“I have heard with wrath of the infamous outrage committed by our common enemies upon you and upon your business.  I assure you that your deprivation can be only temporary.  The mailed fist, with further aid from Almighty God, will restore you to your office, of which no man by right can rob you.  The company will wreak vengeance on those who have dared so insolently to lay their criminal hands on you.  We hope to welcome you at the earliest opportunity.”

The failure of his business was the great drama of the century; and it is worth while to remember what it was that killed it—­and him.  While the struggle was still on there were many arguments as to what would bring matters to an end; some cunning invention, some new patent that would outwit the methods of his firm.  But after all it was nothing more startling than the printing press and the moral of the whole matter may be put in those fine old words, “But above all things, truth beareth away the victory.”  Little by little, the immense power of the printed word became too strong for him.  Rave and fume as he might, and hammer the mahogany desk, the rolling thunders of a world massed against him cracked even his stiff will.  Little by little the plain truth sifted into the minds and hearts of the thousands working in his huge organization.  In Russia, in Greece, in Spain, in Austria, in China, in Mexico, he saw men bursting the shells of age and custom that had cramped them.  One by one his competitors adopted the new ideas, or had them forced upon them; profit-sharing, workmen’s insurance, the right of free communities to live their own lives.

Deep in his heart he must have known he was doomed to fail, but that perverse demon of strong-headed pugnacity was trenched deep within him.  He was always a fighter, but his face, though angry, obstinate, proud, was still not an evil face.  He broke down while there was still some of the business to save and some of the goodwill intact.

It was the printing press that decided it:  the greatest engine in the world, to which submarines and howitzers and airplanes are but wasteful toys.  For when the printing presses are united the planet may buck and yaw, but she comes into line at last.  A million inky cylinders, roaring in chorus, were telling him the truth.  When his assistants found him, on his desk lay a half-ripped magazine where he had tried to tear up a mocking cartoon.

I think that as he sat at his table in those last days, staring with embittered eyes at the savage words and pictures that came to him from over the seven seas, he must have had some vision of the shadowy might of the press, of the vast irresistible urge of public opinion, that hung like dark wings above his head.  For little by little the printed word incarnates itself in power, and in ways undreamed of makes itself felt.  Little by little the wills of common men, coalescing, running together like beads of mercury on a plate, quivering into rhythm and concord, become a mighty force that may be ever so impalpable, but grinds empires to powder.  Mankind suffers hideous wrongs and cruel setbacks, but when once the collective purpose of humanity is summoned to a righteous end, it moves onward like the tide up a harbour.