THE GOLDEN RULE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 February 1942, Page 6

THE GOLDEN RULE

NEED IN BUSINESS WORLD A SPIRITED PLEA. , BY ACCOUNTANTS’ PRESIDENT. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, This Day. A spirited plea for the observance of the Golden Rule in commercial and industrial life was made by Mr R. English, of Hamilton, in his presidential address at the annual meeting of the New Zealand Society of Accountants last night. He declared that the world war and the general international upset were directly traceable to worldwide national neglect of the principles of the Golden Rule. “In the past,” he said, “we have been rather inclined to concentrate our energies in an endeavour to improve our position, or to increase our wealth, ignoring or overlooking anything that might in any way interfere with our desires for pleasure, pecuniary gain, or advancement. Before we can hope for a better world in the future, and one which will be worth living in, we must be prepared for a whole-time application of the principles of the Golden Rule, and adopt a totally different outlook upon life. We must not constantly look for a ‘quid pro quo,’ but must cultivate the habit of helping others without expecting that the bread cast upon the waters will return.

“The time has undoubtedly come for a thorough and honest stocktaking of the position in our commercial life, and surely members of the Accountants’ Society are amongst those to whom all engaged in business pursuits- are entitled to look for a lead. We -may not succeed at first, but we shall have attempted something. If we can only realise ourselves, and make all those concerned realise, the extent to which dishonesty. selfishness, greed and slackness have crept into, and are threatening' to destroy, the standards of uprightness and decency in our business life, we will have done something worth while and justified our existence as a Society.

“Once we had secured the recognition. and the practice of the principles of the Golden Rule, we should be able to look forward with confidence to the time when the other fellow’s rights would be respected—irrespective of the extent of his worldly possessions or his social position. We should then hear and see less of secret commissions; less of the flagrant breaches of contract; less of deliberate lying and misrepresentation which Ave all encounter from time to time. We might eventually hope to reach the point where a man’s word, once given, could be safely accepted without the necessity of putting it in writing over his signature.”