have had no propensity to become avaricious. I should have required no
more, and cheerfully lived up to my income; but my precarious situation
has constantly and necessarily kept me in fear. I love liberty, and I
loathe constraint, dependence, and all their kindred annoyances. As long
as my purse contains money it secures my independence, and exempts me
from the trouble of seeking other money, a trouble of which I have always
had a perfect horror; and the dread of seeing the end of my independence,
makes me proportionately unwilling to part with my money. The money that
we possess is the instrument of liberty, that which we lack and strive to
obtain is the instrument of slavery. Thence it is that I hold fast to
aught that I have, and yet covet nothing more.

My disinterestedness, then, is in reality only idleness, the pleasure of
possessing is not in my estimation worth the trouble of acquiring: and my
dissipation is only another form of idleness; when we have an opportunity
of disbursing pleasantly we should make the best possible use of it.

I am less tempted by money than by other objects, because between the
moment of possessing the money and that of using it to obtain the desired
object there is always an interval, however short; whereas to possess the
thing is to enjoy it. I see a thing and it tempts me; but if I see not
the thing itself but only the means of acquiring it, I am not tempted.
Therefore it is that I have been a pilferer, and am so even now, in the
way of mere trifles to which I take a fancy, and which I find it easier
to take than to ask for; but I never in my life recollect having taken a
farthing from any one, except about fifteen years ago, when I stole seven
francs and ten sous. The story is worth recounting, as it exhibits a
concurrence of ignorance and stupidity I should scarcely credit, did it
relate to any but myself.

It was in Paris: I was walking with M. de Franceul at the Palais Royal;
he pulled out his watch, he looked at it, and said to me, "Suppose we go
to the opera?"--"With all my heart." We go: he takes two box tickets,
gives me one, and enters himself with the other; I follow, find the door
crowded; and, looking in, see every one standing; judging, therefore,
that M. de Franceul might suppose me concealed by the company, I go out,
ask for my ticket, and, getting the money returned, leave the house,
without considering, that by then I had reached the door every one would
b