They cannot put themselves in the place of another; they cannot
comprehend something which is a little different from what they are
accustomed to hear; not only cannot they understand it, they cannot
lovingly or patiently look at it. Think of the things that have kept
people apart in physical and mental and spiritual realms, the rivers,
the mountain chains, the oceans; differences of religion, differences
of language, differences of civilization; different ethical ideas,
until people of the world have sat looking at each other with faces of
fear and antagonism instead of with the dawning in their eyes of love
and brotherhood.
Now what the world needs is something to atone, to bridge over these
differences, to bring men into sympathetic and loving acquaintance with
each other. I wish to note two or three things that have wrought very
largely and effectively in this direction. Does it ever occur to you
that commerce is something besides a means for the accumulation of
wealth? Commerce has played one of the largest parts in the history of
this world in atoning the differences, the antagonisms, between nation
and nation and man and man. It has taught the world that there is a
community of interests, and that, instead of fighting each other, they
are mutually blessed and helped by coworking, co-operating, exchanging
with each other.
So the inventors, the discoverers, have helped to bring about this
sense of human brotherhood, this community of human interests.
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