The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo. TUESDAY, AUGUST 12, 1910. ANDREW CARNEGIE.

Auckland Star, Volume L, Issue 190, 12 August 1919, Page 4

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 12, 1910. ANDREW CARNEGIE.

— • —— For the cause that lacks assistance, For the wrong that n'ltds resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that WO MM do.

Before the war Andrew Carnegie was one of the; wonders of tho world. A Colossus in finance and philanthropy, bid name was always in the papers, his portrait, liiri castle and his philosophy of lite ;i regular feature of the magazines. Then the war came and swept him aside, just as it whirled away hu own dreams of peace. No other man famous before the war lias had lose publicity during the great trial. The stagre was bet for mightier issues than his money, his libraries and his endowment*?; one w reminded of the. hietorio warning to tho king who boasted of his wealth that someone would come with iron and rob him of all his gold. The old man was silent, nnd no wonder. It ie to his credit that he dropped (he pacifism in which ho delighted before the war, but the blow to j Ilia iiopes mudt have been cruel. He had made lisht of the German menace. acclaimed tho Kaiser ac a man of peace, and built the Palace of Peace at The ' Hague, only to sec Germany deliberately set the world afire and start out to march to world dominion through I the, mine of freedom. He who loomed 'so largo in the world's affairs was pushed so far into the background that wo can imagine people eaying today: "Carnegie dead? Why, I thought ' lie died lout; ago. , '

Before tho war there were many who refused to take the popular view of Andrew Carnegie, refused to worship him as the personification of Success. The war ha* added to their number. More

and more people are putting the man of wealth to two tents—how did you get your wealth, and how are you making use of it? The doctrine of selfhelp no longer suffices as , a code of morals. Andrew Carnegie comee through one test, but not through tho other. But as Mr. A. G. Gardiner says in his illuminating sketch of him, there were two Carnegies. There was Carnegie the business man of genius, the ruthless maker of millions, the man who drove his steelworkers long hours, who broke the trade union at Homestead, and in whose establishment strikers were shot down; anil there was Carnegie the. philanthropist, tho giver of libraries, the worker for humanity, the apostle of peace, the author of the saying that "The man who dies rich dies disgraced."' "Scon through that dazzling rain of dollars he appears radiant and anreoled, , ' says Mr. Gardiner: "seen through the. smoke, of I'itteburg he is le.-s radiant/* and the aureole is dim. Your judgment of him will be governed by whether you take the rainy or the smoky view, whether yon think of him in

terms of libraries or universities, IVace Palaces and Hero Funds, or in the light of the thousands of men working twelve hours a day and seven days a week in the furnaces of Pitteburg." This dual personality is not uncommon; only in Carnegie's case it was sharply outlined by his prominence in tho two worlds of ruthless business and humnnitarianism. Thousands of men live under two codes ol conduct—one for business and one for everything else—and perhaps Mr. (Jar-

dinor is right in thinking Carnegie's record in America no better and no worse than that of the average millionaire. Hut when this Scot with the razoredged business mind, with "the swift eye for an opportunity and the instinct for turning it to account," had made his millions out of eteel, he set up in trade as the greatest dispenser of gifts in tho world. In the steel trade business had biu-n businosH; now humanity was to be served. There is no justification for calling the man a hypocrite; in both spheres he was quite «iiicere. He gave not only generously, but with care. He aimed at dying poor, and though he found tho task beyond him he really tried to succeed. By I!>H ho had given away thirty or forty millions for the betterment of man, but aa fast as he shovelled out the gold the balance increased, lie scattered libraries over the world, thereby doing something really valuable for tho spread of knowledge; with the typical respect of the Scot for learning he endowed education heavily; he established tho Carnegie Institute, whose research work has extended to this country; and he paid for a home for the Court of Arbitration at The Hague, a palace of peace now permanently put out of use by the decision to make Geneva tho centre of the League of Nations. Through it all he was a very vigorous young old man, full of enthusiasm for causes, delighting in books and science, prenehing a gospel of radical individualism, ready, indeed, to express an opinion

on anything under the sun. Hits fondness for commonplace maxims, his fucile and shallow optimism, and his read in e=B to plunge into any sulijrr-t, became irritating. One felt that lie presumed too much on his astonishing business success,

that because lie had made many millions by a narrow streak of materialistic' genius, helped by dubious methods, tliat was no reason why he should attempt to be c-ensor and lerturer to tlie world. And ' one ranif back to the difficulty we have ' mentioned. Libraries were excellent; so was the Carnegie Institute, with its most valnublc rosea rcli work for the world's benefit; but would it not have beeu better to devote some of Lie millions to improving the daily lot of the Hteelworkers on whom the vast structure, of '-Is wealth rested? Had these harddriven men not lirct claim upon him? One wonders with Mr. Gardiner how the thought of these men's lot struck the millionaire at Skibo Tattle. 'For the biographer the smoke of Pittebnrg rises between him and his subject, and the ureole prows dim. That, we fear, to an ■cr increasing extent will bo the final npression of the world.