172 PERILS.— WEALTH. 



which nations have run. "Nations have decayed, but 

 it has never been with the imbecihty of age."^ " Ava- 

 rice and hixury have been the ruin of every great state." - 

 Her American possessions ' made Spain the richest and 

 most powerful nation of Europe; but wealth induced 

 luxury and idleness, whence came poverty and degrada- 

 tion. Rome was never stronger in all the seeming ele- 

 ments of power than at the moment of her fall. She 

 had grown rich, and riches had corrupted her morals, 

 rendered her effeminate, and made her an easy prey to 

 the lusty barbarian of the North. The material splen- 

 dor of Israel reached its climax in the glorj' of Solomon's 

 reign, in which silver was made to be in Jerusalem as 

 stones ; but it was followed by the immediate dismem- 

 berment of the kingdom. Under all that magnificence, 

 at which even Oriental monarchs wondered, was spring- 

 ing a discontent which led to speedy revolt. Bancroft 

 has wisely said that, ' ' Sedition is bred in the lap of lux- 

 ury." 



The influence of mechanical invention is to stimulate 

 luxurious living. We are told by Edward Atkinson 

 that by the hand looms in the South ten hours' work will 

 produce eight yards of cloth, while in the factory of 

 New England ten hours' work Avill produce 800 yards. 

 In 1888 the steam power of the United States was equal 

 to the working-power of 161,333,000 men;^ as if one-half 

 of all the male workmen on the globe had engaged in 

 our service. When we remember that this machinery 

 is an enormous producer of the necessaries, comforts, 

 and luxuries of life, but is not a consumer of the same, 

 we see how immensely the average consumption per 

 caput has increased. As luxuries are thus cheapened 

 and brought within the reach of an ever-widening circle, 

 there is an increasing tendency toward self-indulgence. 

 Herodotus said : " It is a law of nature that faint-hearted 



* Charles Sumner. 



2 Livy. 



3 MulhalFs Growth of American Industries and Wealth, p. 



