thousands of families are gone.

More important, a host of unemployed citizens face the grim problem of
existence, and an equally great number toil with little return. Only a
foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment.

And yet our distress comes from no failure of substance. We are
stricken by no plague of locusts. Compared with the perils which our
forefathers conquered because they believed and were not afraid, we
have still much to be thankful for. Nature still offers her bounty and
human efforts have multiplied it. Plenty is at our doorstep, but a
generous use of it languishes in the very sight of the supply.
Primarily this is because the rulers of the exchange of mankind's goods
have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence,
have admitted their failure and have abdicated. Practices of the
unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public
opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.

True they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern
of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit they have proposed
only the lending of more money. Stripped of the lure of profit by which
to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have
resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence.
They only know the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no
vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.

Yes, the money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple
of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient
truths. The measure of that restoration lies in the extent to which we
apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit.