le in the New Testament,
even if that work is regarded as a code of ethics, and they form the
spirit of that stirring definition of engineering[1] which is based on the
direction of the vital forces of nature and the doing of things for
mankind."

[Footnote 1: "Ability to do and the _doing_, efficiency, and the use of it
all for mankind."--Tredgold's definition of Engineering.]

Manufacturing concerns have found it pays them to provide decent tenements
for their workers, but society has not yet awakened to the fact that the
rank and file of the great army of salaried employees is left to fend for
itself in a world only too prone to take advantage of its necessities.
There is danger in this neglect of wholesome living surroundings, because
from this stratum develops normally the intelligence of the future, and
how can mentally active children grow up under the prevailing unsightly
and unsanitary conditions?

Of course with the passing of pioneer conditions will pass in a measure
the courage and adaptability which braced itself to meet and overcome
obstacles. The salaried position in a great combine, instead of work for
one's self in an independent business, tends to magnify the value of mere
money-income gained through smartness rather than by ability. If life is
made too easy, men will settle into indolent sterility, just as animals
and plants degenerate with too much food.

The future will surely bring greater mechanical perfection and thus leave
it possible for the individual, for each member of the family group, to do
for himself many little things which are not comfortable to do now. But
will he be willing to do them? Not unless he feels it to be a duty or a
pleasure. Not unless there is an undercurrent of principle which carries
him along. Without this principle strong enough to give an impetus over
hard places in the early stages of life, the individual and the family
will surely drift into the hotel and boarding-house, where everything is
done on a money basis and nothing for love of one's kind; where a tip
salves the hurt of menial work. These habits once gained are hard to break
up; therefore it is much better for young people to begin life doing some
things for themselves in a house where machinery responds to their call
without a tip, where they may economize without loss of self-respect. We
need to revive some of the pagan ideals of the beauty and value of the
human body and human life which consists in t