The Art of Money Getting

The Art of Money Getting
Golden Rules for Making Money
P. T. Barnum
In the United States, where we have more land than people, it is not at all
difficult for persons in good health to make money. In this comparatively
new field there are so many avenues of success open, so many vocations
which are not crowded, that any person of either sex who is willing, at least
for the time being, to engage in any respectable occupation that offers, may
find lucrative employment.



Those who really desire to attain an independence, have only to set their
minds upon it, and adopt the proper means, as they do in regard to any other
object which they wish to accomplish, and the thing is easily done. But
however easy it may be found to make money, I have no doubt many of my
hearers will agree it is the most difficult thing in the world to keep it. The
road to wealth is, as Dr. Franklin truly says, “as plain as the road to the mill.”
It consists simply in expending less than we earn; that seems to be a very
simple problem. Mr. Micawber, one of those happy creations of the genial
Dickens, puts the case in a strong light when he says that to have annual
income of twenty pounds per annum, and spend twenty pounds and
sixpence, is to be the most miserable of men; whereas, to have an income of
only twenty pounds, and spend but nineteen pounds and sixpence is to be
the happiest of mortals. Many of my readers may say, “we understand this:
this is economy, and we know economy is wealth; we know we can’t eat our
cake and keep it also.” Yet I beg to say that perhaps more cases of failure
arise from mistakes on this point than almost any other. The fact is, many
people think they understand economy when they really do not.
True economy is misapprehended, and people go through life without
properly comprehending what that principle is. One says, “I have an income
of so much, and here is my neighbor who has the same; yet every year he gets
something ahead and I fall short; why is it? I know all about economy.” He
thinks he does, but he does not. There are men who think that economy
consists in saving cheese-parings and candle-ends, in cutting off two pence
from the laundress’ bill and doing all sorts of little, mean, dirty things.
Economy is not meanness. The misfortune is, also, that this class of persons
let their economy apply in only one direction. They fancy they are so
wonderfully economical in saving a half-penny where they ought to spend
twopence, that they think they can afford to squander in other directions. A
few years ago, before kerosene oil was discovered or thought of, one might
stop overnight at almost any farmer’s house in the agricultural districts and
get a very good supper, but after supper he might attempt to read in the
sitting-room, and would find it impossible with the inefficient light of one
candle. The hostess, seeing his dilemma, would say: “It is rather difficult to
read here evenings; the proverb says ‘you must have a ship at sea in order to
be able to burn two candles at once; we never have an extra candle except
on extra occasions.” These extra occasions occur, perhaps, twice a year. In
this way the good woman saves five, six, or ten dollars in that time: but the
information which might be derived from having the extra light would, of
course, far outweigh a ton of candles.
But the trouble does not end here. Feeling that she is so economical in
tallow candies, she thinks she can afford to go frequently to the village and
spend twenty or thirty dollars for ribbons and furbelows, many of which are
not necessary. This false connote may frequently be seen in men of business,
and in those instances it often runs to writing-paper. You find good
businessmen who save all the old envelopes and scraps, and would not tear
a new sheet of paper, if they could avoid it, for the world. This is all very
well; they may in this way save five or ten dollars a year, but being so
economical (only in note paper), they think they can afford to waste time; to
have expensive parties, and to drive their carriages. This is an illustration of’
Dr. Franklin’s “saving at the spigot and wasting at the bung-hole;” “penny
wise and pound foolish.” Punch in speaking of this “one idea” class of people
says “they are like the man who bought a penny herring for his family’s
dinner and then hired a coach and four to take it home.” I never knew a man
to succeed by practising this kind of economy.
True economy consists in always making the income exceed the out-go.
Wear the old clothes a little longer if necessary; dispense with the new pair
of gloves; mend the old dress: live on plainer food if need be; so that, under
all circumstances, unless some unforeseen accident occurs, there will be a
margin in favor of the income. A penny here, and a dollar there, placed at
interest, goes on accumulating, and in this way the desired result is attained.
It requires some training, perhaps, to accomplish this economy, but when
once used to it, you will find there is more satisfaction in rational saving
than in irrational spending. Here is a recipe which I recommend: I have
found it to work an excellent cure for extravagance, and especially for
mistaken economy: When you find that you have no surplus at the end of
the year, and yet have a good income, I advise you to take a few sheets of
paper and form them into a book and mark down every item of expenditure.
Post it every day or week in two columns, one headed “necessaries” or even
“comforts”, and the other headed “luxuries,” and you will find that the latter
column will be double, treble, and frequently ten times greater than the
former. The real comforts of life cost but a small portion of what most of us
can earn. Dr. Franklin says “it is the eyes of others and not our own eyes
which ruin us. If all the world were blind except myself l should not care for
fine clothes or furniture.” It is the fear of what Mrs. Grundy may say that
keeps the noses of many worthy families to the grindstone. In America many
persons like to repeat “we are all free and equal,” but it is a great mistake in
more senses than one.
That we are born “free and equal” is a glorious truth in one sense, yet we are
not all born equally rich, and we never shall be. One may say;
“there is a man who has an income of fifty thousand dollars per annum,
while I have but one thousand dollars; I knew that fellow when he was poor
like myself; now he is rich and thinks he is better than I am; I will show him
that I am as good as he is; I will go and buy a horse and buggy; no, I cannot
do that, but I will go and hire one and ride this afternoon on the same road
that he does, and thus prove to him that I am as good as he is.”
My friend, you need not take that trouble; you can easily prove that you are
“as good as he is;” you have only to behave as well as he does; but you cannot
make anybody believe that you are rich as he is. Besides, if you put on these
“airs,” add waste your time and spend your money, your poor wife will be
obliged to scrub her fingers off at home, and buy her tea two ounces at a
time, and everything else in proportion, in order that you may keep up
“appearances,” and, after all, deceive nobody. On the other hand, Mrs. Smith
may say that her next-door neighbor married Johnson for his money, and
“everybody says so.” She has a nice one-thousand dollar camel’s hair shawl,
and she will make Smith get her an imitation one, and she will sit in a pew
right next to her neighbor in church, in order to prove that she is her equal.
My good woman, you will not get ahead in the world, if your vanity and
envy thus take the lead. In this country, where we believe the majority
ought to rule, we ignore that principle in regard to fashion, and let a handful
of people, calling themselves the aristocracy, run up a false standard of
perfection, and in endeavoring to rise to that standard, we constantly keep
ourselves poor; all the time digging away for the sake of outside
appearances. How much wiser to be a “law unto ourselves” and say, “we will
regulate our out-go by our income, and lay up something for a rainy day.”
People ought to be as sensible on the subject of money-getting as on any
other subject. Like causes produces like effects. You cannot accumulate a
fortune by taking the road that leads to poverty. It needs no prophet to tell
us that those who live fully up to their means, without any thought of a
reverse in this life, can never attain a pecuniary independence.
Men and women accustomed to gratify every whim and caprice, will find it
hard, at first, to cut down their various unnecessary expenses, and will feel
it a great self-denial to live in a smaller house than they have been
accustomed to, with less expensive furniture, less company, less costly
clothing, fewer servants, a less number of balls, parties, theater-goings,
carriage-ridings, pleasure excursions, cigar-smokings, liquor-drinkings, and
other extravagances; but, after all, if they will try the plan of laying by a
“nest-egg,” or, in other words, a small sum of money, at interest or
judiciously invested in land, they will be surprised at the pleasure to be
derived from constantly adding to their little “pile,” as well as from all the
economical habits which are engendered by this course.
The old suit of clothes, and the old bonnet and dress, will answer for
another season; the Croton or spring water taste better than champagne; a
cold bath and a brisk walk will prove more exhilarating than a ride in the
finest coach; a social chat, an evening’s reading in the family circle, or an
hour’s play of “hunt the slipper” and “blind man’s buff” will be far more
pleasant than a fifty or five hundred dollar party, when the reflection on the
difference in cost is indulged in by those who begin to know the pleasures of
saving. Thousands of men are kept poor, and tens of thousands are made so
after they have acquired quite sufficient to support them well through life,
in consequence of laying their plans of living on too broad a platform. Some
families expend twenty thousand dollars per annum, and some much more,
and would scarcely know how to live on less, while others secure more solid
enjoyment frequently on a twentieth part of that amount. Prosperity is a
more severe ordeal than adversity, especially sudden prosperity. “Easy come,
easy go,” is an old and true proverb. A spirit of pride and vanity, when
permitted to have full sway, is the undying canker-worm which gnaws the
very vitals of a man’s worldly possessions, let them be small or great,
hundreds, or millions. Many persons, as they begin to prosper, immediately
expand their ideas and commence expending for luxuries, until in a short
time their expenses swallow up their income, and they become ruined in
their ridiculous attempts to keep up appearances, and make a “sensation.”
I know a gentleman of fortune who says, that when he first began to
prosper, his wife would have a new and elegant sofa. “That sofa,” he says,
“cost me thirty thousand dollars!” When the sofa reached the house, it was
found necessary to get chairs to match; then side-boards, carpets and tables
“to correspond” with them, and so on through the entire stock of furniture;
when at last it was found that the house itself was quite too small and oldfashioned
for the furniture, and a new one was built to correspond with the
new purchases; “thus,” added my friend, “summing up an outlay of thirty
thousand dollars, caused by that single sofa, and saddling on me, in the
shape of servants, equipage, and the necessary expenses attendant upon
keeping up a fine ‘establishment,’ a yearly outlay of eleven thousand dollars,
and a tight pinch at that: whereas, ten years ago, we lived with much more
real comfort, because with much less care, on as many hundreds. The truth
is,” he continued, “that sofa would have brought me to inevitable
bankruptcy, had not a most unexampled title to prosperity kept me above
it, and had I not checked the natural desire to ‘cut a dash’.”
The foundation of success in life is good health: that is the substratum
fortune; it is also the basis of happiness. A person cannot accumulate a
fortune very well when he is sick. He has no ambition; no incentive; no
force. Of course, there are those who have bad health and cannot help it: you
cannot expect that such persons can accumulate wealth, but there are a
great many in poor health who need not be so.
If, then, sound health is the foundation of success and happiness in life, how
important it is that we should study the laws of health, which is but another
expression for the laws of nature! The nearer we keep to the laws of nature,
the nearer we are to good health, and yet how many persons there are who
pay no attention to natural laws, but absolutely transgress them, even
against their own natural inclination. We ought to know that the “sin of
ignorance” is never winked at in regard to the violation of nature’s laws;
their infraction always brings the penalty. A child may thrust its finger into
the flames without knowing it will burn, and so suffers, repentance, even,
will not stop the smart. Many of our ancestors knew very little about the
principle of ventilation. They did not know much about oxygen, whatever
other “gin” they might have been acquainted with; and consequently they
built their houses with little seven-by-nine feet bedrooms, and these good
old pious Puritans would lock themselves up in one of these cells, say their
prayers and go to bed. In the morning they would devoutly return thanks for
the “preservation of their lives,” during the night, and nobody had better
reason to be thankful. Probably some big crack in the window, or in the
door, let in a little fresh air, and thus saved them.
Many persons knowingly violate the laws of nature against their better
impulses, for the sake of fashion. For instance, there is one thing that
nothing living except a vile worm ever naturally loved, and that is tobacco;
yet how many persons there are who deliberately train an unnatural
appetite, and overcome this implanted aversion for tobacco, to such a degree
that they get to love it. They have got hold of a poisonous, filthy weed, or
rather that takes a firm hold of them. Here are married men who run about
spitting tobacco juice on the carpet and floors, and sometimes even upon
their wives besides. They do not kick their wives out of doors like drunken
men, but their wives, I have no doubt, often wish they were outside of the
house. Another perilous feature is that this artificial appetite, like jealousy,
“grows by what it feeds on;” when you love that which is unnatural, a
stronger appetite is created for the hurtful thing than the natural desire for
what is harmless. There is an old proverb which says that “habit is second
nature,” but an artificial habit is stronger than nature. Take for instance, an
old tobacco-chewer; his love for the “quid” is stronger than his love for any
particular kind of food. He can give up roast beef easier than give up the
weed.
Young lads regret that they are not men; they would like to go to bed boys
and wake up men; and to accomplish this they copy the bad habits of their
seniors. Little Tommy and Johnny see their fathers or uncles smoke a pipe,
and they say, “If I could only do that, I would be a man too; uncle John has
gone out and left his pipe of tobacco, let us try it.” They take a match and
light it, and then puff away. “We will learn to smoke; do you like it Johnny?”
That lad dolefully replies: “Not very much; it tastes bitter;” by and by he
grows pale, but he persists arid he soon offers up a sacrifice on the altar of
fashion; but the boys stick to it and persevere until at last they conquer their
natural appetites and become the victims of acquired tastes.
I speak “by the book,” for I have noticed its effects on myself, having gone so
far as to smoke ten or fifteen cigars a day; although I have not used the weed
during the last fourteen years, and never shall again. The more a man
smokes, the more he craves smoking; the last cigar smoked simply excites
the desire for another, and so on incessantly.
Take the tobacco-chewer. In the morning, when he gets up, he puts a quid
in his mouth and keeps it there all day, never taking it out except to
exchange it for a fresh one, or when he is going to eat; oh! yes, at intervals
during the day and evening, many a chewer takes out the quid and holds it
in his hand long enough to take a drink, and then pop it goes back again.
This simply proves that the appetite for rum is even stronger than that for
tobacco. When the tobacco-chewer goes to your country seat and you show
him your grapery and fruit house, and the beauties of your garden, when you
offer him some fresh, ripe fruit, and say, “My friend, I have got here the most
delicious apples, and pears, and peaches, and apricots; I have imported them
from Spain, France and Italy—just see those luscious grapes; there is
nothing more delicious nor more healthy than ripe fruit, so help yourself; I
want to see you delight yourself with these things;” he will roll the dear quid
under his tongue and answer, “No, I thank you, I have got tobacco in my
mouth.” His palate has become narcotized by the noxious weed, and he has
lost, in a great measure, the delicate and enviable taste for fruits. This
shows what expensive, useless and injurious habits men will get into. I
speak from experience. I have smoked until I trembled like an aspen leaf, the
blood rushed to my head, and I had a palpitation of the heart which I
thought was heart disease, till I was almost killed with fright. When I
consulted my physician, he said “break off tobacco using.” I was not only
injuring my health and spending a great deal of money, but I was setting a
bad example. I obeyed his counsel. No young man in the world ever looked
so beautiful, as he thought he did, behind a fifteen cent cigar or a
meerschaum!
These remarks apply with tenfold force to the use of intoxicating drinks. To
make money, requires a clear brain. A man has got to see that two and two
make four; he must lay all his plans with reflection and forethought, and
closely examine all the details and the ins and outs of business. As no man
can succeed in business unless he has a brain to enable him to lay his plans,
and reason to guide him in their execution, so, no matter how bountifully a
man may be blessed with intelligence, if the brain is muddled, and his
judgment warped by intoxicating drinks, it is impossible for him to carry on
business successfully. How many good opportunities have passed, never to
return, while a man was sipping a “social glass,” with his friend! How many
foolish bargains have been made under the influence of the “nervine,” which
temporarily makes its victim think he is rich. How many important chances
have been put off until to-morrow, and then forever, because the wine cup
has thrown the system into a state of lassitude, neutralizing the energies so
essential to success in business. Verily, “wine is a mocker.” The use of
intoxicating drinks as a beverage, is as much an infatuation, as is the
smoking of opium by the Chinese, and the former is quite as destructive to
the success of the business man as the latter. It is an unmitigated evil,
utterly indefensible in the light of philosophy; religion or good sense. It is
the parent of nearly every other evil in our country.
DON’T MISTAKE YOUR VOCATION
The safest plan, and the one most sure of success for the young man starting
in life, is to select the vocation which is most congenial to his tastes. Parents
and guardians are often quite too negligent in regard to this. It very common
for a father to say, for example: “I have five boys. I will make Billy a
clergyman; John a lawyer; Tom a doctor, and Dick a farmer.” He then goes
into town and looks about to see what he will do with Sammy. He returns
home and says “Sammy, I see watch-making is a nice genteel business; I
think I will make you a goldsmith.” He does this, regardless of Sam’s natural
inclinations, or genius.
We are all, no doubt, born for a wise purpose. There is as much diversity in
our brains as in our countenances. Some are born natural mechanics, while
some have great aversion to machinery. Let a dozen boys of ten years get
together, and you will soon observe two or three are “whittling” out some
ingenious device; working with locks or complicated machinery. When they
were but five years old, their father could find no toy to please them like a
puzzle. They are natural mechanics; but the other eight or nine boys have
different aptitudes. I belong to the latter class; I never had the slightest love
for mechanism; on the contrary, I have a sort of abhorrence for complicated
machinery. I never had ingenuity enough to whittle a cider tap so it would
not leak. I never could make a pen that I could write with, or understand the
principle of a steam engine. If a man was to take such a boy as I was, and
attempt to make a watchmaker of him, the boy might, after an
apprenticeship of five or seven years, be able to take apart and put together
a watch; but all through life he would be working up hill and seizing every
excuse for leaving his work and idling away his time. Watchmaking is
repulsive to him.
Unless a man enters upon the vocation intended for him by nature, and
best suited to his peculiar genius, he cannot succeed. I am glad to
believe that the majority of persons do find their right vocation. Yet
we see many who have mistaken their calling, from the blacksmith up (or
down) to the clergyman. You will see, for instance, that extraordinary
linguist the “learned blacksmith,” who ought to have been a teacher of
languages; and you may have seen lawyers, doctors and clergymen who were
better fitted by nature for the anvil or the lapstone.
SELECT THE RIGHT LOCATION
After securing the right vocation, you must be careful to select the proper
location. You may have been cut out for a hotel keeper, and they say it
requires a genius to “know how to keep a hotel.” You might conduct a hotel
like clock-work, and provide satisfactorily for five hundred guests every day;
yet, if you should locate your house in a small village where there is no
railroad communication or public travel, the location would be your ruin. It
is equally important that you do not commence business where there are
already enough to meet all demands in the same occupation. I remember a
case which illustrates this subject.
When I was in London in 1858, I was passing down Holborn with an
English
friend and came to the “penny shows.” They had immense cartoons outside,
portraying the wonderful curiosities to be seen “all for a penny.” Being a
little in the “show line” myself, I said “let us go in here.” We soon found
ourselves in the presence of the illustrious showman, and he proved to be
the sharpest man in that line I had ever met. He told us some extraordinary
stories in reference to his bearded ladies, his Albinos, and his Armadillos,
which we could hardly believe, but thought it “better to believe it than look
after the proof’.” He finally begged to call our attention to some wax
statuary, and showed us a lot of the dirtiest and filthiest wax figures
imaginable. They looked as if they had not seen water since the Deluge.
“What is there so wonderful about your statuary?” I asked.
“I beg you not to speak so satirically,” he replied, “Sir, these are not Madam
Tussaud’s wax figures, all covered with gilt and tinsel and imitation
diamonds, and copied from engravings and photographs. Mine, sir, were
taken from life. Whenever you look upon one of those figures, you may
consider that you are looking upon the living individual.”
Glancing casually at them, I saw one labeled “Henry VIII,” and feeling a little
curious upon seeing that it looked like Calvin Edson, the living skeleton, I
said: “Do you call that ‘Henry the Eighth?’” He replied, “Certainly; sir; it was
taken from life at Hampton Court, by special order of his majesty; on such a
day.”
He would have given the hour of the day if I had resisted; I said, “Everybody
knows that ‘Henry VIII.’ was a great stout old king, and that figure is lean
and lank; what do you say to that?”
“Why,” he replied, “you would be lean and lank yourself if you sat there as
long as he has.”
There was no resisting such arguments. I said to my English friend, “Let us
go out; do not tell him who I am; I show the white feather; he beats me.”
He followed us to the door, and seeing the rabble in the street, he called out,
“ladies and gentlemen, I beg to draw your attention to the respectable
character of my visitors,” pointing to us as we walked away. I called upon
him a couple of days afterwards; told him who I was, and said:
“My friend, you are an excellent showman, but you have selected a bad
location.”
He replied, “This is true, sir; I feel that all my talents are thrown away; but
what can I do?”
“You can go to America,” I replied. “You can give full play to your faculties
over there; you will find plenty of elbowroom in America; I will engage you
for two years; after that you will be able to go on your own account.”
He accepted my offer and remained two years in my New York Museum. He
then went to New Orleans and carried on a traveling show business during
the summer. To-day he is worth sixty thousand dollars, simply because he
selected the right vocation and also secured the proper location. The old
proverb says, “Three removes are as bad as a fire,” but when a man is in the
fire, it matters but little how soon or how often he removes.
AVOID DEBT
Young men starting in life should avoid running into debt. There is scarcely
anything that drags a person down like debt. It is a slavish position to get ill,
yet we find many a young man, hardly out of his “teens,” running in debt. He
meets a chum and says, “Look at this: I have got trusted for a new suit of
clothes.” He seems to look upon the clothes as so much given to him; well, it
frequently is so, but, if he succeeds in paying and then gets trusted again, he
is adopting a habit which will keep him in poverty through life. Debt robs a
man of his self-respect, and makes him almost despise himself. Grunting and
groaning and working for what he has eaten up or worn out, and now when
he is called upon to pay up, he has nothing to show for his money; this is
properly termed “working for a dead horse.” I do not speak of merchants
buying and selling on credit, or of those who buy on credit in order to turn
the purchase to a profit. The old Quaker said to his farmer son, “John, never
get trusted; but if thee gets trusted for anything, let it be for ‘manure,’
because that will help thee pay it back again.”
Mr. Beecher advised young men to get in debt if they could to a small
amount in the purchase of land, in the country districts. “If a young man,” he
says, “will only get in debt for some land and then get married, these two
things will keep him straight, or nothing will.” This may be safe to a limited
extent, but getting in debt for what you eat and drink and wear is to be
avoided. Some families have a foolish habit of getting credit at “the stores,”
and thus frequently purchase many things which might have been
dispensed with.
It is all very well to say; “I have got trusted for sixty days, and if I don’t have
the money the creditor will think nothing about it.” There is no class of
people in the world, who have such good memories as creditors. When the
sixty days run out, you will have to pay. If you do not pay, you will break
your promise, and probably resort to a falsehood. You may make some
excuse or get in debt elsewhere to pay it, but that only involves you the
deeper.
A good-looking, lazy young fellow, was the apprentice boy, Horatio. His
employer said, “Horatio, did you ever see a snail?” “I - think - I - have,” he
drawled out. “You must have met him then, for I am sure you never overtook
one,” said the “boss.” Your creditor will meet you or overtake you and say,
“Now, my young friend, you agreed to pay me; you have not done it, you
must give me your note.” You give the note on interest and it commences
working against you; “it is a dead horse.” The creditor goes to bed at night
and wakes up in the morning better off than when he retired to bed, because
his interest has increased during the night, but you grow poorer while you
are sleeping, for the interest is accumulating against you.
Money is in some respects like fire; it is a very excellent servant but a
terrible master. When you have it mastering you; when interest is
constantly piling up against you, it will keep you down in the worst kind of
slavery. But let money work for you, and you have the most devoted servant
in the world. It is no “eye-servant.” There is nothing animate or inanimate
that will work so faithfully as money when placed at interest, well secured.
It works night and day, and in wet or dry weather.
I was born in the blue-law State of Connecticut, where the old Puritans had
laws so rigid that it was said, “they fined a man for kissing his wife on
Sunday.” Yet these rich old Puritans would have thousands of dollars at
interest, and on Saturday night would be worth a certain amount; on
Sunday they would go to church and perform all the duties of a Christian.
On waking up on Monday morning, they would find themselves
considerably richer than the Saturday night previous, simply because their
money placed at interest had worked faithfully for them all day Sunday,
according to law!
Do not let it work against you; if you do there is no chance for success in life
so far as money is concerned. John Randolph, the eccentric Virginian, once
exclaimed in Congress, “Mr. Speaker, I have discovered the philosopher’s
stone: pay as you go.” This is, indeed, nearer to the philosopher’s stone than
any alchemist has ever yet arrived.
PERSEVERE
When a man is in the right path, he must persevere. I speak of this because
there are some persons who are “born tired;” naturally lazy and possessing
no self-reliance and no perseverance. But they can cultivate these qualities,
as Davy Crockett said:
“This thing remember, when I am dead: Be sure you are right, then go
ahead.”
It is this go-aheaditiveness, this determination not to let the “horrors” or the
“blues” take possession of you, so as to make you relax your energies in the
struggle for independence, which you must cultivate.
How many have almost reached the goal of their ambition, but, losing faith
in themselves, have relaxed their energies, and the golden prize has been lost
forever.
It is, no doubt, often true, as Shakespeare says:
“There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which, taken at the flood, leads on to
fortune.”
If you hesitate, some bolder hand will stretch out before you and get the
prize. Remember the proverb of Solomon: “He becometh poor that dealeth
with a slack hand; but the hand of the diligent maketh rich.”
Perseverance is sometimes but another word for self-reliance. Many persons
naturally look on the dark side of life, and borrow trouble. They are born so.
Then they ask for advice, and they will be governed by one wind and blown
by another, and cannot rely upon themselves. Until you can get so that you
can rely upon yourself, you need not expect to succeed.
I have known men, personally, who have met with pecuniary reverses, and
absolutely committed suicide, because they thought they could never
overcome their misfortune. But I have known others who have met more
serious financial difficulties, and have bridged them over by simple
perseverance, aided by a firm belief that they were doing justly, and that
Providence would “overcome evil with good.” You will see this illustrated in
any sphere of life.
Take two generals; both understand military tactics, both educated at West
Point, if you please, both equally gifted; yet one, having this principle of
perseverance, and the other lacking it, the former will succeed in his
profession, while the latter will fail. One may hear the cry, “the enemy are
coming, and they have got cannon.”
“Got cannon?” says the hesitating general.
“Yes.”
“Then halt every man.”
He wants time to reflect; his hesitation is his ruin; the enemy passes
unmolested, or overwhelms him; while on the other hand, the general of
pluck, perseverance and self-reliance, goes into battle with a will, and, amid
the clash of arms, the booming of cannon, the shrieks of the wounded, and
the moans of the dying, you will see this man persevering, going on, cutting
and slashing his way through with unwavering determination, inspiring his
soldiers to deeds of fortitude, valor, and triumph.
WHATEVER YOU DO, DO IT WITH ALL YOUR MIGHT
Work at it, if necessary, early and late, in season and out of season, not
leaving a stone unturned, and never deferring for a single hour that which
can be done just as well now. The old proverb is full of truth and meaning,
“Whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing well.” Many a man acquires
a fortune by doing his business thoroughly, while his neighbor remains poor
for life, because he only half does it. Ambition, energy, industry,
perseverance, are indispensable requisites for success in business.
Fortune always favors the brave, and never helps a man who does not help
himself. It won’t do to spend your time like Mr. Micawber, in waiting for
something to “turn up.” To such men one of two things usually “turns up:”
the poorhouse or the jail; for idleness breeds bad habits, and clothes a man
in rags. The poor spendthrift vagabond says to a rich man:
“I have discovered there is enough money in the world for all of us, if it was
equally divided; this must be done, and we shall all be happy together.”
“But,” was the response, “if everybody was like you, it would be spent in two
months, and what would you do then?”
“Oh! divide again; keep dividing, of course!”
I was recently reading in a London paper an account of a like philosophic
pauper who was kicked out of a cheap boarding-house because he could not
pay his bill, but he had a roll of papers sticking out of his coat pocket,
which, upon examination, proved to be his plan for paying off the national
debt of England without the aid of a penny.
People have got to do as Cromwell said: “not only trust in Providence,
but keep the powder dry.” Do your part of the work, or you cannot
succeed. Mahomet, one night, while encamping in the desert, overheard
one of his fatigued followers remark: “I will loose my camel, and trust
it to God!” “No, no, not so,” said the prophet, “tie thy camel, and
trust it to God!” Do all you can for yourselves, and then trust to
Providence, or luck, or whatever you please to call it, for the rest
DEPEND UPON YOUR OWN PERSONAL EXERTIONS.
The eye of the employer is often worth more than the hands of a dozen
employees. In the nature of things, an agent cannot be so faithful to his
employer as to himself. Many who are employers will call to mind instances
where the best employees have overlooked important points which could
not have escaped their own observation as a proprietor. No man has a right
to expect to succeed in life unless he understands his business, and nobody
can understand his business thoroughly unless he learns it by personal
application and experience. A man may be a manufacturer: he has got to
learn the many details of his business personally; he will learn something
every day, and he will find he will make mistakes nearly every day. And
these very mistakes are helps to him in the way of experiences if he but
heeds them. He will be like the Yankee tin-peddler, who, having been
cheated as to quality in the purchase of his merchandise, said: “All right,
there’s a little information to be gained every day; I will never be cheated in
that way again.” Thus a man buys his experience, and it is the best kind if
not purchased at too dear a rate.
I hold that every man should, like Cuvier, the French naturalist, thoroughly
know his business. So proficient was he in the study of natural history, that
you might bring to him the bone, or even a section of a bone of an animal
which he had never seen described, and, reasoning from analogy, he would
be able to draw a picture of the object from which the bone had been taken.
On one occasion his students attempted to deceive him. They rolled one of
their number in a cow skin and put him under the professor’s table as a new
specimen. When the philosopher came into the room, some of the students
asked him what animal it was. Suddenly the animal said “I am the devil and
I am going to eat you.” It was but natural that Cuvier should desire to
classify this creature, and examining it intently, he said:
“Divided hoof; graminivorous! It cannot be done.”
He knew that an animal with a split hoof must live upon grass and grain, or
other kind of vegetation, and would not be inclined to eat flesh, dead or
alive, so he considered himself perfectly safe. The possession of a perfect
knowledge of your business is an absolute necessity in order to insure
success.
Among the maxims of the elder Rothschild was one, all apparent paradox:
“Be cautious and bold.” This seems to be a contradiction in terms, but it is
not, and there is great wisdom in the maxim. It is, in fact, a condensed
statement of what I have already said. It is to say; “you must exercise your
caution in laying your plans, but be bold in carrying them out.” A man who
is all caution, will never dare to take hold and be successful; and a man who
is all boldness, is merely reckless, and must eventually fail. A man may go on
“’change” and make fifty, or one hundred thousand dollars in speculating in
stocks, at a single operation. But if he has simple boldness without caution,
it is mere chance, and what he gains to-day he will lose to-morrow. You
must have both the caution and the boldness, to insure success.
The Rothschilds have another maxim: “Never have anything to do with an
unlucky man or place.” That is to say, never have anything to do with a man
or place which never succeeds, because, although a man may appear to be
honest and intelligent, yet if he tries this or that thing and always fails, it is
on account of some fault or infirmity that you may not be able to discover
but nevertheless which must exist.
There is no such thing in the world as luck. There never was a man who
could go out in the morning and find a purse full of gold in the street to-day,
and another to-morrow, and so on, day after day: He may do so once in his
life; but so far as mere luck is concerned, he is as liable to lose it as to find it.
“Like causes produce like effects.” If a man adopts the proper methods to be
successful, “luck” will not prevent him. If he does not succeed, there are
reasons for it, although, perhaps, he may not be able to see them.
USE THE BEST TOOLS
Men in engaging employees should be careful to get the best. Understand,
you cannot have too good tools to work with, and there is no tool you
should be so particular about as living tools. If you get a good one, it is
better to keep him, than keep changing. He learns something every day; and
you arc benefited by the experience he acquires. He is worth more to you
this year than last, and he is the last man to part with, provided his habits
are good, and he continues faithful. If, as he gets more valuable, he demands
an exorbitant increase of salary; on the supposition that you can’t do
without him, let him go. Whenever I have such an employee, I always
discharge him; first, to convince him that his place may be supplied, and
second, because he is good for nothing if he thinks he is invaluable and
cannot be spared.
But I would keep him, if possible, in order to profit from the result of his
experience. An important element in an employee is the brain. You can see
bills up, “Hands Wanted,” but “hands” are not worth a great deal without
“heads.” Mr. Beecher illustrates this, in this wise:
An employee offers his services by saving, “I have a pair of hands and one of
my fingers thinks.” “That is very good,” says the employer. Another man
comes along, and says “he has two fingers that think.” “Ah! that is better.”
But a third calls in and says that “all his fingers and thumbs think.” That is
better still. Finally another steps in and says, “I have a brain that thinks; I
think all over; I am a thinking as well as a working man!” “You are the man I
want,” says the delighted employer.
Those men who have brains and experience are therefore the most valuable
and not to be readily parted with; it is better for them, as well as yourself, to
keep them, at reasonable advances in their salaries from time to time.
DON’T GET ABOVE YOUR BUSINESS
Young men after they get through their business training, or apprenticeship,
instead of pursuing their avocation and rising in their business, will often lie
about doing nothing. They say; “I have learned my business, but I am not
going to be a hireling; what is the object of learning my trade or profession,
unless I establish myself?’”
“Have you capital to start with?”
“No, but I am going to have it.”
“How are you going to get it?”
“I will tell you confidentially; I have a wealthy old aunt, and she will die
pretty soon; but if she does not, I expect to find some rich old man who will
lend me a few thousands to give me a start. If I only get the money to start
with I will do well.”
There 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 became 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, what can I
do?” He happened to see “Boots,” the Irishman. “Pat,” said he, “wash your
hands and face; take that white apron and come into the dining-room in five
minutes.” Presently Pat appeared as required, and the proprietor said: “Now
Pat, you must stand behind these two chairs, and wait on the gentlemen
who will occupy them; did you ever act as a waiter?”
“I know all about it, sure, but I never did it.”
Like the Irish pilot, on one occasion when the captain, thinking he was
considerably out of his course, asked, “Are you certain you understand what
you are doing?”
Pat replied, “Sure and I knows every rock in the channel.”
That moment, “bang” thumped the vessel against a rock.
“Ah! be-jabers, and that is one of ‘em,” continued the pilot. But to return to
the dining-room. “Pat,” said the landlord, “here we do everything
systematically. You must first give the gentlemen each a plate of soup, and
when they finish that, ask them what they will have next.”
Pat replied, “Ah! an’ I understand parfectly the vartues of shystem.”
Very soon in came the guests. The plates of soup were placed before them.
One of Pat’s two gentlemen ate his soup; the other did not care for it. He
said: “Waiter, take this plate away and bring me some fish.” Pat looked at
the untasted plate of soup, and remembering the instructions of the
landlord in regard to “system,” replied: “Not till ye have ate yer supe!”
Of course that was carrying “system” entirely too far.
READ THE NEWSPAPERS
Always take a trustworthy newspaper, and thus keep thoroughly posted in
regard to the transactions of the world. He who is without a newspaper is
cut off from his species. In these days of telegraphs and steam, many
important inventions and improvements in every branch of trade are being
made, and he who don’t consult the newspapers will soon find himself and
his business left out in the cold.
BEWARE OF “OUTSIDE OPERATIONS”
We sometimes see men who have obtained fortunes, suddenly become poor.
In many cases, this arises from intemperance, and often from gaming, and
other bad habits. Frequently it occurs because a man has been engaged in
“outside operations,” of some sort. When he gets rich in his legitimate
business, he is told of a grand speculation where he can make a score of
thousands. He is constantly flattered by his friends, who tell him that he is
born lucky, that everything he touches turns into gold. Now if he forgets
that his economical habits, his rectitude of conduct and a personal attention
to a business which he understood, caused his success in life, he will listen
to the siren voices. He says:
“I will put in twenty thousand dollars. I have been lucky, and my good luck
will soon bring me back sixty thousand dollars.”
A few days elapse and it is discovered he must put in ten thousand dollars
more: soon after he is told “it is all right,” but certain matters not foreseen,
require an advance of twenty thousand dollars more, which will bring him a
rich harvest; but before the time comes around to realize, the bubble bursts,
he loses all he is possessed of, and then he learns what he ought to have
known at the first, that however successful a man may be in his own
business, if he turns from that and engages ill a business which he don’t
understand, he is like Samson when shorn of his locks his strength has
departed, and he becomes like other men.
If a man has plenty of money, he ought to invest something in everything
that appears to promise success, and that will probably benefit mankind;
but let the sums thus invested be moderate in amount, and never let a man
foolishly jeopardize a fortune that he has earned m a legitimate way, by
investing it m things m which he has had no experience.
DON’T INDORSE WITHOUT SECURITY
I hold that no man ought ever to indorse a note or become security, for any
man, be it his father or brother, to a greater extent than he can afford to lose
and care nothing about, without taking good security. Here is a man that is
worth twenty thousand dollars; he is doing a thriving manufacturing or
mercantile trade; you are retired and living on your money; he comes to you
and says:
“You are aware that I am worth twenty thousand dollars, and don’t owe a
dollar; if I had five thousand dollars in cash, I could purchase a particular lot
of goods and double my money in a couple of months; will you indorse my
note for that amount?”
You reflect that he is worth twenty thousand dollars, and you incur no risk
by endorsing his note; you like to accommodate him, and you lend your
name without taking the precaution of getting security. Shortly after, he
shows you the note with your endorsement canceled, and tells you,
probably truly, “that he made the profit that he expected by the operation,”
you reflect that you have done a good action, and the thought makes you feel
happy. By and by, the same thing occurs again and you do it again; you have
already fixed the impression in your mind that it is perfectly safe to indorse
his notes without security.
But the trouble is, this man is getting money too easily. He has only to take
your note to the bank, get it discounted and take the cash. He gets money
for the time being without effort; without inconvenience to himself. Now
mark the result. He sees a chance for speculation outside of his business. A
temporary investment of only $10,000 is required. It is sure to come back
before a note at the bank would be due. He places a note for that amount
before you. You sign it almost mechanically. Being firmly convinced that
your friend is responsible and trustworthy; you indorse his notes as a
“matter of course.”
Unfortunately the speculation does not come to a head quite so soon as was
expected, and another $10,000 note must be discounted to take up the last
one when due. Before this note matures the speculation has proved an utter
failure and all the money is lost. Does the loser tell his friend, the endorser,
that he has lost half of his fortune? Not at all. He don’t even mention that he
has speculated at all. But he has got excited; the spirit of speculation has
seized him; he sees others making large sums in this way (we seldom hear of
the losers), and, like other speculators, he “looks for his money where he
loses it.” He tries again. endorsing notes has become chronic with you, and
at every loss he gets your signature for whatever amount he wants. Finally
you discover your friend has lost all of his property and all of yours. You are
overwhelmed with astonishment and grief, and you say “it is a hard thing;
my friend here has ruined me,” but, you should add, “I have also ruined him.”
If you had said in the first place, “I will accommodate you, but I never
indorse without taking ample security,” he could not have gone beyond the
length of his tether, and he would never have been tempted away from his
legitimate business. It is a very dangerous thing, therefore, at any time, to let
people get possession of money too easily; it tempts them to hazardous
speculations, if nothing more. Solomon truly said “he that hateth suretiship
is sure.”
So with the young man starting in business; let him understand the value of
money by earning it. When he does understand its value, then grease the
wheels a little in helping him to start business, but remember, men who get
money with too great facility cannot usually succeed. You must get the first
dollars by hard knocks, and at some sacrifice, in order to appreciate the
value of those dollars.
ADVERTISE YOUR BUSINESS
We all depend, more or less, upon the public for our support. We all trade
with the public—lawyers, doctors, shoemakers, artists, blacksmiths,
showmen, opera stagers, railroad presidents, and college professors. Those
who deal with the public must be careful that their goods are valuable; that
they are genuine, and will give satisfaction. When you get an article which
you know is going to please your customers, and that when they have tried
it, they will feel they have got their money’s worth, then let the fact be
known that you have got it. Be careful to advertise it in some shape or other
because it is evident that if a man has ever so good an article for sale, and
nobody knows it, it will bring him no return. In a country like this, where
nearly everybody reads, and where newspapers are issued and circulated in
editions of five thousand to two hundred thousand, it would be very unwise
if this channel was not taken advantage of to reach the public in advertising.
A newspaper goes into the family, and is read by wife and children, as well
as the head of the home; hence hundreds and thousands of people may read
your advertisement, while you are attending to your routine business. Many,
perhaps, read it while you are asleep. The whole philosophy of life is, first
“sow,” then “reap.” That is the way the farmer does; he plants his potatoes
and corn, and sows his grain, and then goes about something else, and the
time comes when he reaps. But he never reaps first and sows afterwards.
This principle applies to all kinds of business, and to nothing more
eminently than to advertising. If a man has a genuine article, there is no way
in which he can reap more advantageously than by “sowing” to the public in
this way. He must, of course, have a really good article, and one which will
please his customers; anything spurious will not succeed permanently
because the public is wiser than many imagine. Men and women are selfish,
and we all prefer purchasing where we can get the most for our money and
we try to find out where we can most surely do so.
You may advertise a spurious article, and induce many people to call and
buy it once, but they will denounce you as an impostor and swindler, and
your business will gradually die out and leave you poor. This is right. Few
people can safely depend upon chance custom. You all need to have your
customers return and purchase again. A man said to me, “I have tried
advertising and did not succeed; yet I have a good article.”
I replied, “My friend, there may be exceptions to a general rule. But how do
you advertise?”
“I put it in a weekly newspaper three times, and paid a dollar and a half for
it.” I replied: “Sir, advertising is like learning—‘a little is a dangerous thing!’”
A French writer says that “The reader of a newspaper does not see the first
mention of an ordinary advertisement; the second insertion he sees, but does
not read; the third insertion he reads; the fourth insertion, he looks at the
price; the fifth insertion, he speaks of it to his wife; the sixth insertion, he is
ready to purchase, and the seventh insertion, he purchases.” Your object in
advertising is to make the public understand what you have got to sell, and
if you have not the pluck to keep advertising, until you have imparted that
information, all the money you have spent is lost. You are like the fellow
who told the gentleman if he would give him ten cents it would save him a
dollar. “How can I help you so much with so small a sum?” asked the
gentleman in surprise. “I started out this morning (hiccuped the fellow)
with the full determination to get drunk, and I have spent my only dollar to
accomplish the object, and it has not quite done it. Ten cents worth more of
whiskey would just do it, and in this manner I should save the dollar already
expended.”
So a man who advertises at all must keep it up until the public know who
and what he is, and what his business is, or else the money invested in
advertising is lost.
Some men have a peculiar genius for writing a striking advertisement,
one that will arrest the attention of the reader at first sight. This
fact, of course, gives the advertiser a great advantage. Sometimes a man
makes himself popular by an unique sign or a curious display in his
window, recently I observed a swing sign extending over the sidewalk in
front of a store, on which was the inscription in plain letters,
“DON’T READ THE OTHER SIDE”
Of course I did, and so did everybody else, and I learned that the man had
made all independence by first attracting the public to his business in that
way and then using his customers well afterwards.
Genin, the hatter, bought the first Jenny Lind ticket at auction for two
hundred and twenty-five dollars, because he knew it would be a good
advertisement for him. “Who is the bidder?” said the auctioneer, as he
knocked down that ticket at Castle Garden. “Genin, the hatter,” was the
response. Here were thousands of people from the Fifth avenue, and from
distant cities in the highest stations m life. “Who is ‘Genin,’ the hatter?” they
exclaimed. They had never heard of him before. The next morning the
newspapers and telegraph had circulated the facts from Maine to Texas, and
from five to ten millions off people had read that the tickets sold at auction
For Jenny Lind’s first concert amounted to about twenty thousand dollars,
and that a single ticket was sold at two hundred and twenty-five dollars, to
“Genin, the hatter.” Men throughout the country involuntarily took off their
hats to see if they had a “Genin” hat on their heads. At a town in Iowa it was
found that in the crowd around the post office, there was one man who had
a “Genin” hat, and he showed it in triumph, although it was worn out and
not worth two cents. “Why,” one man exclaimed, “you have a real ‘Genin’
hat; what a lucky fellow you are.” Another man said, “Hang on to that hat, it
will be a valuable heir-loom in your family.” Still another man in the crowd
who seemed to envy the possessor of this good fortune, said, “Come, give us
all a chance; put it up at auction!” He did so, and it was sold as a keepsake
for nine dollars and fifty cents! What was the consequence to Mr. Genin? He
sold ten thousand extra hats per annum, the first six years. Nine-tenths of
the purchasers bought of him, probably, out of curiosity, and many of them,
finding that he gave them an equivalent for their money, became his regular
customers. This novel advertisement first struck their attention, and then,
as he made a good article, they came again.
Now I don’t say that everybody should advertise as Mr. Genin did. But I say
if a man has got goods for sale, and he don’t advertise their in some way, the
chances are that some day the sheriff will do it for him. Nor do I say that
everybody must advertise in a newspaper, or indeed use “printers’ ink” at all.
On the contrary, although that article is indispensable in the majority of
cases, yet doctors and clergymen, and sometimes lawyers and some others,
can more effectually reach the public in some other manner. But it is
obvious, they must be known in some way, else how could they be
supported?
BE POLITE AND KIND TO YOUR CUSTOMERS
Politeness and civility are the best capital ever invested in business. Large
stores, gilt signs, flaming advertisements, will all prove unavailing if you or
your employees treat your patrons abruptly. The truth is, the more kind and
liberal a man is, the more generous will be the patronage bestowed upon
him. “Like begets like.” The man who gives the greatest amount of goods of a
corresponding quality for the least sum (still reserving for himself a profit)
will generally succeed best in the long run. This brings us to the golden rule,
“As ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them” and they will
do better by you than if you always treated them as if you wanted to get the
most you could out of them for the least return. Men who drive sharp
bargains with their customers, acting as if they never expected to see them
again, will not be mistaken. They will never see them again as customers.
People don’t like to pay and get kicked also.
One of the ushers in my Museum once told me he intended to whip a man
who was in the lecture-room as soon as he came out.
“What for?” I inquired.
“Because he said I was no gentleman,” replied the usher.
“Never mind,” I replied, “he pays for that, and you will not convince him you
are a gentleman by whipping him. I cannot afford to lose a customer. If you
whip him, he will never visit the Museum again, and he will induce friends
to go with him to other places of amusement instead of this, and thus you
see, I should be a serious loser.”
“But he insulted me,” muttered the usher.
“Exactly,” I replied, “and if he owned the Museum, and you had paid him for
the privilege of visiting it, and he had then insulted you, there might be some
reason in your resenting it, but in this instance he is the man who pays,
while we receive, and you must, therefore, put up with his bad manners.”
My usher laughingly remarked, that this was undoubtedly the true policy;
but he added that he should not object to an increase of salary if he was
expected to be abused in order to promote my interest.
BE CHARITABLE
Of course men should be charitable, because it is a duty and a pleasure. But
even as a matter of policy, if you possess no higher incentive, you will find
that the liberal man will command patronage, while the sordid, uncharitable
miser will be avoided.
Solomon says: “There is that scattereth and yet increaseth; and there is that
withholdeth more than meet, but it tendeth to poverty.” Of course the only
true charity is that which is from the heart.
The best kind of charity is to help those who are willing to help themselves.
Promiscuous almsgiving, without inquiring into the worthiness of the
applicant, is bad in every sense. But to search out and quietly assist those
who are struggling for themselves, is the kind that “scattereth and yet
increaseth.” But don’t fall into the idea that some persons practice, of giving
a prayer instead of a potato, and a benediction instead of bread, to the
hungry. It is easier to make Christians with full stomachs than empty.
DON’T BLAB
Some men have a foolish habit of telling their business secrets. If they make
money they like to tell their neighbors how it was done. Nothing is gained
by this, and ofttimes much is lost. Say nothing about your profits, your
hopes, your expectations, your intentions. And this should apply to letters
as well as to conversation. Goethe makes Mephistophilles say: “Never write
a letter nor destroy one.” Business men must write letters, but they should
be careful what they put in them. If you are losing money, be specially
cautious and not tell of it, or you will lose your reputation.
PRESERVE YOUR INTEGRITY
It is more precious than diamonds or rubies. The old miser said to his sons:
“Get money; get it honestly if you can, but get money:” This advice was not
only atrociously wicked, but it was the very essence of stupidity: It was as
much as to say, “if you find it difficult to obtain money honestly, you can
easily get it dishonestly. Get it in that way.” Poor fool! Not to know that the
most difficult thing in life is to make money dishonestly! Not to know that
our prisons are full of men who attempted to follow this advice; not to
understand that no man can be dishonest, without soon being found out,
and that when his lack of principle is discovered, nearly every avenue to
success is closed against him forever. The public very properly shun all
whose integrity is doubted. No matter how polite and pleasant and
accommodating a man may be, none of us dare to deal with him if we
suspect “false weights and measures.” Strict honesty, not only lies at the
foundation of all success in life (financially), but in every other respect.
Uncompromising integrity of character is invaluable. It secures to its
possessor a peace and joy which cannot be attained without it—which no
amount of money, or houses and lands can purchase. A man who is known
to
be strictly honest, may be ever so poor, but he has the purses of all the
community at his disposal—for all know that if he promises to return what
he borrows, he will never disappoint them. As a mere matter of selfishness,
therefore, if a man had no higher motive for being honest, all will find that
the maxim of Dr. Franklin can never fail to be true, that “honesty is the best
policy.”
To get rich, is not always equivalent to being successful. “There are many
rich poor men,” while there are many others, honest and devout men and
women, who have never possessed so much money as some rich persons
squander in a week, but who are nevertheless really richer and happier than
any man can ever be while he is a transgressor of the higher laws of his
being.
The inordinate love of money, no doubt, may be and is “the root of all evil,”
but money itself, when properly used, is not only a “handy thing to have in
the house,” but affords the gratification of blessing our race by enabling its
possessor to enlarge the scope of human happiness and human influence.
The desire for wealth is nearly universal, and none can say it is not laudable,
provided the possessor of it accepts its responsibilities, and uses it as a
friend to humanity.
The history of money-getting, which is commerce, is a history of civilization,
and wherever trade has flourished most, there, too, have art and science
produced the noblest fruits. In fact, as a general thing, money-getters are the
benefactors of our race. To them, in a great measure, are we indebted for our
institutions of learning and of art, our academies, colleges and churches. It is
no argument against the desire for, or the possession of wealth, to say that
there are sometimes misers who hoard money only for the sake of hoarding
and who have no higher aspiration than to grasp everything which comes
within their reach. As we have sometimes hypocrites in religion, and
demagogues in politics, so there are occasionally misers among, moneygetters.
These, however, are only exceptions to the general rule. But when,
in this country, we find such a nuisance and stumbling block as a miser, we
remember with gratitude that in America we have no laws of primogeniture,
and that in the due course of nature the time will come when the hoarded
dust will be scattered for the benefit of mankind. To all men and women,
therefore, do I conscientiously say, make money honestly, and not
otherwise, for Shakespeare has truly said, “He that wants money, means,
and content, is without three good friends.”