And State Papers 537 



with their doctrines. The American people are slow 

 to wrath, but when their wrath is once kindled it 

 burns like a consuming flame. 



During the last .five years business confidence has 

 been restored and the nation is to be congratulated 

 because of its present abounding prosperity. Such 

 prosperity can never be created by law alone, al- 

 though it is easy enough to destroy it by mischievous 

 laws. If the hand of the Lord is heavy upon any 

 country, if flood or drought comes, human wisdom 

 is powerless to avert the calamity. Moreover, no law 

 can guard us against the consequences of our own 

 folly. The men who are idle or credulous, the men 

 who seek gains not by genuine work with head or 

 hand but by gambling in any form, are always a 

 source of menace not only to themselves but to 

 others. If the business world loses its head, it loses 

 what legislation can not supply. Fundamentally the 

 welfare of each citizen, and therefore the welfare 

 of the aggregate of citizens which makes the nation, 

 must rest upon individual thrift and energy, resolu- 

 tion and intelligence. Nothing can take the place 

 of this individual capacity ; but wise legislation and 

 honest and intelligent administration can give it the 

 fullest scope, the largest opportunity to work to good 

 effect. 



The tremendous and highly complex industrial de- 

 velopment which went on with ever accelerated ra- 

 pidity during the latter half of the nineteenth cen- 

 tury brings us face to face, at the beginning of the 



