A poor man in Massachusetts who had worked in the nail-works was injured at thirty-eight,and he could earn but little money.He was employed in the office to rub out the marks on the bills made by pencil memorandums,and he used a rubber until his hand grew tired.He then tied a piece of rubber on the end of a stick and worked it like a plane.His little girl came and said,"Why,you have a patent,haven't you?"The father said afterward,"My daughter told me when I took that stick and put the rubber on the end that there was a patent,and that was the first thoughtof that."He went to Boston and applied for his patent,and every one of you that has a rubber-tipped pencil in your pocket is now paying tribute to the millionaire.No capital,not a penny did he invest in it.All was income,all the way up into the millions.
But let me hasten to one other greater thought."Show me the great men and women who live in Philadelphia."A gentleman over there will get up and say："We don't have any great men in Philadelphia.They don't live here.They live away off in Rome or St.Petersburg or London or Manayunk,or anywhere else but here in our town."I have come now to the apex of my thought.I have come now to the heart of the whole matter and to the center of my struggle：Why isn't Philadelphia a greater city in its greater wealth?Why does New York excel Philadelphia?People say,"Because of her harbor."Why do many other cities of the United States get ahead of Philadelphia now?There is only one answer,and that is because our own people talk down their own city.If there ever was a community on earth that has to be forced ahead,it is the city of Philadelphia.If we are to have a boulevard,talk it down;if we are going to have better schools,talk them down;if you wish to have wise legislation,talk it down;talk all the proposed improvements down.That is the only great wrong that I can lay at the feet of the magnificentPhiladelphia that has been so universally kind to me.I say it is time we turn around in our city and begin to talk up the things that are in our city,and begin to set them before the world as the people of Chicago,New York,St.Louis,and San Francisco do.Oh,if we only could get that spirit out among our people,that we can do things in Philadelphia and do them well!