The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1900-12-16
IMPORTANCE OF THRIFT.
Russell Sage, n Man Who Knows, Tells
How to Save.
Saturday Evening Post.

CdLuTQdy 6NcflHS IOSI.
Thrift is so essential TO happiness in this
world that the failure to practice it is.
TO me, incomprehensible. 1t is such an
easy, simple thing, and 1t means so much.
1t is the foundation of success in business,
of contentment in the home, of standing in
society. 1t stimulates industry. i never
yet heard of a thrifty man who was lazy.
1t begets independence and self-confdence.
1t makes a man of the individual who
practices it.
L think the greatest fault that character
ICES our education of the young to-day is
the failure TO teach thrift in the schools.
From the very outset a child ought TO
understand the value of saving. In some
schools, l understand, penny savings funds
are now established. Out of these funds.
if they are administered with practical
common sense, will grow more sound
teaching than out of anything else in the
curriculum l mean teaching that will
make for success; and that, after all. is
what the. mother hopes for for her child
and a nation for its citizens.
Failure i'm the world is impossible IL a
young man will start out right. IL society
will take hold of the matter in the proper
spirit, every young man will start out
right. OF course, even under the most ia
vorable conditions there will be exceptions
TO this rule. But there are exceptions to ev-
cry rule. OF them we can take no account.
Blu the great body of young men would
go right II they were taught the road at
the outset. You may not be able to make
good morals by legislation, but you can
ION u AhoA ~ VI NCSANAAtA5
and example
AS matters stand now. all that the aver
age. child ever hears in school OF the value
of Saving is contained in some dry text
book or essay. There is nothing living. vital
or forciole in such material as this. 1t is of
very much greater Importance that a child
or young man should know how TO proceed
on the road to success in the world than IL
is that he should know the road TO Cape
Town or London, or that he should know
the involved principles of the higher SCI
ences.
This is a tremendously practical world,
and that man is going TO get the most out
of it who is not hampered by a constant
want of money. 1t is absurd to suppose
that great riches always. bring happiness,
or even that the accumulation of great
riches is essential TO success. The man
Of moderate means is, on the whole, per-
haps happier than the extremely rich man,
and he who makes for himself a safe place
in any field can be set down as being quite
as successful as the man who accumulates
millions. But the man who is perpetually
hardup cannot under any circumstances be
happy. no matter what the foolish I'm the
safe place in the world if he is hampered
with debts. Helpless poverty Is the most
rushing affiction that can come 10 a fam
iiy, and is the affection most easily avoid
cd The man who starts out right will
never be poor in the extreme sense. no
matter how limited his income, or how
circumseribed his opportunities.
Let him lay down the rule for himself
that he will invariably spend less than he
makes then he is safe. No man can be
happy in this life for any length of time if
he does not live up TO this principle. no
matter how dazzlingly he starts out, or
what his prospects are. IL he deviates from
this rule he will sooner or later come 10
grief. He must save 10 succeed. He must
succeed in something to be Happy. That
man surely faces acute misery who at thir-
~ is not better off than he was at twenty.
IL is a simple process. and for its nonob-
servance there can be no possible excuse
Let the boy or man live so economically
that he always has something TO lay By.
and is certain TO have, in the end. a com
petence TO protect him against all ordinary
worries. OF course. there may come I'M
avoidable accidents; but even these will be
the habit of e~conomizing had been cult
waited. I wonder constantly, when I meet
examples OF misery caused by unthrifti-
ness. how such things can be with a human
being whose brain is normal.