To the glory of mankind, there was, for the first and only time in history, a
country of money—and I have no higher, more reverent tribute to pay to
America, for this means: a country of reason, justice, freedom, production,
achievement. For the first time, man’s mind and money were set free, and there
were no fortunes-by-conquest, but only fortunes-by-work, and instead of
swordsmen and slaves, there appeared the real maker of wealth, the greatest
worker, the highest type of human being—the self-made man—the American
industrialist.
If you ask me to name the proudest distinction of Americans, I would
choose—because it contains all the others—the fact that they were the people
who created the phrase “to make money.” No other language or nation had ever
used these words before; men had always thought of wealth as a static
quantity—to be seized, begged, inherited, shared, looted or obtained as a
favor. Americans were the first to understand that wealth has to be created.