In the last twenty years of his life, after retirement from business, Carnegie had leisure to return to the favorite ambitions of his youth -- writing and public speaking.
Much of the book comprises the great steel master's arraignment of socialism. These have even more interest today than when originally published, for a great modern state has adopted Marxism as a rule of life.
Whatever one may think of Carnegie's attitude, it is at least apparent that he had studied the question carefully and had abundant reasons for his individualistic faith. The opinions of one of the greatest capitalists of the nineteenth century on socialism have historic value; Carnegie is almost the only man of his class who has put his convictions in this permanent form.
