Russell H. Conwell, founder of the Institutional church in America : $b the work and the manBurr, Agnes Rush
Religion
Russell H. Conwell, founder of the Institutional church in America : $b the work and the man
Burr, Agnes Rush
Conwell, Russell H., 1843-1925; Minneapolis (Minn.) -- Biography
A.T. Stewart, the great princely merchant of New York, the richest man
in America in his time, was a poor boy; he had a dollar and a half and
went into the mercantile business. But he lost eighty-seven and a half
cents of his first dollar and a half because he bought some needles
and thread and buttons to sell, which people didn't want. Are you
poor? It is because you are not wanted and are left on your own hands.
There was the great lesson. Apply it whichever way you will it comes
to every single person's life, young or old. He did not know what
people needed, and consequently bought something they didn't want, and
had the goods left on his hands a dead loss. A.T. Stewart earned there
the great lesson of his mercantile life and said, "I will never buy
anything more until I first learn what the people want; then I'll make
the purchase." He went around to the doors and asked them what they
did want, and when he found out what they wanted, he invested his
sixty-two and a hall cents and began to supply "a known demand." I
care not what your profession or occupation in life may be; I care not
whether you are a lawyer, a doctor, a housekeeper, teacher or whatever
else, the principle is precisely the same. We must know what the world
needs first and then invest ourselves to supply that need, and success
is almost certain. A.T. Stewart went on until he was worth forty
millions. "Well," you will say, "a man can do that in New York, but
cannot do it here in Philadelphia." The statistics very carefully
gathered in New York in 1889 showed one hundred and seven millionaires
in the city worth over ten millions apiece. It was remarkable and
people think they must go there to get rich. Out of that one hundred
and seven millionaires only seven of them made their money in New
York, and the others moved to New York after their fortunes were made,
and sixty-seven out of the remaining hundred made their fortunes in
towns of less than six thousand people, and the richest man in
the country at that time lived in a town of thirty-five hundred
inhabitants, and always lived there and never moved away. It is not
so much where you are as what you are. But at the same time if the
largeness of the city comes into the problem, then remember it is the
smaller city that furnishes the great opportunity to make the millions
of money. The best illustration that I can give is in reference to
John Jacob Astor, who was a poor boy and who made all the money of the
Astor family. He made more than his successors have ever earned, and
yet he once held a mortgage on a millinery store in New York, and
because the people could not make enough money to pay the interest and
the rent, he foreclosed the mortgage and took possession of the store
and went into partnership with the man who had failed. He kept the
same stock did not give them a dollar of capital, and he left them
alone and went out and sat down upon a bench in the park. Out there on
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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