2 o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MONETARY PROBLEM. 



By LOGAN G. McPHERSON. 



THE consideration of every problem concerning the welfare of 

 humanity compels, first, the understanding of what consti- 

 tutes that welfare. That is, recognition must be had of the fac- 

 tors that forward civilization, which is the condition that permits 

 the attainment by each individual of the highest harmonious, 

 physical, mental, and moral development of which he is capable. 

 To the highest physical life it is necessary that the body be nour- 

 ished by a regular and sufficient supply of food ; that it be pro- 

 tected by appropriate clothing and properly housed ; that it re- 

 ceive the exercise and the care and attendance that contribute to 

 the maintenance of the bodily functions. To attain the highest 

 mental life it is necessary that knowledge of that which mankind 

 has said and done shall be brought to the mind of each individual, 

 to the extent that such knowledge will the more thoroughly adapt 

 him to his environment and enable him to most effectively react 

 upon that environment. In the agencies that lead to these ends 

 that is, in the production and distribution of food and clothing ; 

 in the erection and furnishing of houses ; in the processes of 

 manufacture that result in the various articles of personal use ; 

 in the production of newspapers, books, paintings, and statues ; 

 in the composition and rendition of music, and in all the other 

 functions that contribute to bodily and mental welfare and grati- 

 fication are employed the efforts of by far the greater number of 

 the adult male population and of a considerable number of the 

 female population of the civilized world. As this effort is so 

 interwoven that it is almost if not quite literally true that the 

 work of all contributes to the welfare of each, and the work of 

 each contributes to the welfare of all, it is manifest that there 

 must be some means whereby the portion of welfare accruing to 

 each individual from the totality of effort may be measured out 

 to him, and as human effort has become the more closely inter- 

 woven has this means changed in becoming the more adapted to 

 its purpose. 



In prehistoric time, the man whose home was a cave, whose 

 clothing was the untanned skins of beasts, and whose food their 

 flesh and berries and fruit, knew not money and needed not 

 money the satisfaction of his wants resulted immediately and 

 directly from his own exertion. And so likewise throughout the 

 untold years during which he learned to cook with fire made by 

 the spark of flint and to fashion the flint into spear heads, he 

 needed not of the effort of others. But through the ages, as his 

 developing brain led his hands to other uses, as he learned to 



