You are a Harvard man yourself."
"Yes, and I am not a rich man. A million or two, more or less; but what is
that? I have suffered, at the start and all along, from the question as to
what a man with the education of a gentleman ought to do in such and such
a juncture. The fellows who have not that sort of education have not that
sort of question, and they go in and win."
"So you admit, then," said the professor, "that the higher education
elevates a business man's standard of morals?"
"Undoubtedly. That is one of its chief drawbacks," said the banker, with a
laugh.
"Well," I said, with the deference due even to a man who had only a
million or two, more or less, "we must allow _you_ to say such things. But
if the case is so bad with the business men who have made the great
fortunes--the business men who have never had the disadvantage of a
university education--I wish you would explain to Mr. Homos why, in every
public exigency, we instinctively appeal to the business sense of the
community as if it were the fountain of wisdom, probity, and equity.
Suppose there were some question of vital interest--I won't say financial,
but political or moral or social--on which it was necessary to rouse
public opinion, what would be the first thing to do? To call a meeting
over the signatures of the leading business men, because no other names
appeal with such force to the public.
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