will go to ruin, and the Japanese will catch us. A great many able men feel that way, and express themselves very strongly.

"I find the same feeling among those who are being interfered with in politics. A gentleman who has been carrying on the affairs of a great city and receiving no pay but such as came 'on the side' showed me the report of a Bureau of Municipal Research. It was positively insulting. The men who got it up did n't even know what a bureau is. A bureau is a device for getting things done by referring them to another bureau that refers them back. But these fellows got up a bureau for finding out why our bureaus don't work, and why they cost so much. The report was full of figures. We had no objection to that, for we can figure too. But the mischief of it was that these figures were arranged so that you could tell what they meant. It was a bare-faced attempt to gratify intellectual curiosity.

"My friend said that if this thing kept up, he would give up politics in disgust, and live on the interest of what he had already got out of it.

"He said that the whole system of government, as he understood it, consisted in getting

experts to run it. The public is the owner of a high-powered machine; the professional politician is the chauffeur. If the chauffeur wants to take friends out for a 'joy ride,' the owner ought n't to complain. He can't get along without the chauffeur, for he does n't know how to run the machine himself."

"But," I asked, "could n't he learn how?" "Yes," said the Merry Devil, "I suppose he might, if he took the trouble."

66

Then," said I, "I take it that the kind of education you object to is the kind that makes people take the trouble to look into things."

66

Precisely," said the Merry Devil, “I hate to see people take the trouble to look into things. It induces the habit of discrimination. Now that is n't healthy. In a state of nature people take everything for granted. Why should n't they? It shows confidence in human nature. I like to see people respectful to their betters. If they allow themselves to ask, 'Are they really our betters?' that is n't respectful. You can't have an aristocracy—not a good comfortable aristocracy — where people ask questions. By the way, have you ever met a Captain of Industry?"

"Yes," I said, "at least that was what the newspapers called him."

"What struck you as his most interesting characteristic?"

66

"It struck me that he was very rich."

“That is, he had more money, you think, than was good for him?"

"I don't know about that, but he had more than was good for his children."

"Did it ever occur to you," said the Merry Devil, "that it was curious that a captain got so much out of the service as that? Even a majorgeneral does a good deal of hard work for small pay. He can't lay up much. Are you sure that your friend was n't an army contractor instead of a captain?"

66

Now that you mention it," I said, "I do think he talked more like an army contractor. I thought, at the time, that he was n't very soldierly, especially when I found that he did n't know anything about his men. He said that all his men are on the other side. He seemed to think that was the normal situation."

The Merry Devil laughed heartily. "Just see where you are coming out, and just because I

asked you two or three questions. You have come to the conclusion that the gentleman you admired wasn't a Captain of Industry at all, though the newspapers said he was. It is n't safe to ask questions, unless you are willing to hear the answers.

"When Thomas Carlyle invented that term Captains of Industry, it scared Our People half to death. Carlyle's idea was that the time had come when persons would take up business as one goes into the army. An officer has to think of the army first and himself afterward. If he does n't, he's cashiered. We were afraid that a large number of youths might be educated in that way. When we saw some of the Captains of Industry who passed without question, we were greatly comforted."

The Merry Devil continued in a more chastened mood. "It is n't merely the person who is looking after his own interests, who should be protected against intellectual curiosity. Disinterested persons who spend their lives in doing good, make the same complaint in regard to certain kinds of education. You know we don't object to people trying to do good, so long as they don't succeed. It serves to keep them busy, and it takes

their minds off themselves. We like to see them move in the line of the least resistance. The easier their good work is for them, the less it interferes with our plans. We like to see righteousness moving in ruts. It's only when it breaks out in an unexpected place that it's dangerous. But intellectual curiosity gets people out of their ruts, and sometimes they run wild. Education, if it is n't carefully looked after, is a disturbing influence. It more than doubles the labor, and makes a good man dissatisfied with himself.

"The other day a minister, a worthy man, took me into his confidence, and told me his troubles. He had been gifted with a strong voice and a confident manner, and had acquired a reputation for eloquence. He had by constant practice overcome the timidity which comes to a public speaker when he stops to think whether what he is about to say is worth while. He did not need to stop to think, he was such an easy speaker. He never was at a loss for a word, and would use the words as a life-preserver as he struck out boldly for his next head. He knew that he would always be buoyed up in this way, so that the preparation of his sermons never interfered with his parish calls.