Page:The Wisconsin idea (IA cu31924032449252).pdf/35

 while the workers bore the burdens; the drones increased and the workers bore more burdens, and so it continued until the workers could bear no more; they became dulled, disheartened and discontented, and the pauper and the proletariat appeared. The drones would do no work, and soon the whole structure came tumbling down, to lie covered with the sands of the desert. Selfish power, bad government and oppression brought about its ruin. Why? Because men forgot that prosperity exists for the benefit of the human being and for no other purpose. If prosperity does not uplift the mass of human beings, it is not true prosperity, however it may be counterfeited by a grand show of fair cities or the glories of its riches.

Indeed, if there is a magnificent building built in any city which is not, either directly or indirectly, for the purpose of improving the opportunities and increasing the happiness of all the manhood of the country, it is built for no purpose, and were better not in existence.

This the German knows. This the American, secure still in the mighty phrases of the Declaration of Independence, glorying in the tarnished grandeur of the Constitution, boasting of his riches and the power and might of his material things, has not yet discovered.

Our civilization, with its wealth and prosperity, must be made to exist for its true purposes—the betterment, the efficiency and the welfare of each individual. The