Published by
Books
The term thrift is not only properly applied to money matters, but to everything in life—the wise use of one’s time, the wise use of one’s ability, one’s energy, and this means prudent living, careful habits of life. Thrift is scientific management of one’s self, one’s time, one’s affairs, one’s money, the wisest possible expenditure of what we have of all of life’s resources.
Thrift is the friend of man, a civilization builder. The practice of thrift gives an upward tendency to the life of the individual, and to the life of the nation; it sustains and preserves the. highest welfare of the race.
Lord Rosebery, writing on Thrift,—said that all great empires that were meant to abide, were thrifty.
“Take the Roman Empire, which in some respects, as a centered empire, was the greatest in history,” he said; “it lay like an iron clamp upon the face of the world: it was founded on thrift, and when it ceased to be thrifty it degenerated and came to an end. Take the case of Prussia. It began with a little, narrow, strip of sand in the North of Europe—‘all sting,’ as some one said, from its shape and the fact that its inhabitants were almost all armed men—and it was nurtured by the thrift of Frederick the Great’s father, who prepared a vast treasure and a vast army by an economy which we should call sordid, but which was the weapon by which the greatness of Prussia was founded, and from which the present German Empire has risen. Take the case of France. In my humble belief France is in reality the most frugal of all nations. I am not sure that the French always put their money into the savings banks, and, therefore, they do not figure so well in the proportion of depositors to the nation as some others may do; but, after the disastrous year of 1870, when France was crushed for a time by a foreign enemy and by a money imposition which it seemed almost impossible that any nation could pay, what happened? The stockings of the French peasantry, in which they had kept their savings for years, were emptied into the chest of the State, and that huge indemnity and that war expense was paid off in a time incredibly short. The other two nations that I have spoken of were made by their thrift, but France was saved by her thrift.”
France, saved by her thrift to save democracy! Now it is our opportunity and privilege, by her great example to establish, both in the home and in the nation, such thrift that we can bountifully extend our aid to this brave ally, let us, every one of us, gladly do our part to sustain her at this critical period, so that she may be preserved and her future assured as one of the great nations of the world! What is saved now, is saved for that country and for our own, for the war, for the victory of civilization.
Thrift is not only one of the foundation-stones of a fortune, but also the foundation of much that is excellent in character. It improves the quality of the individual. The Thrift exercise of thrift has a very healthful reaction upon all the other faculties. Thrift is an indication of superiority in many ways. The habit of thrift denotes self-control. It is a proof that a man is not a hopeless victim of his appetites, his weaknesses, but that he is master of himself as well as of his finances.
We know that a thrifty man will not be slovenly, that he will have a certain amount of system and order; that he will be energetic and industrious, and that he is much more likely to be honest than the thriftless man.
Thrift is an educator. A thrifty man thinks ' and plans. He must have a programme. He must have a certain amount of independence.
If you have cultivated thrift it means that you have demonstrated your ability to control your desires; that you have begun to master yourself, that you are developing some of the grandest human qualities—self-reliance, independence, prudence, foresight; that you are developing your resourcefulness, inventiveness. In other words, it indicates that you have a purpose in life, that you are a man.
“Thrift does not require superior courage, nor superior intellect, nor any superhuman virtue,” says a writer on this subject. “It merely requires common-sense and the power of resisting selfish enjoyments. In fact, thrift is merely common-sense in every-day working action. It needs no fervent resolution, but only a little patient self-denial. Begin is its device! The more the habit of thrift is practiced the easier it becomes and the sooner it compensates the self-denier for the sacrifice which it has imposed.”
Herbert Spencer said that the chief difference between the savage and the civilized man is in the former’s lack of foresight. Notwithstanding the hardships of the primitive life, the savage but slowly learns to practice self-denial in order to provide for remote contingencies. Given ample provision for to-day he has no anxiety over the uncertainty of tomorrow.
It is every one’s duty to give some thought to the future, to keep in mind a comfortable old age.
The possession of money in reserve gives an independence which is an encouragement to effort, just as it is a safeguard for the future. It enables a man to work with more confidence, to look up and not down, to rise superior to his surroundings and not be dragged down by them.
When we get a little money ahead it arouses enthusiasm to add to it. It is a perpetual suggestion to save. It makes it a little easier to say “No” when inclined to spend foolishly or for things which arc really not worth while. His small savings have kept many a young man from falling into temptations which might have crippled or ruined him.
The little difference between what we earn and what we spend is capital, an asset. Savings suggest to a young couple just establishing a home wonderful possibilities. Money saved means a better home, more comforts. It means a little more reading matter and better books and periodicals. It means a possible college course later on for the children, and protection for our old age. It means an opportunity to help others—perhaps our country—when the call comes. It means sound sleep, less worry and less anxiety about the future; it means exemption from the horror of horrors, fear of coming to want, anxiety lest those dear to us may suffer for lack of the comforts of life. It may mean the difference between a skillful surgeon or physician and a bungler, in a case of life or death, when sickness enters our home.
I know a very brilliant young man who earned a great deal of money, but who felt such confidence in his continued ability to earn that he recklessly spent every cent as he went along. Suddenly his young wife was taken seriously ill, and in order to save her life he was obliged to get a noted surgeon to perform a very delicate and dangerous operation. As the surgeon would not operate until he was assured of his fee, the young man was compelled to borrow the necessary sum, which was very large. His wife’s life was saved, but her continued illness and the illness of their small children, together with the wear and anxiety, so injured the young man’s health, that his earning capacity was impaired for many years. In fact, his career was very seriously handicapped, and he and his family suffered many privations for lack of ready money to tide them over their difficulties. This young man could easily have saved a thousand dollars in a single year before his wife’s illness, but he did not think it necessary, and believed in living up to his income as he went along. He took no thought for the future.
We never can tell when illness, or accident, may impair our earning capacity, or when some unforeseen emergency may make an unexpected call upon us. Tens of thousands of mothers and children have endured all sorts of hardships because the father never laid up any money for an emergency, and when it came there was no savings-bank balance to help them over their time of stress.