It is a truth much to be deplored that money is the criterion of merit in the judgment of the majority. Anything is endurable from a man who is rich; it is wealth alone that hides a multitude of sins. While this is so the poor will not only strive to be rich, but will generally follow the ways of the rich as far as possible. This shows the great responsibility resting upon the rich to be examples, which very few of them consider or care for. When those who stand in high places become corrupt, we find the corruption contagious. Men high in office, men who prefix "honorable" to their names, are proverbially unreliable at this time in this nation. Honesty in office is now rarely found. The following from the Chronicle gives a sad, but no doubt truthful view of the wealthy business men of San Francisco, and of the perversion of justice in the land. "There is more than a minority, who, in their greed of gain and lust of lucre, will in their business operations step close to the line of crime. Transactions are not of uncommon occurrence which, by every standard of moral right, ought to consign the wealthy operators to the prison at San Quentin. There is here a different standard by which to determine the honesty of rich men; what would be blackmailing, swindling, subornation of perjury, conspiracy to rob and cheat, if perpetrated by a man of small means in ordinary occupations, is, when done by millionaires in the carrying out of their stupendous enterprises, regarded as evidences of shrewd management and business capacity. The result of this is to demoralize the business community and to lower the standard of commercial honor. It is only disgraceful to steal small amounts, and the grade of rascality is in the inverse ratio to the magnitude of the offense. San Quentin is only intended for poor men and small offenders. Of nearly a thousand prisoners at present confined in our State Penitentiary there is not one who is worth $10,000. Men worth $100,000 are never convicted; while a man worth $1,000,000 is never legally arraigned and never put on trial."