We
find indeed, that in almost every instance in which parents have
transcended the limits of competence, and thus raised their children above
the necessity of doing anything themselves for a subsistence, God has
cursed the act, and the canker of His displeasure has consumed this
ill-saved property. That curse we see often in the prodigality and
dissipation of the children. They walk in the slippery paths of sin, kneel
at the altar of Mammon, fare sumptuously every day, as prodigal in spending
their fortune as their parents were penurious in amassing it, until at last
they come to want, rush into crime, and end their unhappy life in the
state's prison, or upon the gibbet.
We see, therefore, that when parents give their children more than what
they actually need, they place in their possession the instruments with
which, they ruin themselves. History shows that the most wealthy men
started out in the world with barely enough, and some, with, nothing; and
that generally those who started with an independent fortune ended with
less than they started, and many closed their earthly career in abject
poverty and misery. Besides, the man who made his fortune knows how to keep
and expend it; and in point of happiness derived from property, "there is
no comparison between a fortune which, a man acquires by well applied
industry, or by a series of success in his business, and one found in his
possession or received from another.
Pages:
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285