American Ideals 21 



wrong-doers whom all execrate; they are the men 

 who do not do quite as much wrong, but who are 

 applauded instead of being execrated. The career 

 of Benedict Arnold has done us no harm as a nation 

 because of the universal horror it inspired. The men 

 who have done us harm are those who have advo- 

 cated disunion, but have done it so that they have 

 been enabled to keep their political position; who 

 have advocated repudiation of debts, or other finan- 

 cial dishonesty, but have kept their standing in the 

 community; who preach the doctrines of anarchy, 

 but refrain from action that will bring them within 

 the pale of the law; for these men lead thousands 

 astray by the fact that they go unpunished or even 

 are rewarded for their misdeeds. 



It is unhappily true that we inherit the evil as 

 well as the good done by those who have gone befgre 

 us, and in the one case as in the other the influence 

 extends far beyond the mere material effects. The 

 foes of order harm quite as much by example as by 

 what they actually accomplish. So it is with the 

 equally dangerous criminals of the wealthy classes. 

 The conscienceless stock speculator who acquires 

 wealth by swindling his fellows, by debauching 

 judges and corrupting legislatures, and who ends his 

 days with the reputation of being among the richest 

 men in America, exerts over the minds of the rising 

 generation an influence worse than that of the aver- 

 age murderer or bandit, because his career is even 

 more dazzling in its success, and even more dan- 

 gerous in its effects upon the community. Any one 



