THE SEMI-MONTHLY MAGAZINE SECTION
11
'" i.l. i.i hi Icinkl uiitcv cnmits n shin-
tt n (in. I Muir seconds liustlo you out of
tin' iojk-iI 1'iii'losuro.
Tins would seem to iiidicatt' that Imsi
iv is an a(jyrossiu game; but that all
di'i'iMids upon the point of view. It is
iijigrcssiM' if the effort is to make im-oliie
pieatcr than outgo. It is defensive if the
itli.it is to make outgo smaller than in-
..me. li( not mistake this statement for
repetition or verbal juggling. It is noth
ing .f the sort. 1'or there are two dis
tinctly different methods of performing.
One is to sit down and figuro cxenses
$7".i,iiint and then get out and dig up
u.'.tigii buyers to produce an income for
..u in o'-cess of $750,0(10.
The oilier is to figure income at
..7"0,t.Oii and then to sit down with a blue
pencil in one hand and a butcher's fear
lessness in your mind and put wages, sal
aries, pun liases and other expenses to a
point below $700,000.
The first met hod is practiced by busi
ness men who do not know better. The
secnnu is invariaiiiy practiced ny nanKers
when they get their hooks in for the pur
pose of protecting the bond holders and
other creditors.
In a sense, bankers are business men;
but not much. The average banker
Knows moie about business, collectively,
than Mr. Hradstieet ever pretended to
iliink. Vet this same average banker
hasn't the slightest idea, specifically, how
tu manufacture a hair pin, or to whole
sale groceries, or to retail chewing gum.
His business acumen is the wisdom of
ueneral terms, not of concrete acts.
Vet he will gladly, calmly, placidly,
i ill vine i n gly and thoroughly tell experi
enced and practical You how to run your
nwii business.
pAHKLKSS users of English sometimes
refer to the "banking business."
Properly speaking, banking per sc is not
business but art. This lias been dis
covered by more than one manufacturer
who has had to bond his plant.
The bank was very sorry, very sorry
indeed, but it could not buy the bonds at
auy price. On second thought, however,
it knew of a broker on the top tloor who
might bo interested. "Might lie" was
the proper term, for the broker was any
thing but enthusiastic. Still, if you in
sisted, he would buy the bonds; but ho
i ould not pay more than 80. Hoing
lunched, the manufacturer sold.
And he waited around for his money
while the broker went downstairs to the
bank that couldn't buy the bonds at any
price and sold the rejected bonds to that
hclfsame bank at 00. Then the bank,
which was custodian of the affairs of nu
merous widows and orphans, forthwith
proceeded to assure the said widows and
orphans that these particular bonds weie
in every respect gilt edged and worth
every cent of pur and accrued interest.
As indeed they were: only, it required the
interposition of a broker and 14 per cent
to make the bank see it.
llusiness men are resourceful liecauso
they hae to be. When a manufacturer
discovers that he can not produce his
goods as cheaply as his competitors do, he
immediately creates around his goods, by
means of advertising, an "atmosphere"
of exclusiveness and superiority. This
brings him the highest class of trade and
enables him to get for his goods a higher
price than most sellers would have the
face to demand.
Indeed, most things in business arc
done under compulsion. The maker who
produced more soap, more beer or more
jack knives than anybody else in his in
dustry became tho biggest producer by a
series of events that ho never predeter
mined. As n small maker, he found his cost of
production too high, so he increased his
output. This effort reduced tho cost of
production and also increased the demand
for his goods to such an extent that new
factory buildings were required. His new
buildings forced him still further to in
crease his output to keep down tho cost
of production, and as the output grow
beyond factory capacity, still more build
nigs were required. Thus, output ex
tended fnctory, and factory extensions in
creased output, until Mr. Manufacturer
became the Jumbo of his industry.
People stand afar off and gaze on him
and marvel at his prosperity. Rut if
the truth were known, most business men
would prefer a conservative business that
produces reasonable dividends to one that
produces far greater returns and at the
same time keeps its owner's nose on the'
grindstone and his heart m his mouth.
"A rich estate," says l'nierson (and
business is an estate), "appears to
woman a llrm and lasting fact; to a mer
chant, one easily created out of auy ma
terials, and easily lost. ' '
True for you, sage of Concord' Who
of us has not seen big business dwindle
away as a dream at the alarm clock's chit
terf Years ago, in our own old town, tlx; ,
big store was a firm and lasting fact;'
today it is a memory, and the old town,
has dozens of stores bigger, brighter and
better.
Easily created and ensily lost, tells the
story brielly. That is, if you once get
a proper start. Having got'a start, your
advantage is so easily lost that it amounts
to a proverb among business men that it
is next to impossible even to make a busi
ness stay good seven years running. For
merly, this failing was attributed to po
litical campaigns and crop failures; but'
since political campaigns have become
useful distributers of funds, and since
crop failures have long since ceased to lie I
fashionable, we have come to know that '
business fluctuations are due to tluctua
tions in business men.
No one man and no ono set of men
can everlastingly race along at top speed.
The fastest of us slow up, jilst like the
marathon winner of other years, the ex
champion pug, and the former king pin
base runner.
Husincss is simply men in action. And
the rise and fall of business institutions
is simply tho rise and fall of individual
men in their business activities.
This does not vitiate our earlier dclini
tions of business. Neither does it exclude
an additional definition; i. e., that busi
ness is the exploitation of the other fel
low's ignorance, inability, or unwilling
ncss. Keduccd to its simplest terms, this
latter means that .loncs succeeds as a
shoemaker simply because those who buy
from him and therefore make his success
are either ignorant of the processes of
shocmaking; or, knowing how to make
shoes, are unnble to do so for any one of
numy reasons; or, whether knowing or
not, have other fish to fry.
Hut we were discussing why business
slumps, and had arrived at the conclusion
that business slumps because business men
slump. What a man thinks, that he is.
Somebody forecasts hard times, business
men get the hard times thought in their
minds, and, behold, hard times are here.
f 11, a business house goes bounding
away on the top wave of prosperity,
and it feels so natural to be on top that
the individuals at the responsible posts
get to thinking that the ship is iiusiuk
able, .lust about that time the boiler
explodes. The ship was unsinkable; but
it wasn't explosion proof.
It is no more possible for one business
house to remain perpetually in undisputed
leadership than it was for the Uoman
empire to dominate the world perpetually, i
Neither business nor empire has yet dis
covered the fountain of perpetual youth.
Woe betide the leader, any how! His
position is always the hardest to hold.
What he has, everybody among his com
petitors wants. He must set and main
tain the highest standards. From him
everybody expects most. His speed is the
speed his competitors try to exceed. He
is one against tho entire field. Let him
slip ever so little, nnd quickly a com
petitor has taken his measure. Even his '
own prosperity undermines him. For lie
waxes fat and indolent with much success. '
Wholly in vain do business men scheme
and plan and labor in the hope of keep
ing up tho institution's speed and tacks
out of her tires. If in the eternal plan
of things it had been intended that per
M'tual dominance should be among man's
possessions, that fact would have been
tipped off to us by the discovery or in
vention, ere now, of a machine producing
bona fide perpetual motion.
To all of which thero is ono more or
less constant exception, tho same being
monopolies. Hut, after all, monopolies
are not business. They are merely com
lnercinlized black-jackery.
Continued on Page 14)
.y 'W!w a
-ii i tn
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that breaks or wears out within two yearn.
A COLLAPSIBLE CARRIAGE IS BEST FOR MOTHER AND BABY
The very loaturet. that make it collapsible enable vou instantlv to convert It (rum n light, attr.ic
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EXCLUSIVE SIDWAY FEATURES in addition to the TWO-YEAR GUARANTEE)
Genuine Fabrlkold Laalhar unvd eicluahely A Sldway Red Rubber Tlree (ni.ide rscliislf ly for
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KininiiiU'n. hy I l.li K I llul'ont dp Neranura l'owder uuxl nu ordinnry cnrrlanea A Cradle Spring,
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wriia lour for nam or ii air anti rrra bonMat annwine th
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S1DWAY MERCANTILE COMPANY
103G 14th Street, Elkhart, Ind.
Hit same arriaefjoltifj i r c'stVollafsibttUabyi a i.u'r -.i, tot y in thtU'vtU
VIMBli -V N. III! J .-ma. -1 JV3! " I 11
t ( s
i our nerves "M.
are exhausted
want you to take mi
oanatogen regularly
HOW many thousands of men and women have cause to look
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tion upset V()U may do well to consider whether the remarkable food lonu
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to retain the i:ood health that is even man s nulilf
Write for a Free Copy of "Nerve Health Regained"
The work nf a plijalcUii author, beautifully illuatratf-d which tella you
aomo renlly lureieatlny ttilnKa aliout your nervuua ayatein. factswhlcli
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Hits nook ulan tella the atory of HmmtOKen eonr lurlng-ly, from the
point ot view of ii phjaiciun. but an that any luyman can understand It
Sanatogtn it told in three $ize$, $1.00, $1.90, $3.60
art Hnnttiofjen from your ilruyyinl if not ohtmn
tittle Truth Mil,, tint wmii rrreijit of pi-i.
I'll
THE BAUER CHEMICAL CO., 25-V Irving Place, New York
Prof. C. A. Ewald,
of lUrlln Univritr. IWtorhon
orU cun lirilvfrltr ot MrvUn4
UtM In lila runtribuiiwn on" J jr,liu
HlHtwiuinIU."
' ' 1 cn nay Mitt I livo unril Hon
Uirn la prrat numlivr of runt
Ittitt la. In lltoa ijialuiliftfira t
nivUlMrlUm w tilth wr mainly of
iiMrvou or nrurwthrnlf orlin and
ItaVN obtainetl (-Iwnt (vault "
HU Excellency, Prof. Dr.
Von Ley den,
IMrtur t-'lnt Ma. Ural ( Imle
IWrlin IJnlvaraitv, vrrtUia
' I tmvw vU'lly ni frouiitly ir
riiiMHi iSaJialoiran In caaaa of nail
rat KtintM In my rlinlral aa wall a
tnr liirat ii raft Ira ami kin at
tlfmrljr aatJa"ta ilblt.w rwaulta '
Arnold Bennett,
lb rtnu nuvatiat, writ
"Tha tonic atfarrt of tta,iiaUlrruifi
liia la Implr wofi Jarful "
Sir C. Parker, M. P.
rrasiing tha anargr nl tlliia fraah
Tltfor to U ovarworkaj anJ
mind.'
John Temple Graves,
tha noUit tditor td Orator,
ritaai
'1 am vary ood frland of Bad
alo(n and rwcosnmontl It rontinuallr
to my frtrnda from a iretkal ii
iiarianro of lU gowd alfacU."
We can rncore an AdvertUer only hy your iiii1hua.