314 FAMOUS LIVING AMERICANS self ease and luxury and the praise of society given to those who succeed in the things that society understands. It would be wrong to suppose, however, that John Mitchell chose deliberately between these two methods of procedure; that after due deliberation he decided to give up the egoistic for the altruistic. Altruism was so much a part of his nature that it developed with his growth, without struggle and with- out thought. He gave up nothing, because it appears that it never occurred to him that there was anything to do, for him at least, that was other than he was doing. Andrew Carnegie, beginning as John Mitchell did, in poverty and ignorance, made himself one of the foremost men of his time in the finance of the world. Behind him lies, as the result of his lifework, a better system of refining steel, innumerable li- braries — his gifts and bearing his name — a hundred mil- lionaires and more — his one-time lieutenants — ^ and personal wealth so great as to tax his gigantic intellect to find means for its expenditure. In addition to this he has worldwide fame as a man who has succeeded in the game of life. John Mitchell, in a life as yet much shorter, leaves behind him not a better system of refining steel, not a hundred millionaires, not innumerable Ubraries with his name in stone over the V doors, but better living conditions for four hundred thousand miners — more wages, fewer hours of labor, less dangerous mine conditions, far-reaching laws for greater safety, a bet- ter understanding between capital and labor. For himself he has, as reward, a modest salary and more battles to fight for the men he leads, almost in spite of themselves. Both Andrew Carnegie and John Mitchell were and are necessary to the world. The one built up and made possible the won- derful financial system of today, the great aggregates of cap- ital which the other is now attempting to direct toward the bettering of all mankind. Each man is necessary, but each represents a different philosophy and a different theory of economics. Consciously or unconsciously, Andrew Carnegie stands for that old theory, first put forward by Adam Smith, that social progress, the advance of the masses of the people, is most rapid when each individual of the mass is struggling
