The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-05-31
TALKS ON THRIFT
The Thrift Habit

The trouble with a great many people is they expect to acquire good habits in old age, while they spend most of their youth in cultivating bad ones. It is so
 easy to postpone doing the things that are hard until tomorrow, and so easy to
 drift along today. Not only is hell paved
 with good intentions, but the pathway of
 the average man is strewn with the
 wrecks of good intentions. The whole
 scheme of right living contempiates that
 man should not put off until tomorrow
 the things he should do today.
 One of the habits we hope to acquire
 sometime is the habit of thrift. This
 habit often comes late in life-not always
 from choice but often from necessity.
 Having satisfied habits that are destruc-
 tive, when the passions are burned out
 of decaying mind and body, men find
 themselves more or less free from temp
 tations, and mistake a flickering flame
 for a ripening virtue. Any habit which
 is forced is likely to find itself in an
 unhealthy environment, and becomes
 meaningless in it's practice.
 Before you can practice a virtue, you
 must desire the results which that vir-
 tue brings, and understand the process
 through which it comes. Many a man
 has gone to his doom because he hoped
 to stop drinking, or spending, or gam
 bling, some day, but his hope never got to the point of action.
 Frequently you will find standing alone, or in groups, on a wind-swept plain, trees with no branches on what the sailor would call the ''windward side," and leaning sharply in the direction in which the wind blows. This has been no sud- den process. For years the north wind has blown gently or f1ercely against the tree, so that little by little it became distorted in shape, until it has become it's habit to grow lopsided.
 No bad habit is acquired in an instant it is a subtle process, little by little be- coming so fixed that the nature becomes distorted, like the tree, battling in vain against an adverse mind.
 If this habit of thrift is to be whole. some, sweet, and fruitful one. it must be acquired while the body is healthy, and the mind vigorous. It must not be a dy- ing reformation. It's best work can be done when the earning power is great est. the resisting power strongest, and the future, it may be, afar off.
 No man ever becomes a spendthrift at a single leap. The wasteful habits which he allows to grow become so fixed that. struggle as he may, and wish as 1 hard as he might, he cannot change his nature. Old age may compel thriftiness because there is nothing more to waste, | but the saddest commentary on human | life is to find at the close nothing stored up of energy money or property, for | which the best years of life have been given.
 ! Thrift is composite virtue It includes ] the desirable attributes of economy. self l denia. and saving; but it is no relative to niggardliness or meanness. The man who would let his grandmother starve Is
 not thrifty man, but a brute. Any vir- l tue carried to extremes becomes unde- sirable and no longer virtue. The thrift ] that does not make a man charitable sours into ayarice. Thrift means better I homes, better citizens, more comforts, more enjoyment, little waste, little anx- iety-peace. Out of it grows productive energy. steady courage. opportunity, in
 dependence, self respect, aimfulness in ] life manhood. It is the one material habit that has no shady side. It is ac- quired little by little-a steady pressure | Gin the right direction) until it becomes second nature to save and thrift becomes | a habit.