as Edison has obtained his, for instance, has earned the many gratifications that it gives; but those that merely inherit wealth cannot be said to have earned it. They have it by the mere accident of birth. They have still to earn it. They are paid in advance. The chance happening that they have an assured income does not in the least release them from the moral duty of serving the world with the best that is in them and of them. Every year the rich folks are coming to see this more clearly.
And now who are the rich? For I'll warrant that every one of my readers is slapping his knees and saying "Good! Good! That just hits them!" Hits them? It hits you. For there is probably not one of the well-to-do, comfortable people who will use this cyclopedia of illustrations but is looked up to as rich by someone, and doubtless by many someone’s. "Why," said a neighbor of mine once to me, "I can go to the Thingamabob Club and get lunch for only so much," and he named a sum precisely three times the limit I set for my usual midday repast. He does not call himself a rich man, and, as wealth goes nowadays, I suppose he is not rich; but he is rich to me. And I am rich to many others. And they, in turn, are rich to many more.
It is as true of you as it is of young Vanderbilt or young Rockefeller that what you inherit—of money, or ability, or opportunity—pays you in advance for the service you are expected to render to mankind. Are you paying your debts? Are you planning and preparing to pay them? Or are you satisfied with being a miserable bankrupt, heels over head in debt to the world? In the matter of a dollar or a million dollars, friends, let's be honest!
From the People to the People.
In presenting to the University of Minnesota the princely gift of two million dollars for medical education the eminent surgeon, Dr. William J. Mayo, said, "The money came from the people, and we feel it should return to the people."
The principle then expressed applies to all who have received conspicuous overflowing rewards from the exercise of talents which are above the ordinary. Those talents were given them freely by the Creator. They should be used freely for His creatures. The excess of returns is also to be used freely, as a sacred trust. The principle, scarcely recognized till recent years, is coming rapidly to be received and acted upon. Nor does it apply only to great talents and vast rewards, but, in due proportion, to the smaller abilities and fortunes of every child of God.