87/100 Poverty

87. Poverty

It can not be too often repeated that it is not the so-called blessings of life, its sunshine and calms, that makes men, but its rugged experiences, its storms, tempests, and trials. Early poverty, especially, is emphatically a blessing in disguise. The school of poverty graduates the ablest pupils. It does more, perhaps, than any thing else to develop the energetic, self-reliant traits of character, without which the highest ability makes but sorry work of life's battles. Thousands of men are bemoaning present indigence and obscurity who might have won riches and honor had they only been compelled by early poverty to develop their manhood. As well expect the oak to grow strong in the atmosphere of the hot-house as that man would reach his best estate surrounded from earliest years by the comforts and luxury of wealth.

Many of the evils of poverty are imaginary, arising from mistaken notions we may entertain as to what constitutes happiness and comfort. There is not such a difference as some men imagine between the poor and the rich. In pomp, show, and opinion there is a great deal, but little as to the real pleasures and joys of life. No man is poor who does not think himself so. But if in a full fortune, with impatience he desires more, he proclaims his wants and his beggarly condition. We are more and more impressed that the poor are only they who feel poor. He whom we esteem wealthy in a true scale would perhaps be found very indigent. Of what avail the wealth of Cr[oe]sus if the heart feels pinched and poor?

It is one of the mysteries of our life that genius, the noblest gift of God to man, is nourished by poverty. Its noblest works have been achieved by the sorrowing ones of the world in tears and despair. Not in the brilliant saloon, furnished with every comfort and elegance; not in the library, well-fitted, softly carpeted, and looking out upon a smooth, green lawn or a broad expanse of scenery; not in ease and competence,—is genius born and nurtured. More frequently in adversity and destitution, amidst the harassing cares of a straitened household, in bare and fireless garrets, is genius born and reared. This is its birthplace, and with such surroundings have men labored, studied, and trained themselves, until they have at last emanated out of the gloom of that obscurity, the shining lights of their time, and exercised an influence upon the thoughts of the world amounting to a species of intellectual legislation.

If there is any thing in the world that a young man should be more grateful for than another, it is the poverty which necessitates his starting in life under very great disadvantages. Poverty is one of the best tests of human quality in existence. A triumph over it is like graduating with honor from West Point. It demonstrates stuff and stamina. It is a certificate of worthy labor faithfully performed. A young man who can not stand this test is not good for any thing. He can never rise above a drudge or a pauper. If he can not feel his will harden as the yoke of poverty presses upon him, and his pluck rise with every difficulty that poverty throws in his way, he may as well withdraw from the conflict, since his defeat is already assured. Poverty saves a thousand times more men than it ruins; for it only ruins those who are not worth saving, while it saves multitudes of those whom wealth would have ruined.

It is of decided advantage for a man to be under the necessity of having to struggle with poverty, and conquer it. "He who has battled," says Carlyle, "were it only with poverty and toil, will be found stronger and more expert than he who could stay at home from the battle." It is not prosperity so much as adversity, not wealth so much as poverty, that stimulates the perseverance of strong and healthy natures, rouses their energy, and develops their character. Indeed, misfortune and poverty have frequently converted the indolent votary of society into a useful member of the community, and made him a moving power in the great workshop of the world, teaching men, and developing the powers which nature has bestowed on them.

Poverty is the great test of civility and the touchstone of friendship. Amid the poverty and privation of the humblest homes are often found scenes of magnanimity and self-denial as utterly beyond the belief as it is the practices of the great and rich—acts of self-denial, kindness, and generosity, which borrow no support either from the gaze of the many or the admiration of the few, yet giving daily exhibitions of its strength and constancy. It is the great privilege of poverty to be happy and unenvied, to be healthy without physic, secure without a guard, and to obtain from the bounty of nature what the great and wealthy are compelled to procure by the help of art.

Few are the real wants and necessities of mankind. Some men with thousands a year suffer more for want of means than others with only hundreds. The reason is found in the artificial wants of the former. Though his income is great his wants are still greater, and, as a consequence, his income is not equal to his outgo. There are many wealthy people who, of course, enjoy their wealth, but there are thousands who never know a moment's peace because they live above their means. He who earns but a dollar a day, and does not run in debt, is a happier man. The great secret of being solvent and well-to-do and comfortable is to get ahead of your expenses. Eat and drink this month what you earned last month, not what you are going to earn the next.

Poverty may be a bitter draught, yet it often is a tonic, strengthening all the powers of manhood. Though the drinker makes a wry face there is, after all, a wholesome goodness in the cup. But debt, however courteously it may be offered, is the cup of a siren, and the wine, spiced and delicious though it be, is poison. The man out of debt, though with a flaw in his jerkin and a hole in his hat, is still the son of liberty, free as the singing bird above him; but the debtor, although clothed in the utmost bravery, what is he but a serf out upon a holiday? a slave to be reclaimed at every instant by his owner, the creditor?

Poverty is never felt so severely as by those who have seen better days. The poverty of the poor has

many elements of hardness, but it is endurable, and is developing their strength and endurance. The poverty of the formerly affluent is, indeed, hard; it avoids the light of the day and shuns the sympathy of those who would relieve its wants; it preys upon the heart and corrodes the mind; the sunshine of life is gone, and it requires a strong mind to resolutely set about to mend the impaired fortune.

It is the misfortune of many young persons today that they begin life with too many advantages. Every possible want of their many-sided nature is supplied before it is consciously felt. Books, teachers, mental and religious training, lectures, amusements, clothes, and food, all of the best quality, and without stint in quantity—in short, the pick of the world's good things—and help of every kind are lavished upon them, till satiety results, and all ambition is extinguished. What motive has a young man for whom life is thus "thrice winnowed" to exert himself? Having supped full of life's sweets he finds them palling on his taste; having done nothing to earn its good things he can not appreciate their value. Like a hot-house plant, grown weak and spindling through too much shelter and watching, he needs nothing so much as to be set in the open air of the world, and to grow strong with struggling for existence.

It is a fact that the working, successful men of to-day were once industrious, self-reliant boys. And the same thing will be repeated, for from the ranks of the hard-working, economical, temperate, and self-reliant boys of to-day will emanate the progressive, prominent men of the future. All boys should grow up strong as steel bars, fighting their way to an education, and then, when they are all ready, plunging into real life. The majority of the men of mark in this country are not the sons of those whose fathers could give them all they want, and much more than they should have, but are those who were brought up in cottages and cabins, cutting their way through difficulties on every side to their present commanding position.

Of all poverty that of the mind is the most deplorable. And it is, at the same time, without excuse. Every one who wills it can lay in a rich store of mental wealth. The poor man's purse may be empty, but he has as much gold in the sunset, and as much silver in the moon, as any body. Wealth of heart is not dependent upon wealth of purse. Home comfort and happiness does not depend upon elegance of surroundings. But it is found in the spirit presiding over the household; this is the spirit of loving kindness, and is as apt to dwell with poverty as with wealth. Thus the evils of poverty are much exaggerated. And the evils, if evils they be, are, after all, for our own ultimate good.