The Potter journal. [volume] (Coudersport, Pa.) 1857-1872, 1867-03-05

"Dear Sir: am poor boy. I would like
60 get rich. Now What shall dc? | would
like tn quit this section. ! don't ant 10 re-
main on my fathers farm. Please give me The
best advice you can, and oblige Yours q. o. s.
AnSwer.-Tbe aspiration to be rich
though by no means the highest that can
impeI career-is in our view, wholesome
and laudabIe. The youth who SAYS, Let
me be rich ony how, and before all other
considerations" is very likely to bring up
in some State Prison; but he who conSis-
tently says. LET me first be Just, honest,
moral, dilIigent, useful; then rich, is on
the right road. Every boy ought to as
pire to be rich, provided he can be ilhout
unfaithfulness to social obligation or to NOR
al principle.
But how shall he set about getting rich?
We would enneisely say:
!. Firmly resotpe ncver 10 oo0e a debt.
it is the Fundamental mistake of most
boys to suppose that they can get rich fast
er on money earned bv others than on that
earned respectively by themselves. If ev-
ery youth Of l8 tn % years Were to day
offered $4,000 for ten years at seven per
cent. interest, two-thirds of them would
eagerly accept il; when the probable con
sequence is that three fourths of them
would die bankrupts and paupers. Boys
do not need money ha SO much AS they
need to know how to earn aud save 1t. The
boy who, at the close of his first year of III
dependence, h2s earned and saved 500,
and invested or loaned it where it will pay
him six or seven per cent, will almost
surely become rich if he lives; while he
who closes his first year of responsibility
in debt, will probably live and lie in Debt.
There is no greater mistake made by our
American youth than that OF choosing 10
pay Interest rather than receive 1t. Intsr-
est devours us while We sleep; 1t absorbs
our profits and aggrarates our losses. Let
a young man at twenty-five have Sl,uVO
loaned on bonl and mortgage or ln> este,i
in public securities, and he Wi rarely want
money thereafter: in fact, that $500, in
vested at seven per cent, will OF itself make
him rich before he is sixty. There Is No
rule more important or wholesome for oul
boys than that which teaches them to 90
through life receiving interest rather than
paving it. Of the torments which atilcl
this mortal sphere, the first rank is held
by Crime; the second by Debt.
ii. acquire promptly and thoroughly
some useful coi5ing.-Some pursuits ARE
more lucrative some more respeclable, some
,o.,oo,llo ,l,,,D lH,t III
ney-sweep's is far better than none at all.
No matter how rich his parents may be, u
boy should learn trade; 10 matter how
poor he may he, boy may learn some
if he will. This City is full to day of yo ng
(and old) men who have been clerks, book
keepers, porters. &c., DC, yet ca" find moth
ing to do, and are star, ing because then
foolish parents did not give them trades.
A trade is an estate, and almost q ways d
productive one. A good, efficient farm
laborer can generally find palng work II
he does not insist in looking for 1t in citN
where it cannot well be; while many II
college graduate furnishes because nobody
wants the only work he knows how To do.
Let nothing prevent your acquiring skill il,
some branch of productive industry.
Ill Reso Ue not tn be rocer A roll
ing "stone gathers no moss" but is con
stantIy lhumped and knocked, and otter
shivered to pieces. If You are honest ano
industrious, you must be constantly max
ing reputation, which, if you remain IN on'
place, helps you along the road to fortune
Even a hnd-carrier or street-sweeper VIII,
has proved that his promise 10 appear OF
a given day and hour and go to work may
be trusted, has a property In the confidence
thus created. If YOU cannot find yout
work where you now are, migrate; but d.
it once for ALL When you have stuck youl
stake stand by it!
". Comprehendthat there IS aCork al
most erery,Uhrre 1cr him aUho can do Il
An Italian named Biancomi sett ell il
Ireland some sixty Years ago, and got yer,
rich there by gradually establishing lime
of passenger cOnNeyances all over that
island. AImust any man won have SAID
that he who went To- Ireland to make hl>
fortune must be mad He who know,
how, and will work. can get rich growing
potat"esin New England, though he hash
five cent stamp to begin with. There l.
work that will pay foI a million more pro-
pie on the soil of Connecticut alone. Ther,
are millions of unproiuctIre acres "thlI
days rite of this City that might h'
bought and rendered largel: fruitful at :,
clear profit Of 500 or more per acre. A
man In Niles, Mich, declined to 60 90 d.
hunting in the Rocky mountains because
there WAS more gold 10 Niles than he could
get holl OF. The reason was a good one,
and 1t applies almost everywhere. If you
can find nothing to do where You are, it is
generally becouse you can do nothing.
V. Realsze that he who earns Sir-pence
per duy more than he spends must get