to the amassing of millions which he cannot
spend. It is obvious, therefore, that the noble words which Canning
dedicated to the memory of Pitt can have no meaning for him, and he
would be wisely guided if he left the names of patriots out of the
argument.

Mr Carnegie's choice of an epitaph is easily explained. He is wont to
assert, without warrant, that "a man who dies rich dies disgraced." He
does not tell us how the rich man shall escape disgrace. Not even the
master of millions, great and good as he is reputed to be, knows when
his hour comes. There is a foresight which even money cannot buy. Death
visits the golden palace of the rich and the hovel of the poor
with equal and unexpected foot. The fact that Mr Carnegie is still
distributing libraries with both hands seems to suggest that, had he
been overtaken during the last twenty years, he would not have realised
his ideal. There is but one method by which a rich man may die poor, and
that is by disencumbering himself of his wealth the very day that it is
acquired. And he who is not prepared for this sacrifice does but waste
his breath in celebrating the honour of a pauper's grave.

As there is no merit in living rich, so there is no virtue in dying
poor. That a millionaire should desert his money-bags at his death is
not a reproach to him if they be honestly filled. He has small chance of
emptying them while he is on the earth. But Mr Carnegie has a reason for
his aphorism. He aspires to be a philosopher as well as a millionaire,
and he has decided that a posthumous bequest is of no value, moral or
material. "Men who leave vast sums," says he, "may fairly be thought
men who would not have left it at all had they been able to take it with
them." On such a question as this the authority of Mr Carnegie is not
absolute. Let the cobbler stick to his last. The millionaire, no doubt,
is more familiar with account-books than with the lessons of history;
and the record of a thousand pious benefactors proves the worth of wise
legacies. Nor, indeed, need we travel beyond our own generation to find
a splendid example of wealth honourably bestowed. The will of Cecil
Rhodes remains a tribute to the generosity and to the imagination of
a great man, and is enough of itself to brush aside the quibbles of Mr
Carnegie.

The sentiment of "doing good" and of controlling great wealth leads
rapidly to megalomania, and Mr Carnegie cannot conceal the pride of
omniscience. He seems to