bepraised
acts of our multimillionaires--the seignorial donating of millions to
"charitable" or "public-spirited" purposes.

Like the Astors, the Schermerhorns, the Rhinelanders and a galaxy of
others, Field diffused large sums; he, like them, was overwhelmed with
panegyrics. Millions Field gave toward the founding and sustaining of
the Field Columbian Museum in Chicago, and to the University of Chicago.
It may be parenthetically added that, (to repeat), he owned, adjacent to
this latter institution, many blocks of land the increased value of
which, after the establishment of the University, more than recouped him
for his gifts. This might have been either accidental or it might have
been cold calculation; judging from Field's consistent methods, it was
probably not chance.

So composite, however, is the human character, so crossed and seamed by
conflicting influences, that at no time is it easy to draw any absolute
line between motives. Merely because he exploited his employees
mercilessly, and cheated the public treasury out of millions of dollars,
it does not necessarily follow that Field was utterly deficient in
redeeming traits. As business is conducted, it is well known that many
successful men (financially), who practice the most cruel and oppressive
methods, are, outside the realm of strict business transactions,
expansively generous and kind. In business they are beasts of prey,
because under the private property system, competition, whether between
small or large concerns, is reduced to a cutthroat struggle, and those
who are in the contest must abide by its desperate rules. They must let
no sympathy or tenderness interpose in their business dealings, else
they are lost.

But without entering into a further philosophical disquisition, this
fact must be noted: The amounts that Field gave for "philanthropy" were
about identical with the sums out of which he defrauded Chicago in the
one item of taxes alone. Probed into, it is seen that a great part of
the sums that multimillionaires have given, represent but a tithe of the
sums cheated by them in taxes. William C. Schermerhorn donates $300,000
to Columbia University; the aggregate amount that he defrauded in taxes
was much more. Thus do our magnates supply themselves with present and
posthumous fame gratuitously. Not to consider the far greater and
incalculably more comprehensive question of their appropriating the
resources of the country and the labor of hun