Rockefeller vs Carnegie: should a fortune be hoarded or given away?

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ROCKEFELLER vs CARNEGIE go head to head — and every jab is rooted in real history.

ROCKEFELLER

I built Standard Oil by discipline and thrift, then gave with prayerful care—God gave me my money, and I mean to steward it, not scatter it.

CARNEGIE

Stewardship is a fine word for delay, John; I say the man who dies rich dies disgraced, so I emptied my vaults into libraries while I still breathed.

ROCKEFELLER

You built temples of books and called it virtue, Andrew—yet those same mills of yours ran hot at Homestead, and steel is a hard thing to read by.

CARNEGIE

And your oil trust crushed every rival before the pulpit ever saw a penny—at least my libraries outlived my sins, while your monopoly needed the courts to teach it charity.

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