e wants
of his mechanical being. He is not clamorous for food, raiment, or
shelter, and makes no demands for the expenses of education. The eating
and drinking, the reading and writing, and the clothes-wearing world,
are benefited by the labors of these co-operatives, in the same way as
if Providence had provided for their service millions of beings, like
ourselves in external appearance, able to labor and to toil, and yet
requiring little or nothing for their own consumption or subsistence; or
rather, as if Providence had created a race of giants, each of whom,
demanding no more for his support and consumption than a common laborer,
should yet be able to perform the work of a hundred.

Now, Sir, turn back to the Massachusetts tables of production, and you
will see that it is these automatic allies and co-operators, and these
powers of nature, thus employed and placed under human direction, which
have come, with such prodigious effect, to man's aid, in the great
business of procuring the means of living, of comfort, and of wealth,
and which have so swollen the products of her skilful industry. Look at
these tables once more, Sir, and you will see the effects of labor,
united with and acting upon capital. Look yet again, and you will see
that credit, mutual trust, prompt and punctual dealings, and commercial
confidence, are all mixed up as indispensable elements in the general
system.

I will ask you to look yet once more, Sir, and you will perceive that
general competence, great equality in human condition, a degree of
popular knowledge and intelligence nowhere surpassed, if anywhere
equalled, the prevalence of good moral sentiment, and extraordinary
general prosperity, are the result of the whole. Sir, I have done with
Massachusetts. I do not praise the old "Bay State" of the Revolution; I
only present her as she is.

Mr. President, such is the state of things actually existing in the
country, and of which I have now given you a sample. And yet there are
persons who constantly clamor against this state of things. They call it
aristocracy. They excite the poor to make war upon the rich, while in
truth they know not who are either rich or poor. They complain of
oppression, speculation, and the pernicious influence of accumulated
wealth. They cry out loudly against all banks and corporations, and all
the means by which small capitals become united, in order to produce
important and beneficial results. They carry on a m