80 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTELY. 



of multitudes of clerks, who, by helping purchasers to secure 

 desired commodities, by writing letters and keeping accounts, 

 contribute to the benefit of society effort that requires a consid- 

 erable degree of intelligence in addition to manual labor. Their 

 contributions to the totality of effort, and likewise those of arti- 

 sans, such as carpenters and machinists, to the performance of 

 whose work is necessary a considerable degree of intelligence, 

 training, and experience, meet with ampler reward than those 

 whose efforts spring from physical exertion alone. To those who 

 direct the efforts of others toward results of great benefit to a 

 great number of people still greater reward is given. The manu- 

 facturer, who employs the services of numerous employees in 

 producing commodities of a design and quality that cause them 

 to be of use to multitudes of people throughout an extended 

 territory, and the transportation manager and the merchant who 

 utilize the efforts of legions of subordinates in effecting their dis- 

 tribution, frequently amass fortunes. Those from whose brains 

 spring ideas that are of extraordinary benefit to mankind, and 

 those who have made practical utilization of such ideas, have 

 received extraordinary reward. Instance after instance occurs of 

 inventors whose devices have wonderfully cheapened and facili- 

 tated production and distribution, and who have thereby reaped 

 immense personal gain. And likewise throughout the professions 

 and the arts. There is a vast difference between the remuneration 

 accruing to the lawyer of slight and unimportant practice and 

 that to him who contributes to the adjustment and maintenance 

 of vast and important interests ; between the reward given the 

 actor of little histrionic ability and that flowing in upon a Jeffer- 

 son or a Booth. At the extreme end of the scale are the vagabond 

 and the tramp, who, contributing nothing to the well-being of 

 any one, are entitled to nothing in return. 



Out of the different capacities of different men that have been 

 accentuated by the increasing specialization by which alone it 

 has been possible to administer to the growing and varied needs 

 of mankind has arisen the present industrial system. Each man, 

 to obtain the satisfaction of his own needs, must contribute to the 

 needs of others ; each man, in the endeavor to obtain the most for 

 himself, strives for higher wages and salaries and for greater fees 

 and profits ; and all men, that they may supply their own needs 

 to the fullest extent, strive to obtain services and commodities for 

 the lowest price. Therefrom arises the great force of competi- 

 tion that, acting through the merchant who sells, upon the man- 

 ufacturer who produces articles of use and consumption, compels 

 production in best adapted localities, the adoption of economical 

 appliances and thrifty methods, the placing of particular func- 

 tions in charge of those best fitted to their performance. The in- 



