Certainly the Secretaries of the Treasury must understand what are the vast amounts they have charge of. Only try and appreciate how much money was taken in by the United States in 1883 for gross revenue. It was $954,230,146. But the United States wanted a great deal of money that year, and so it paid out in 1883 $885,491,968.
This is one of the big counts of the United States Treasury. On the 29th of August of 1893 the cash alone on hand was $174,770,422.97 in coin. Sixty experts began work on it, and it took three months to finish the job. The weight of mixed coin was nearly 5000 tons.
When you come to figures in their application to time most of us get quite lost. We call this year 1896—that is 1896 years since the birth of Christ. In the history of the world that is only an instant, and yet it seems so far distant as to be somewhat out of our comprehension. But what is the mental process which can span the period between to-day and the time when the pyramids were built—say 3000 years before the birth of Christ. Perhaps one way of comprehending it is to divide every 100 years by three, because 33-1/3 years may about present a generation.
Suppose we take the conquest of England by William of Normandy, and his coronation at Westminster, in 1066. That was 830 years ago. In the eight centuries there would be about three generations for each 100 years, and that would make twenty-five generations and twenty-nine years over. Let us say the event took place twenty-five generations ago—it is curious dividing time in that way—how much nearer William the Conqueror seems to be to us. There is only one trouble about this method; it is the sense of humiliation it causes, because twenty-five or thirty generations ago our forefathers must have been rather savage people. At the same time we have the consolation of knowing that we have improved since then. Why, Christopher Columbus found America only twelve generations back—and there are many people alive who have seen five generations, counting themselves. It does not do, however, to go too far back, say to the forefather who was alive when the pyramid was reared. I do not understand 1964 generations ago.
