id, the last point that I wish to make on this
subject; and the reader will please notice that I have nowhere said that
I consider American commercial morality at the present day to be higher
than English. Nor do I think that it is. Incontestably it is but a
little while since the English standard was appreciably the higher of
the two. I have cited from my own memory instances of conditions which
existed in America only twenty years ago in support of the fact--though
no proof is needed--that this is so. I by no means underestimate the
fineness of the traditions of British commerce or the number of men
still living who hold to those traditions. On the other hand, better
judges than I believe that the standard of morality in English business
circles is declining. In America it is certainly and rapidly improving.

Present English ideas about American commercial ethics are founded on a
knowledge of facts, correct enough at the time, which existed before the
improvement had made anything like the headway that it has, which facts
no longer exist. I have roughly compared in outline some of the
essential qualities of the atmosphere in which, and some of the
conditions under which, the business men in the two countries live and
do their business, showing that in the United States there is a much
more marked tendency to insist on the character of the individual and a
much larger opportunity for the individuality to develop itself; and
that in certain particulars there are in England inherited social
conditions and institutions which it would appear cannot fail to hamper
the spirit of self-reliance, on which self-respect is ultimately
dependent.

* * * * *

And the conclusion? For the most part my readers must draw it for
themselves. My own opinion is that, whatever the relative standing of
the two countries may be to-day, it is hardly conceivable that, by the
course on which each is travelling, in another generation American
commercial integrity will not stand the higher of the two. The
conditions in America are making for the shaping of a sterner type of
man.

* * * * *

_Postscript._--The opinion has been expressed in the foregoing pages
that in one particular the American on the average comes as near to
getting justice in his courts as does the Englishman. I have also given
expression to my great respect, which I think is shared by everyone who
knows anything