2 
IOWA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 
suited in an intellectual renaissance; and the discovery of 
its treasures has produced that ^vonderful industrial devel- 
opment which marks the present age. The latter fact, un- 
fortunately, has also resulted in a tremendous abuse of 
those natural resources which are everywhere being 
drained to meet the constantly increasing demands of in- 
dustrial interests. Almost every community in the land 
bows down to the fetich of industrial and resultant com- 
mercial activity. Young men have been taught, by impli- 
cation if not by direction, that money-making is the great 
goal of all ambition, and the result is a lowering of stand- 
ards of public and private morals. Let a schemer pro- 
pose the building up of a business enterprise in any 
community and, no matter how questionable the means or 
uncertain the methods by which the scheme is advanced, 
the public becomes its enthusiastic supporter on the 
ground that it will “bring business”, and that men will se- 
cure employment. 
It is not my purpose to decry activity in legitimate 
business or enterprise, but I do insist that the best 
citizen is not necessarily he who is most expert in 
the art of money-making, and that the enterprises and 
undertakings which are of the greatest value to the com- 
munity are not those whose results can be measured by 
ordinary commercial standards. The desire for making 
money, and for booming business enterprises, so com- 
pletely dominates our people that public opinion has 
frequently permitted the grossest violations of the laws of 
justice and common sense, if only business activity could 
be promoted. Sometimes this is due to ignorance, but 
more frequently it is an exhibition of the spirit which 
was manifested by the railway promoter who, desiring 
a portion of one of the parks in a large city in this 
state, sneeringly publicly declared that if the people 
wanted grass they could keep their parks, but if they 
wanted business they had to have railroads. 
Again and again certain business enterprises have been 
represented as the hope and salvation of the communities 
