The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1880-10-28
Riches and Comfort.

Il nc StOEN ID Vi bAiC Lle1u duQ
his wife who, soon after marriage, fell
to talking of their future. 81 want to
be rich, said he. 81 care nothing for
riches" was her reply. % All | wish is
TO be comfortable They had grown
beyond middle age, when, calling up
the old conversation, the husband re-
marked to- friend: f" got rich twenty
Years ago, but my wife is not yet com
fortableT The truth of the story is
realized every day in this country, al
though it is not the husbands but the
wives who, with the accumulation of
wealth, grow comfortable. 1t does not
require a great deal of money to make
women comfortable, and they bear mar
row circumstances, even pinching pow
erty, with a patience unknown to men.
They are far fonder of beauty and lux
ury than we are, and they are often
very lavish in expenditure, usually be-
cause they have had no financial in
struetion; but they seldom love money
for moneys sake, after the manner of
men. Women like money for what it
will bring them; men honor and worship
money for its mere possession.
lAltllCS anu COllAOlA- tACODb III a lld-
terial sense, are rarely united in man.
How many millionaires in this, the COM
mercial metropolis of the nation, feel,
or can feel, comfortable? They may
have everything that renders life desir-
able. including health, domestic con-
tentment, sincere friendship, public con-
Ifidence,. private esteem-things not
purchasable-but they are very likely
to be haunted by the dread of loss, or a
feverish hope of added gain; to be pos
sessed by rather than to possess their
wealth. Their Investments, old and
new, make them uneasy; they can not
bear TO have any capital idle; they are
as anxious that every thousand dollars
should draw interest as if they needed
the five or six per cent. it will yield for
their, daily necessities. g. -.
> A great fortune is great tyrant; it
drives and spares not. Many a rich
man looks back on the time when he
was poor and signs to remember how
free his mind then was from care, how
much he enjoyed the simplest pleas
ures. But he would not exchange his
present for his past any quicker than he
would exchange freedom for slavery,
health for disease, honor for infamy
He may confess that his vast property,
toiled and suffered for through years,
worries and hardens him; but he would
not surrender any portion of it more
willingly than he would surrender the
use of his right arm. 1t is the maledic-
ton of superintendent riches that, while
they harry their owner and may de-
stroy his mental peace, he clings to
them as tenaciously as to life and is Bit
terly tormented by the smallest fraction
of their decrease. The ordinary rich
man does not enjoy what he has so
much as he suffers from what he fails to
get. We have all heard of the New
York Crnsus who declined to contrib
ute too most worthy charity. The man
who had asked for his subscription eX-
pressed his surprise. 81 should be glad
to do If" was his excuse, "but really l
can't afford it. Why, at this moment l
have more than half a million of dollars
in bank and I'm not getting a cent Of
interest on it."
Most very rich men form a habit of
counting the interest on everything.
When they build fine house, or books
or pictures or furniture; when they lay
out grounds, or travel, or make a dona-
ton, they can not help thinking what
the sum expended would have brought
in at a certain per cent. A very wealthy
manufacturer up town put up, not long
ago, palatial country seat, and made
it his home for eight months in the
year. He furnished it at great eX-
pense, not because he cared for the rare
and dainty things that filed the spa
cious rooms, but because he imagined
that they would add to his social conse-
queuce He told a friend one day: 1T
is a splendid place; l admire it myself,
but it makes me unhappy when l think
that six per cent. on its cost would give
me $4,000 year, and it yields no re-
turn at all. | ike that photograph in
my library better than any of those
foreign paintings. 1t never troubles
me; l only gave thirty dollars for it,
frame and ALT was was a regular
bargain-siX per cent. on thirty dollars
won't hurt any man."
Money getting, simply for the sake of
getting it, unquestionably carries its re-
venges, which the most sordid, selfish
creature can not wholly escape. No
sensible person depreciates money; it
has incalculable power of civilizing, hui
manizing, refining. of doing good in all
directions Like fire and passion, it is
an-excellent servant, but a fearful mas
ter. No man, in the way of accumula-
ton, can be too careful of its domina-
ltion, whose approaches are stealthy
and insidious. At the beginning we
say we want to be relieved of anxiety,
to be modestlv independents; we do not
wish. to be rich. A few, a very few,
when independence has been attained,
have strength to pause in the pursuit of
gold and to turn their attention to their
higher needs. Others-they are fewer
stillLgo ia search of wealth, and hav-
mo acquired It employ it nationally and
literally, helping those who need help;
encouraging, art, literature, science,
Strengthening. SO far as they may. the
cause of Humanity aud freedom. Their
wealth bless them and those around
them; it is comforting and comfortable.
This kind of wealth-getting is beyond
the reach of many, rs New Workers so
completely know. We have any num-
Der of rich men, though most of them
are poor in spirit and bankrupt in sym
pathy. They whose purses are filled
with intelligence and compassion as
well as gold, are all the more apprecia-
ted and revered, from their paucity in
this busting, needless capital. They
have learned that, while wealth is good,
very good, there are better things than
it, and among them is the understand