usin, if that reason would hold, I daresay the world was
never such anywhere that any man might have kept any substance
without the danger of damnation. For since Christ's days to the
world's end, we have the witness of his own word that there hath
never lacked poor men nor ever shall. For he said himself, "Poor
men shall you always have with you, unto whom, when you will, you
may do good." So that, as I tell you, if your rule should hold,
then I suppose there would be no place, in no time, since Christ's
days hitherto, nor I think in as long before that either, nor never
shall there be hereafter, in which any man could abide rich
without the danger of eternal damnation, even for his riches
alone, though he demeaned himself never so well.

But, cousin, men of substance must there be. For otherwise shall
you have more beggars, perdy, than there are, and no man left able
to relieve another. For this I think in my mind a very sure
conclusion: If all the money that is in this country were tomorrow
brought together out of every man's hand and laid all upon one
heap, and then divided out unto every man alike, it would be on
the morrow after worse than it was the day before. For I suppose
that when it were all equally thus divided among all, the best
would be left little better then than almost a beggar is now. And
yet he who was a beggar before, all that he shall be the richer
for, that he should thereby receive, shall not make him much above
a beggar still. But many a one of the rich men, if their riches
stood but in movable substance, shall be safe enough from riches,
haply for all their life after!

Men cannot, you know, live here in this world unless some one man
provide a means of living for many others. Every man cannot have a
ship of his own, nor every man be a merchant without a stock. And
these things, you know, must needs be had. Nor can every man have a
plough by himself. And who could live by the tailor's craft, if no
man were able to have a gown made? Who could live by masonry, or
who could live a carpenter, if no man were able to build either
church or house? Who would be the makers of any manner of cloth, if
there lacked men of substance to set sundry sorts to work? Some man
who hath not two ducats in his house would do better to lose them
both and leave himself not a farthing, but utterly lose all his
own, rather than that some rich man by whom he is weekly set to
work should lose one half of his money. For