he could not have hoped to attain competitively. In many direc- tions and ways the returned veteran, the heroic fireman, the brave engineer, the fearless physician, may find facilitation.
Reward, naturally the appropriate stimulus to incite to service on behalf of the group, is most lavishly employed when the group is most in need of service, i. e., in war time. While punishment may keep the nation's defenders up to a certain level of deed, it is necessary to distinguish by reward all achievement of valor or fortitude or devotion rising above this plane. The stimulus that might be applied by a discriminating public in marking with instant and due recognition every service rising above the ordinary is incalculable.
It will be observed that the rewards held out by the public are not chiefly the material compensations by which ordinary services are secured. They are rewards, not of goods, but of honors and glory, which, while superlatively prized by most men, cost but little to confer. By careful and well considered bestowal of public attentions and marks of distinction, a people can reap the fruit of heroic exertions, that, if recompensed by material rewards, would entail a prodigious burden of taxes. Its good will and admiration is an asset that, if well husbanded and prudently spent by a community, will procure it most precious services and sacrifices from its members.
The agent relied on to dispense the punishments and rewards just described, is public feeling. To many it will seem going too far to expect from the sentiments that fitfully agitate the amorphous mass of unreflective people a rational pressure steadily urging the individual away from his egoistic aims in the direction of the social welfare. The public it will be said, has all manner of likes and dislikes, doubtfuUest of which is its liking for genuine social service and its dislike of brazen egoism. Borne high on the crest of popular idolatry the soubrette, the bruiser, the jockey and the skirt-dancer share the honors with the soldier, the patriot and the philanthropist. Is it a man's social service that wins admiration? or is it certain qualities, such as courage, prowess, magnanimity or genius that may or may not be
