PROSPERITY COMING

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 97, 21 October 1931, Page 10

PROSPERITY COMING

"GO AND MEET IT"

BUSINESS GOES ON

Amongst those who do not believe iv sitting down with folded hands and bewailing the present hard times is Mr. 15. A. Beverlcy, managing director of tlio Texas Company, Australia, who is on a visit to Wellington. He divides business men of to-day into two classes, one of which says that things couldn't be worse, while the other says that things might be worse. "The latter class," remarked Mr. Beverlcy to

a "Post." representative, "lias taken its cuut oil', and is working threo times harder than it ever did before, and it is showing results. These men havo faith in the immediate future. They know that prosperity is coming again. All the signs point to the fact that it is oven closer than we think. Then let us not huddle together in gloom, waiting for prosperity to come. Let us consolidate our forces and go out to meet it."

Quoting the story of a famous general, who, when it was reported to him that the enemy was attacking strongly nil along the line, said: "Very well, wo will advance!" Mr. Beverley went on to say: "There is a law of life that is also a law of business —one must go either forward or backward, there is no standing still. Man must have work. Even if he makes wealth enough to give up that labour by which he made his wealth, Nature is inexorable. Unless that individual finds other work for his hands and his brain to do, stagnation and decay are inevitable. We do not admiro the man of timid peacu. We admire the man who embodies victorious effort, who has those virile qualities necessary to win in the strain and strife of actual life.

"The situation calls for men of vision and courage. Twelve months ago, practically all businesses were in a prosperous state. To-day such is not the case. Yet a great many seem- to forget that crises have como beforq in. this, as in other countries, and the people have triumphed, and prosperity has como again. All through this crisis, while a groat number of men have iv the words of Shakespeare, 'troubled deaf Heaven with their bootless cries/ others, looking ahead and seeing the attacks on all fronts, havo given the order to advance. They havo attacked, and while they may not havo made a great deal of progress, at least they have consolidated their forces, maintained their ground, and when, the time is propitious will be the first to go forward to now and bigger successes.

"In times of depression, a great number of business mou seem to forget that the population must be fed, that millions of families must still buy food and drink; men and women must have clothes; schoolchildren, to", must be equipped; industry must go on with its demand for materials of all kinds; coal must be dug from the earth; motor-cars and trucks in hundreds of thousands must continue to run; petrol and oil must bo consumed; tires must wear out. Amidst all the widespread upheaval, a great demand has still to be met. The great danger is that, depression can become a disease called 'repression,' whereby the community, badly directed, will, through fear of the future, cease lo spend that normal proportion of their earnings on the things of life which they need, and which they are, even under present circumstances, able to afford."