168 MICHIGAN STATE AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE 



was wasted, not because the administrators were dishonest, but 

 because they did not know how to spend it. 



It is a great thing to teach a boy, as he is taught in the engineer- 

 ing department of this College, the art of producing electricity — 

 producing it cheaply and in large amounts. Having taught 

 him that, we should regard it as a strange sort of education that 

 did not also train him with equal care in the methods of con- 

 trolling such a dangerous agency to the use of man. For, turned 

 loose over broken or uninsulated wires, the more electricity, the 

 more ruin. Wealth is exactly like that. We have learned to 

 produce it with immense facility in hitherto unequaled amounts; 

 but we have sadly failed in that insulation, that control, which 

 harnesses a powerful and dangerous agency to the use of man. 

 We are the victims today of what may be called uninsulated 

 wealth. Wealth used properly is our servant ; used improperly, 

 our master. 



The greatest need today in our American life is the expert 

 money-user — men who know how to use money wisely for them- 

 selves or for the public good. And they are hard to find ! Let 

 me call your attention to two or three significant things. One 

 of the greatest beneficences of recent years was that of Mr. 

 Carnegie when he founded the Carnegie Institution. What is 

 the purpose of the millions of dollars at the disposal of the direct- 

 ors of that fund ? Why, to find men who have ideas of how to 

 spend money wisely — and having found them, to give them the 

 money they require to work out then plans. The essential 

 question that they ask is this: "Can you spend money so that 

 it will help the human race ?" — and if they are satisfied that a 

 man can do it, all the resources of the institution are placed 

 behind him. 



And just recently, as you all know, Mrs. Russell Sage has 

 given a vast fund of money, $10,000,000, which is to be used, 

 not to relieve poverty, not for education, but in finding out how 

 money can best be expended in helping the poor. 



