The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1886-02-25
SMALL SAVINGS.
True Economy One of the characteristics
of Generous People.

Eacn OF Us mas certain HODUlc>. SCi-
tain crusades, which we especially wish
to preach. One of mine concerns thus
question of true economy.
1t seems to me that the whole foun-
dation of American society, of American
progress, would be strengthened did
we cultivate different views in this mat
ter. met once an old lady who struck
me as having perfect economic theory.
! first observed it in seeing her rescue
from the garret-shelf bent brass match
box. Il will take that" she said, land
have it mended." Somebody remon-
| strated: What use will it be when it
is mended?" for she lived in hand
some house with dainty modern APP
pointmentS, and the matchbox was
! old-fashioned. ~ don't want it for
myself; l will have it mended and give
it to Mrs. Martin Their washerwoman].
! 1t will look very pretty in her house.
l was greatly struck with that. l had
never seen anybody spend money to
| repair 4 mere ornament before giving
It to a poor person. And afterwards L
noticed how this principle, of wasting
nothing in order to give all she could.
underlay her everyday life. Why
| throw away what would benefit
/ others, what others-when the thing
thrown away is food or clothes-are
suffering for? If you are too much of
an American to be willing to save out
of regard to your own purse and your
| own advancement in life, at least you
need not be ashamed to save in order to
! give Cold bits thrown away are an
iniquity; is it not so? Is it very differ
ent from murder to destroy food? Do
! YOU not know that there is not food
/ enough in some houses near you to
keep the family alive? do not mean
/ that any of them are dying of starva-
probably rot; but the doctors say
| that the members of an underfed
family are apt to die off to something
/ like the number which the amount of
food in that family is calculated to
nourish; and still more certainly-an
even worse thing-they grow up with
deficient strength in ratio. on the
average, to their deficiency of food.
You say that you have no poor neigh
bors, that you live in the country, that
habitual gratuity to the poor is their
ruin. Grant all that, but the sin of
wasting what the world needs remains
the same. The problem works out
differently, that is all. What you save
YOU save, and can give; for you will
admit that in this world, ''full'' not
| alone ''of mouths that lack bread, but
.'of souls that lack light there are
| some needs which are safe and right to
give to. If you have not worthy
widow near by who will make extra
good use of that piece of bread-crust
/ (and of the many others like it. ) you
can adopt the theory of Jane Carlyle,
| .They have no business to have bread
cruss," and utilize such things as she
did. in your own cookery. Time Is
valuable. and often the very worst
waste consists in saving Il penny at the
! cost of a dimes worth of time; but | am
not speaking against wise judgment in
that. | am speaking of wantOn waste,
almost intentional, because the thing
wasted is small, and beneath saving by
| a free American citizen. Is 1t beneath
YOU to have a greater margin of money
at the end of the week for your Sunday
offering? VIII not the world move on
| Just that much better and more happily?
Or perhaps your conscientious refusal
to waste may lift your family in the
end to higher plane, not only IN
comfort, but in usefulness. Perhaps
YOU NAV, like Mrs. Carlyle herself, be
the sole cause of great success; for
! CARLYLE could not have been famous If
he had had nothing to eat; and had she
lived on the plan on which half OF our
mechanics live-ashamed to be
''saving''-it would very soon have
come to that.
For there is the difficulty-that they
are ashamed to save; not that they are
unwilling to take trouble. But the
prejudice against ''meanness, as they
most untruly call exact economy, Is
deeply ingrained into the national
mind. till, | do believe, they often
scrape away into the sink what they
would rather keep but for the feeling
that it would not be the thing for
prosperous mans wife to do.
People complain of the food wasted
by their cooks; but l am inclined to
think that these cooks, when they
marry, do very much the same in their
own homes; at least till disaster comes
and perhaps teaches them lifelong les
son. Disaster may never come, or not Tor
many years; yet, all the same, the rise
of that family in life would have been
faster had the feeling not ruled that it
is ''mean'' to be careful to throw away
nothing.
This does not apply to women only.
By no means. The same cold
biooded disregard of small wastes
more generally, in their case, in ex-
penses, small sums of money flung
freely about unnecessarily, simply be-
cause people are looking on and they
are ashamed not to be free-handed-is
even more apparent in many men.
Notice a young business man in the
West. He may be in daily fear OF
losing his situation. may be writh-
ing under debt, may have mothers
and sisters somewhere who need
all he can send them, and yet he falls in
with this fatal tone of the men around
him, and avoids the appearance OF
saving as he would the appearance OF
stealing. Plenty or poverty. so the
lottery goes; and men of all classes
accustom their minds to expect to have
it so. Like a great many other ''dis-
pensations of Providence" the down.
fall is often their own fault.
/ am not an advocate of ''closeness-
would counsel giving even though
ones own family might use what Is
given and be the better for it; but do
set my face against wasting. If a thing
is half worn out, half gone, half use
less, let your family or others more
needy always get the benefit of that re.
naming half, and the usefulness OF
,our life will he increased more than