Lanterna Rally

Author: Albert G. Belding

Publisher: Forgotten Books

Published: 2015-06-02

Total Pages: 228

ISBN-13: 9781330020333

Excerpt from Accounts and Accounting Practice The author of this book has accepted the distinction made by recent writers between bookkeeping and accounting and has adopted the latter title, because the discussions and exercises that follow have to do chiefly with the construction, organization, and interpretation of accounts. One writer says that "bookkeeping is carpentry; accounting, architecture." If this distinction holds, bookkeeping becomes merely an application of arithmetic and penmanship; its aim as a subject of study, the acquisition of manual expertness in marshaling statistics. The study of any subject by the application of prescribed formula must dull the observation and deaden initiative, thus making distinct and logical sequences decline into a routine obedience to rule-of-thumb dogmas. While the student of bookkeeping, therefore, as bookkeeping has been defined, may carry away with him a quantity of not altogether useless preconceptions, the critical faculty, which alone can aid him in analyzing the entirely practical and unceremonious phenomena of business, is not brought into prominence. The clerical aspects of all written work are, of course, important; but a larger aim of this subject should be to teach the principles of business organization and procedure as they are prescribed in the experiences of business men. Business organization results from the observation and interpretation of business facts and events. When a business man appraises a fact of his business, he at the same time appraises the services of the one responsible for that fact. Accounts record values, but values merely reflect the judgments of men. Each account, therefore, has its prototype in some activity of the business. The accounting organization thus symbolizes the business organization; each involves all the principles of the other. It is not contended that a study of the principles of business organization will make a full-fledged business man, and more than a study of legal "cases" will make a full-fledged lawyer. But the aspirant for success in the commercial world who is fortified with a knowledge of principles and precedents is much better able to interpret his environment than one who enters the field with no such equipment. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.