The Secret of Wealth

"The way to wealth is as plain as the way to marketis more to be feared by the individual and by society
-- it depends on two words, industry and frugality; thatthan the condition of poverty; it maddens a good man
is, waste neither time nor money, but make the best ofto crime and drives a madman to destruction. The
both. Without industry and frugality nothing will do; withcondition of poverty is not a normal one and may quite
them everything." -- Franklin.easily be thrown off by any one who has health and
As a man chooses his coat for its wearing qualities orthe will of progress. It was Thucydides who said this
for the moment's passing whim, so does he chooseabout 425 B. C.:
his destiny. The responsibility and the result lie with the"An avowal of poverty is no disgrace to any man; to
chooser. Each living person chooses--and each hourmake no effort to escape it is indeed disgraceful."
that passes fixes his choice deeper and deeper in hisNearly 2,200 years later Oliver Goldsmith said:
daily life."To be poor, and seem to be poor, is a certain way
Wealth is a state of mind or perhaps 'twould be betternever to rise."
to say that wealth is created through a state of mind.So for more than 2,000 years, it has been understood
Few people get rich or acquire riches at a singlethat the person, who was poor and let it be known,
stroke; most people who become rich grow rich, andand made little or no effort to rise above poverty, was
the growth and development of a personal fortune islargely responsible for his own unhappy condition.
sometimes scarcely noted by the busy man orPoverty and pauperism must not be confused; one
woman, who is thus almost unconsciously growing rich.who has, through misfortune, ill-health or a combination
The acquiring of money and property, once begun, is aof circumstances, become a pauper may have left to
simple and easy process; growing rich comes throughhim no avenue of escape. The pauper is to be pitied
habits that are such fixed parts of one's daily life that,and to be helped.
once on the road to wealth, it would be quite difficult, ifThe poor are those people who spend more than
not wholly impossible, to stop the growth*.*they get or at least spend all they get; Bruyere put it
"If you live according to what nature requires, you millthus--"He is poor whose expenses exceed his
never be poor; if according to the notions of men, youincome." If such a condition should obtain long enough,
will never be rich. This is especially detrimental to us,that person would be a pauper; from poverty to
that we live, not according to the light of reason, butpauperism is not a long step; it is only a short slide.
after the fashion set by others."Wealth, ease, comfort and even contentment are
These thoughts from Lucius Annaeus Seneca, whowithin the reach of each one of us, though we all
was born in Rome before the year One. It is easy totravel different roads toward our selected goals. The
see that the same things kept people poor in thosepaths of some of us lie over mountains where, if we
days as in our own time and the principles of living wellhave the strength, we may leap from peak to peak of
and happily and gradually acquiring wealth have notsuccess, but the many of us, the great multitude, who
changed a whit since the year One.travel the level plains, must approach success steadily
There is no condition into which a man may come thatrod by rod, mile by mile, day by day and year by year.