A great many of them were from business houses.

Are the clerks who are responsible for this carelessness likely to win promotion?
Many an employee who would be shocked at the thought of telling his employer a lie with his lips is lying every day in the quality of his work, in his dishonest service, in the rotten hours he is slipping into it, in shirking, in his indifference to his employer's interests.

It is just as dishonest to express deception in poor work, in shirking, as to express it with the lips, yet I have known office-boys, who could not be induced to tell their employer a direct lie, to steal his time when on an errand, to hide away during working hours to smoke a cigarette or take a nap, not realizing, perhaps, that lies can be acted as well as told and that acting a lie may be even worse than telling one.
The man who botches his work, who lies or cheats in the goods he sells or manufactures, is dishonest with himself as well as with his fellow men, and must pay the price in loss of self-respect, loss of character, of standing in his community.
Yet on every side we see all sorts of things selling for a song because the maker put no character, no thought into them.

Articles of clothing that look stylish and attractive when first worn, very quickly get out of shape, and hang and look like old, much-worn garments.

Buttons fly off, seams give way at the slightest strain, dropped stitches are everywhere in evidence, and often the entire article goes to pieces before it is worn half a dozen times.
Everywhere we see furniture which looks all right, but which in reality is full of blemishes and weaknesses, covered up with paint and varnish.
Glue starts at joints, chairs and bedsteads break down at the slightest provocation, castors come off, handles pull out, many things "go to pieces" altogether, even while practically new.
"Made to sell, not for service," would be a good label for the great mass of manufactured articles in our markets to-day.
It is difficult to find anything that is well and honestly made, that has character, individuality and thoroughness wrought into it.