t say beautiful--bouquets. Barring
a certain doubt about her mother's approval, she was well satisfied
with her achievement, she felt a sense of completeness in what she had
done--and well she might, for she had not left a visible bud.

There is a strong tendency to go at business the way Helen went at the
garden. She knew what to do with bouquets; raw material for making them
was within her reach; what more natural than to turn it, in the most
obvious and simple way, into the product for which it was designed.
From her standpoint such a procedure was entirely correct--she was
making bouquets for herself and her friends; every one in her circle
would share the benefit of her industry.

Whenever in the past business enterprise has proceeded from a similar
viewpoint, we have stood aside and let it proceed; it was not our
garden; we were quite willing to take the role of disinterested
spectators. Recently we have discovered that it is our garden; we have
learned that we are not disinterested; we now see that business plays a
large part in the life of every one of us. That being the case, we
assume the right to question its processes, its underlying policies,
and its results. We are gradually coming to think of business in terms
of an integrated and unified national life. We desire the national life
to be both wholesome and secure.

What the public really wants from business, then, is a contribution to
national welfare, and it has become convinced that, by taking thought,
it can make the contribution more certain and more uniform than it has
been in the past. Many business men share this view; with varying zeal
they are trying to work out standards of organization that will insure
the kind of regard for general welfare which the public has come to
demand.

This is the new idea in business; it has already taken deep root; but
it needs to be further developed. We have the difficult task of
reducing an idea to a practical working plan. How shall we go about it?
Fortunately the idea itself contains a hint for further procedure. A
new attitude in business must be coupled with a new attitude in public
policy.

When my enterprising child made an onslaught on the garden it would
have been easy enough to punish her; but it is doubtful if mere
punishment gets very far in a case of that sort. Unless we can teach
the child to enjoy the garden without destroying it, the restraining
influence of punishment will be no stronger than