Abstract A capacity for a professional career in accounting has a relation to technical aptitude which is comparable to the relation of the genius of an artist to his skill with the brush or the chisel. The skill is essential, but it won't carry him far in a professional career. According to the dictionary a profession is a calling in which one professes to have acquired some special knowledge that is used either by way of instructing, guiding, or advising others or of serving them in some art. This is all right so far as it goes, but the essential thing about a profession is that the layman is not capable of judging services rendered, because the special knowledge or skill of the professional man is beyond the power of the layman to evaluate. One can weigh the coal, or measure the lumber, or test the motor, but one cannot tell, unless one is a doctor, whether tonsils were well or poorly removed, or, unless one is a lawyer, whether or not the legal advice received is sound. Therefore the professional man may mislead or betray those who rely on him. The only protection they can have is in such standards of competence and integrity as are maintained by or on behalf of the profession.