People of the highest position, in point of culture and education, have
often as great privations to endure as the average of working people.
They have often to make their incomes go much further. They have to keep
up a social standing. They have to dress better; and live sufficiently
well for the purpose of health. Though their income may be less than
that of colliers and iron-workers, they are under the moral necessity of
educating their sons and bringing them up as gentlemen, so that they may
take their fair share of the world's work.
Thus, the tenth Earl of Buchan brought up a numerous family of children,
one of whom afterwards rose to be Lord Chancellor of England, upon an
income not exceeding two hundred a year. It is not the amount of income,
so much as the good use of it, that marks the true man; and viewed in
this light, good sense, good taste, and sound mental culture, are among
the best of all economists.
The late Dr. Aiton said that his father brought up a still larger family
on only half the income of the Earl of Buchan. The following dedication,
prefixed to his work on "Clerical Economics," is worthy of being
remembered: "This work is respectfully dedicated to a Father, now in the
eighty-third year of his age, who, on an income which never exceeded a
hundred pounds yearly, educated, out of a family of twelve children,
four sons to liberal professions, and who has often sent his last
shilling to each of them, in their turn, when they were at college."
The author might even cite his own case as an illustration of the
advantages of thrift. His mother was left a widow, when her youngest
child--the youngest of eleven--was only three weeks old. Notwithstanding
a considerable debt on account of a suretyship, which was paid, she
bravely met the difficulties of her position, and perseveringly overcame
them. Though her income was less than that of many highly paid working
men, she educated her children well, and brought them up religiously and
virtuously. She put her sons in the way of doing well, and if they have
not done so, it was through no fault of hers.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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