MR. BANKER: You are right. Do you know that I regard credit as one of the three greatest instrumentalities of modern civilization?
MR. LAWYER: Well, no, I never thought of credit in that connection. That suggestion is so unusual that I am quite interested to know what you regard as the three and in what order of importance you would place them.
MR. BANKER: I regard the invention of printing as the greatest influence in the world's advancement, because it opened up the paths of knowledge to the poorest as well as the richest, and completely destroyed the supremacy of wealth in the acquisition of knowledge. We have observed what gigantic strides have been made during the past twenty years, and with what increasing and amazing facility information is now being disseminated, the progress of the last ten years outstripping the imagination itself. Everybody can now know everything, if they have the time and ability to acquire it.
MR. FARMER: How absolutely true that is. There are no less than ten magazines on my table at home. They cover every conceivable subject from electrical science, in which my son is deeply interested, to the fashion plates of the latest style of women's dresses, current events, current literature, fruit growing, intense farming, stock breeding, eugenics and euthenics.
MR. LAWYER: Hold on there, Mr. Farmer, or you'll prove conclusively that you fellows out in the country know more than we do in town.
MR. FARMER: Well, between you and me, I think that's so.
MR. BANKER: The second most powerful agent in the advancement of the human race is that instrumentality by which all the resources of the human mind have been developed and brought into requisition in meeting the ever-increasing demands of mankind throughout the world. It has destroyed the supremacy of money, and provided the means by which the most humble of the race can place his foot upon the ladder of opulence. That instrumentality is credit.
MR. LAWYER: I doubt whether such a proposition was ever thought of, certainly it has never been advanced to my knowledge before; but when you stop to think of it, I do not believe that anyone can successfully controvert that statement. Look about you, and imagine, if you can, what the condition of the people would have been without the advantage of credit. Who of all your acquaintances has not made his way to success by means of credit. Credit is certainly the gateway to opportunity, and opportunity is the everlasting hope of the world.