Pushing to the Front

by Orison Swett Marden

Thrift is not only one of the foundation-stones of a fortune, but also one of character. The habit of thrift improves the quality of the character.

The saving of money usually means the saving of a man. It means cutting off indulgences or avoiding vicious habits which are ruinous. It often means health in the place of dissipation. It often means a clear instead of a cloudy and muddled brain.

Furthermore, the saving habit indicates an ambition to get on and up in the world. It develops a spirit of independence, of self-reliance. A little bank account or an insurance policy indicates a desire to improve one's condition, to look up in life. It means hope, it means ambition, a determination to "make good."

People believe in the young man, who, without being mean or penurious, saves a part of his income. It is an indication of many sterling qualities. Business men naturally reason that if a young man is saving his money, he is also saving his energy, his vitality, from being wasted, that he is looking up in the world, and not down; that he is longheaded, wise; that he is determined not to sacrifice the larger gain of the future for the gratification of the hour.

A snug little bank account will add to your self-respect and self-confidence, because it shows that you have practicability, a little more independence. You can look the world in the face with a little more assurance, you can stand a little more erect and face the future with more confidence, if you know that there stands between yourself and want a little ready money or a safe investment of some kind.

The very consciousness that there is something back of you that will prove a barrier to the wolf which haunts so many human beings, and which is a terror and an efficiency destroyer to so many, will strengthen and buttress you at every point. It will relieve you from worry and anxiety about the future; it will unlock your faculties, release them from the restraint and suppression which uncertainty, fear, and doubt impose, and leave you free to do your best work.

Another great aid and incentive to thrift is the life insurance policy. "Primarily devised for the support of widows and orphans, life insurance practise has been developed so as to include the secure investment of surplus earnings in conjunction with the insurance of a sum payable at death."

I am a great believer in the efficiency of savings-banks as character builders; but life insurance has some greater advantages, especially in furnishing that imperious "must," that spur of necessity so important as a motive to most people.

People can put money into savings-banks when they get it, provided some stronger desire does not overcome the inclination; but they feel that they must pay their insurance premium.

Then again, money obtainable just by signing the name is so easily withdrawn for spending in all sorts of ways. This is one reason why I often recommend life insurance to young people as a means of saving. It has been of untold value as an object-lesson of the tremendous possibilities in acquiring the saving habit.