you are wise you will dread a prosperity which only loads
you with more. Benefit is the end of nature. But for every
benefit which you receive, a tax is levied. He is great
who confers the most benefits. He is base,--and that is
the one base thing in the universe,--to receive favors
and render none. In the order of nature we cannot render
benefits to those from whom we receive them, or only seldom.
But the benefit we receive must be rendered again, line for
line, deed for deed, cent for cent, to somebody. Beware of
too much good staying in your hand. It will fast corrupt and
worm worms. Pay it away quickly in some sort.

Labor is watched over by the same pitiless laws. Cheapest,
say the prudent, is the dearest labor. What we buy in a
broom, a mat, a wagon, a knife, is some application of
good sense to a common want. It is best to pay in your
land a skilful gardener, or to buy good sense applied to
gardening; in your sailor, good sense applied to navigation;
in the house, good sense applied to cooking, sewing, serving;
in your agent, good sense applied to accounts and affairs.
So do you multiply your presence, or spread yourself throughout
your estate. But because of the dual constitution of things,
in labor as in life there can be no cheating. The thief steals
from himself. The swindler swindles himself. For the real price
of labor is knowledge and virtue, whereof wealth and credit are
signs. These signs, like paper money, may be counterfeited or
stolen, but that which they represent, namely, knowledge and
virtue, cannot be counterfeited or stolen. These ends of labor
cannot be answered but by real exertions of the mind, and in
obedience to pure motives. The cheat, the defaulter, the