Tolstoy says that if you would investigate the career of a criminal it
is not sufficient to begin with the commission of a crime; that you must
go back to that day in his life when he deliberately trampled upon his
conscience and did that which he knew to be wrong. And so with all of
us, the turning point in the life is the day when we surrender the soul
for something that for the time being seems more desirable.

Most of the temptations that come to us to sell the soul come in
connection with the getting of money. The Bible says, "The love of money
is the root of all evil." Or, as the Revised Version gives it, "A root
of all kinds of evil."

Because so many of our temptations come through the love of money and
the effort to obtain it, it is worth while to consider the laws of
accumulation. We must all have money; we need food and clothing and
shelter, and money is necessary for the purchase of these things. Money
is not an evil in itself--money is, in fact, a very useful servant. It
is bad only when it becomes the master, and the love of it is hurtful
only because it can, and often does, crowd out the love of nobler
things.

But since we must all use money and must in our active days store up
money for the days when our strength fails, let us see if we can agree
upon God's law of rewards. (See lecture on "His Government and Peace.")

How much money can a man rightfully collect from society? Surely, there
can be no disagreement here. He cannot rightfully collect more than he
honestly earns. If a man collects more than he earns, he collects what
somebody else has earned, and we call it stealing if a man takes that
which belongs to another. Not only is a man limited in his collection of
what he honestly earns, but will an honest man _desire_ to collect more
than he earns?

If a man cannot rightfully collect more than he honestly earns, it is
then a matter of the utmost importance to know how much money a man can
honestly earn. I venture an answer to this, namely, that a man cannot
honestly earn more than fairly measures the value of the service which
he renders to society. I cannot conceive of any way of earning money
except to give to society a service equivalent in value to the money
collected. This is a fundamental proposition and it is important that it
should be clearly understood, for if one desires to collect largely from
society he must be prepared to render a large service to society; and
our schools and