“Ah! be jabers, and that is one of ’em,” continued the pilot. But to return to the dining-room. “Pat,” said the landlord, “here we do everything systematically. You must first give the gentlemen each a plate of soup, and when they finish that, ask them what they will have next.”
Pat replied, “Ah! an’ I understand parfectly the vartues of shystem.”
Very soon in came the guests. The plates of soup were placed before them. One of Pat’s two gentlemen ate his soup, the other did not care for it. He said “Waiter, take this plate away and bring me some fish.” Pat looked at the untasted plate of soup, and remembering the injunctions of the landlord in regard to “system,” replied:
“Not till ye have ate yer supe!”
Of course that was carrying “system” entirely too far.
Read the newspapers.—Always take a trustworthy newspaper and thus keep thoroughly posted in regard to the transactions of the world. He who is without a newspaper is cut off from his species. In these days of telegraphs and steam, many important inventions and improvements in every branch of trade are being made, and he who don’t consult the newspapers will soon find himself and his business left out in the cold.
Beware of “outside operations.”—We sometimes see men who have obtained fortunes, suddenly become poor. In many cases this arises from intemperance, and often from gaming, and other bad habits. Frequently it occurs because a man has been engaged in “outside operations,” of some sort. When he gets rich in his legitimate business, he is told of a grand speculation where he can make a score of thousands. He is constantly flattered by his friends, who tell him that he is born lucky, that everything he touches turns into gold. Now if he forgets that his economical habits, his rectitude of conduct and a personal attention to a business which he understood, caused his success in life, he will listen to the syren voices. He says:
“I will put in twenty thousand dollars. I have been lucky, and my good luck will soon bring me back sixty thousand dollars.”
A few days elapse and it is discovered he must put in ten thousand dollars more; soon after he is told “it is all right,” but certain matters not foreseen require an advance of twenty thousand dollars more, which will bring him a rich harvest; but before the time comes around to realize, the bubble bursts, he loses all he is possessed of, and then he learns what he ought to have known at the first, that however successful a man may be in his own business, if he turns from that and engages in a business which he don’t understand he is like Sampson when shorn of his locks,—his strength has departed, and he becomes like other men.
If a man has plenty of money he ought to invest something in everything that appears to promise success and that will probably benefit mankind; but let the sums thus invested be moderate in amount, and never let a man foolishly jeopardize a fortune that he has earned in a legitimate way, by investing it in things in which he has had no experience.