of view
without careful discrimination, we may well be alarmed; for we live in
a world given over as never before to the whirl of industry and the
rush and excitement of the market-place.

This, of all ages, is the age of the business man. The heroic times
when warfare was the chief concern of nations, have long since passed
by. So too the ages of faith,--when theology was the mainspring of
action, when whole peoples went on long crusades, and when building
cathedrals and burning heretics were typical of men's efforts and
convictions--have fallen far into the historic background. Further, we
would seem in the main to have left behind us that period of which the
French Revolution is the most conspicuous landmark, when the gaining of
political liberty for the individual seemed the one supreme good, and
the object for which nations and communities were ready to sacrifice
all else.

Through these and other periods characterized by their own especial
aims and ideals, we have come to an age when commercialism is the
all-absorbing thing; and we are told by pessimists that these dominant
conditions are hopelessly incompatible with academic idealism or with
the maintenance of high ethical standards, whether for the guidance of
the individual himself or for the acceptance and control of the
community. It is precisely this state of affairs, then, that I desire
briefly to consider. And I shall keep in mind those bearings of it that
might seem to have some relation to the views and aims of students who
are soon to go out from the sheltered life of the university,--under
the necessity, whether they shrink from it or not, of becoming part and
parcel of this organism of business and trade that has invaded almost
every sphere of modern activity.

I have only recently heard a great and eloquent teacher of morals,
himself an exponent of the highest and finest culture to which we have
attained, speak in terms of the utmost doubt and anxiety regarding the
drift of the times. To his mind, the evils and dangers accompanying the
stupendous developments of our day are such as to set what he called
commercialism in direct antagonism to all that in his mind represented
the higher good, which he termed idealism. The impression that he left
upon his audience was that the forces of our present-day business life
are inherently opposed to the achievement of the best results in
statecraft and in the general life of the community. He could propose