so miserable. Yesterday, radiant with the light of an
ideal world in which he lives, the first of men, and now oppressed by
wants and by sickness, for which he must thank himself, none is so
poor to do him reverence. He resembles the opium eaters whom
travellers describe as frequenting the bazaars of Constantinople, who
skulk about all day, the most pitiful drivellers, yellow, emaciated,
ragged, sneaking; then at evening, when the bazaars are open, they
slink to the opium-shop, swallow their morsel and become tranquil,
glorious and great. And who has not seen the tragedy of imprudent
genius struggling for years with paltry pecuniary difficulties, at
last sinking, chilled, exhausted and fruitless, like a giant
slaughtered by pins?

Is it not better that a man should accept the first pains and
mortifications of this sort, which nature is not slack in sending him,
as hints that he must expect no other good than the just fruit of his
own labor and self-denial? Health, bread, climate, social position,
have their importance, and he will give them their due. Let him esteem
Nature a perpetual counsellor, and her perfections the exact measure
of our deviations. Let him make the night night, and the day day. Let
him control the habit of expense. Let him see that as much wisdom may
be expended on a private economy as on an empire, and as much wisdom
may be drawn from it. The laws of the world are written out for him on
every piece of money in his hand. There is nothing he will not be the
better for knowing, were it only the wisdom of Poor Richard,[681] or
the State-street[682] prudence of buying by the acre to sell by the
foot; or the thrift of the agriculturist, to stick[683] in a tree
between whiles, because it will grow whilst he sleeps; or the prudence
which consists in husbanding little strokes of the tool, little
portions of time, particles of stock and small gains. The eye of
prudence may never shut. Iron, if kept at the ironmonger's, will rust;
beer, if not brewed in the right state of the atmosphere, will sour;
timber of ships will rot at sea, or if laid up high and dry, will
strain, warp and dry-rot. Money, if kept by us, yields no rent and is
liable to loss; if invested, is liable to depreciation of the
particular kind of stock. Strike, says the smith, the iron is white.
Keep the rake, says the haymaker, as nigh the scythe as you can, and
the cart as nigh the rake. Our Yankee trade is reputed to be very much
on the ex