'Unless He Had That Three Thousand Dollars In Safe Hands Where He
Couldn't Touch It, He Would No More Last You Six Weeks Than - '
'Of COURSE he wouldn't,' said Thompson; 'I've edited books for that kind
of people; and the moment they get their hands on the royalty - maybe
it's three thousand, maybe it's two thousand - '
'What business has that shoemaker with two thousand dollars, I should
like to know?' broke in Rogers, earnestly. 'A man perhaps perfectly
contented now, there in Mannheim, surrounded by his own class, eating
his bread with the appetite which laborious industry alone can give,
enjoying his humble life, honest, upright, pure in heart; and BLEST! -
yes, I say blest! blest above all the myriads that go in silk attire and
walk the empty artificial round of social folly - but just you put that
temptation before him once! just you lay fifteen hundred dollars before
a man like that, and say - '
'Fifteen hundred devils!' cried I, 'FIVE hundred would rot his
principles, paralyze his industry, drag him to the rumshop, thence to
the gutter, thence to the almshouse, thence to - - '
'WHY put upon ourselves this crime, gentlemen?' interrupted the poet
earnestly and appealingly. 'He is happy where he is, and AS he is.
Every sentiment of honor, every sentiment of charity, every sentiment of
high and sacred benevolence warns us, beseeches us, commands us to leave
him undisturbed. That is real friendship, that is true friendship. We
could follow other courses that would be more showy; but none that would
be so truly kind and wise, depend upon it.'
After some further talk, it became evident that each of us, down in his
heart, felt some misgivings over this settlement of the matter.
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