The Art of Money Getting - P. T. Barnum (top novels TXT) 📗

is no greater mistake than when a young man believes he will

succeed with borrowed money. Why? Because every man’s experience

coincides with that of Mr. Astor, who said, “it was more difficult for

him to accumulate his first thousand dollars, than all the succeeding

millions that made up his colossal fortune.” Money is good for nothing

unless you know the value of it by experience. Give a boy twenty

thousand dollars and put him in business, and the chances are that he

will lose every dollar of it before he is a year older. Like buying a

ticket in the lottery; and drawing a prize, it is “easy come, easy go.”

He does not know the value of it; nothing is worth anything, unless it

costs effort. Without self-denial and economy; patience and

perseverance, and commencing with capital which you have not earned, you

are not sure to succeed in accumulating. Young men, instead of “waiting

for dead men’s shoes,” should be up and doing, for there is no class of

persons who are so unaccommodating in regard to dying as these rich old

people, and it is fortunate for the expectant heirs that it is so. Nine

out of ten of the rich men of our country to-day, started out in life as

poor boys, with determined wills, industry, perseverance, economy and

good habits. They went on gradually, made their own money and saved it;

and this is the best way to acquire a fortune. Stephen Girard started

life as a poor cabin boy, and died worth nine million dollars. A.T.

Stewart was a poor Irish boy; and he paid taxes on a million and a half

dollars of income, per year. John Jacob Astor was a poor farmer boy, and

died worth twenty millions. Cornelius Vanderbilt began life rowing a

boat from Staten Island to New York; he presented our government with a

steamship worth a million of dollars, and died worth fifty million.

“There is no royal road to learning,” says the proverb, and I may say it

is equally true, “there is no royal road to wealth.” But I think there

is a royal road to both. The road to learning is a royal one; the road

that enables the student to expand his intellect and add every day to

his stock of knowledge, until, in the pleasant process of intellectual

growth, he is able to solve the most profound problems, to count the

stars, to analyze every atom of the globe, and to measure the firmament

this is a regal highway, and it is the only road worth traveling.

 

So in regard to wealth. Go on in confidence, study the rules, and above

all things, study human nature; for “the proper study of mankind is

man,” and you will find that while expanding the intellect and the

muscles, your enlarged experience will enable you every day to

accumulate more and more principal, which will increase itself by

interest and otherwise, until you arrive at a state of independence. You

will find, as a general thing, that the poor boys get rich and the rich

boys get poor. For instance, a rich man at his decease, leaves a large

estate to his family. His eldest sons, who have helped him earn his

fortune, know by experience the value of money; and they take their

inheritance and add to it. The separate portions of the young children

are placed at interest, and the little fellows are patted on the head,

and told a dozen times a day, “you are rich; you will never have to

work, you can always have whatever you wish, for you were born with a

golden spoon in your mouth.” The young heir soon finds out what that

means; he has the finest dresses and playthings; he is crammed with

sugar candies and almost “killed with kindness,” and he passes from

school to school, petted and flattered. He becomes arrogant and

self-conceited, abuses his teachers, and carries everything with a high

hand. He knows nothing of the real value of money, having never earned

any; but he knows all about the “golden spoon” business. At college, he

invites his poor fellow-students to his room, where he “wines and dines”

them. He is cajoled and caressed, and called a glorious good follow,

because he is so lavish of his money. He gives his game suppers, drives

his fast horses, invites his chums to fetes and parties, determined to

have lots of “good times.” He spends the night in frolics and

debauchery, and leads off his companions with the familiar song, “we

won’t go home till morning.” He gets them to join him in pulling down

signs, taking gates from their hinges and throwing them into back yards

and horse-ponds. If the police arrest them, he knocks them down, is

taken to the lockup, and joyfully foots the bills.

 

“Ah! my boys,” he cries, “what is the use of being rich, if you can’t

enjoy yourself?”

 

He might more truly say, “if you can’t make a fool of yourself;” but he

is “fast,” hates slow things, and doesn’t “see it.” Young men loaded

down with other people’s money are almost sure to lose all they inherit,

and they acquire all sorts of bad habits which, in the majority of

cases, ruin them in health, purse and character. In this country, one

generation follows another, and the poor of to-day are rich in the next

generation, or the third. Their experience leads them on, and they

become rich, and they leave vast riches to their young children. These

children, having been reared in luxury, are inexperienced and get poor;

and after long experience another generation comes on and gathers up

riches again in turn. And thus “history repeats itself,” and happy is he

who by listening to the experience of others avoids the rocks and shoals

on which so many have been wrecked.

 

“In England, the business makes the man.” If a man in that country is a

mechanic or working-man, he is not recognized as a gentleman. On the

occasion of my first appearance before Queen Victoria, the Duke of

Wellington asked me what sphere in life General Tom Thumb’s parents were

in.

 

“His father is a carpenter,” I replied.

 

“Oh! I had heard he was a gentleman,” was the response of His Grace.

 

In this Republican country, the man makes the business. No matter

whether he is a blacksmith, a shoemaker, a farmer, banker or lawyer, so

long as his business is legitimate, he may be a gentleman. So any

“legitimate” business is a double blessing it helps the man engaged in

it, and also helps others. The Farmer supports his own family, but he

also benefits the merchant or mechanic who needs the products of his

farm. The tailor not only makes a living by his trade, but he also

benefits the farmer, the clergyman and others who cannot make their own

clothing. But all these classes often may be gentlemen.

 

The great ambition should be to excel all others engaged in the same

occupation.

 

The college-student who was about graduating, said to an old lawyer:

 

“I have not yet decided which profession I will follow. Is your

profession full?”

 

“The basement is much crowded, but there is plenty of room up-stairs,”

was the witty and truthful reply.

 

No profession, trade, or calling, is overcrowded in the upper story.

Wherever you find the most honest and intelligent merchant or banker, or

the best lawyer, the best doctor, the best clergyman, the best

shoemaker, carpenter, or anything else, that man is most sought for, and

has always enough to do. As a nation, Americans are too superficial—

they are striving to get rich quickly, and do not generally do their

business as substantially and thoroughly as they should, but whoever

excels all others in his own line, if his habits are good and his

integrity undoubted, cannot fail to secure abundant patronage, and the

wealth that naturally follows. Let your motto then always be

“Excelsior,” for by living up to it there is no such word as fail.

LEARN SOMETHING USEFUL

Every man should make his son or daughter learn some useful trade or

profession, so that in these days of changing fortunes of being rich

to-day and poor tomorrow they may have something tangible to fall back

upon. This provision might save many persons from misery, who by some

unexpected turn of fortune have lost all their means.

 

LET HOPE PREDOMINATE, BUT BE NOT TOO VISIONARY

 

Many persons are always kept poor, because they are too visionary. Every

project looks to them like certain success, and therefore they keep

changing from one business to another, always in hot water, always

“under the harrow.” The plan of “counting the chickens before they are

hatched” is an error of ancient date, but it does not seem to improve by

age.

DO NOT SCATTER YOUR POWERS

Engage in one kind of business only, and stick to it faithfully until

you succeed, or until your experience shows that you should abandon it.

A constant hammering on one nail will generally drive it home at last,

so that it can be clinched. When a man’s undivided attention is centered

on one object, his mind will constantly be suggesting improvements of

value, which would escape him if his brain was occupied by a dozen

different subjects at once. Many a fortune has slipped through a man’s

fingers because he was engaged in too many occupations at a time. There

is good sense in the old caution against having too many irons in the

fire at once.

BE SYSTEMATIC

Men should be systematic in their business. A person who does business

by rule, having a time and place for everything, doing his work

promptly, will accomplish twice as much and with half the trouble of him

who does it carelessly and slipshod. By introducing system into all your

transactions, doing one thing at a time, always meeting appointments

with punctuality, you find leisure for pastime and recreation; whereas

the man who only half does one thing, and then turns to something else,

and half does that, will have his business at loose ends, and will never

know when his day’s work is done, for it never will be done. Of course,

there is a limit to all these rules. We must try to preserve the happy

medium, for there is such a thing as being too systematic. There are men

and women, for instance, who put away things so carefully that they can

never find them again. It is too much like the “red tape” formality at

Washington, and Mr. Dickens’ “Circumlocution Office,”—all theory and

no result.

 

When the “Astor House” was first started in New York city, it was

undoubtedly the best hotel in the country. The proprietors had learned a

good deal in Europe regarding hotels, and the landlords were proud of

the rigid system which pervaded every department of their great

establishment. When twelve o’clock at night had arrived, and there were

a number of guests around, one of the proprietors would say, “Touch that

bell, John;” and in two minutes sixty servants, with a water-bucket in

each hand, would present themselves in the hall. “This,” said the

landlord, addressing his guests, “is our fire-bell; it will show you we

are quite safe here; we do everything systematically.” This was before

the Croton water was introduced into the city. But they sometimes

carried their system too far. On one occasion, when the hotel was

thronged with guests, one of the waiters was suddenly indisposed, and

although there were fifty waiters in the hotel, the landlord thought he

must have his full complement, or his “system” would be interfered with.

Just before dinner-time, he rushed down stairs and said, “There must be

another waiter, I am one waiter short,