Prosperity

“ This morning I ask your attention to “A Sermon of the Moral Dangers which are Incident to a State of long-continued Prosperity.”
By prosperity, I mean the present success of schemes which we form for our material purposes. The ambitious man wants power; the acquisitive, money; the vain, admiration; the nation wants numbers, riches, wide territory, commercial and military power. When they succeed in these desires, they attain prosperity. It is the effect of this condition of success on the formation of a moral character which I ask you to consider. ”

“ It therefore becomes an inquiry of paramount importance, what are the means best calculated for producing the greatest amount of social good? By what ordinances would public prosperity, and all the virtues which not merely adorn that prosperity, but produce it, be most powerfully excited and maintained? ”

“ In the nature of things it is a matter of the deepest concern to the whole Republic, for the prosperity of every part is vital to the prosperity of the whole. In working it out you are entitled, from the outside, to the most impartial attempt to understand its real nature, to the utmost patience with the facts of human nature, to the most profound and most helpful sympathy. ”

“ I will see labor protected, and every title to possession recognized, when you are industrious and honest. I will see prosperity again throughout your land—the busy hum of the shuttle and the tinkling of the smithy shall be heard again. ”

“ I have now to perform the more pleasing task of exhibiting an imperfect sketch of the existing state of the unparalleled prosperity of the country. On a general survey, we behold cultivation extended, the arts flourishing, the face of the country improved, our people fully and profitably employed, and the public countenance exhibiting tranquillity, contentment and happiness. ”

“ But THEY,"—the men of leisure and study,—"WILL MAINTAIN THE STATE OF THE WORLD!" The prosperity and the happiness of a people include something more evident and more permanent than "the Wealth of a Nation." ”

“ There is a heritage of heroic example and noble obligation, not reckoned in the Wealth of Nations, but essential to a nation's life; the contempt of which, in any people, may, not slowly, mean even its commercial fall. Very sweet are the uses of prosperity, the harvests of peace and progress, the fostering sunshine of health and happiness, and length of days in the land. ”

“ If this was the use we were making of this prosperity, we could hardly call it a blessing for which we had a right or ground to thank God. The true prosperity of the nation consisted not so much in the fact that the nation was growing in wealth—though wealth was a necessary attribute of prosperity—but that it was growing in virtue ”

“ And I can't see it is my duty, either: for the reasons I have given you."
"You do not believe it is every man's duty to think of the growth and prosperity of his community?"
"I am not convinced that growth and prosperity, as you consider it, make happiness." ”

“ More than wealth, more [Pg 34] than production, more than trade, more than any material prosperity, there will come with them learning, universal education, literature, arts, the charms and graces of life. I would think but little of my country if it had merely material wealth. I would think but little of my country if the conception of its people was that we were to live like the robber baron of the Middle Ages, who merely gathered into his castle for his own luxury the wealth that he had taken from the surrounding people. ”

“ He had expected labour, and he found it, and did it and made the best of it. In this, his prosperity consisted. ”

“ It will provide you with, employment, with wages that you not so long ago thought liberal; and will place you again in what may be called prosperity--great prosperity as compared with what exists at present. Your homes may be homes of plenty again, your children have sufficient food. ”

“ American society, and perhaps all society, is too apt to do homage to material prosperity; but material prosperity may be obtained by the sacrifice of moral grandeur; and so obtained, it is an apple of Sodom. A man may call out his whole energy, wield all his power, and wealth follow as one of the results. ”

“ The immense wealth which was in the keeping of those establishments, the confidence which they inspired, the prosperity which they had created, their stability, tried by panics, by wars, by revolutions, and found proof against all, were favourite topics. ”

“ There is no prosperity, trade, art, city, or great material wealth of any kind, but if you trace it home, you will find it rooted in a thought of some individual man. ”

“ Let your soul expand, let your heart reach out to others in loving and generous warmth, and great and lasting will be your joy, and all prosperity will come to you. Those who have wandered from the highway of righteousness guard themselves against competition; those who always pursue the right need not to trouble about such defense. ”

“ The most striking instances of prosperity are in the case of those who have had nothing to rely on but their own slender means and the small loans of fellow -workmen, and who lived on bread and water while they devoted the whole surplus of their gains to the formation of a capital. ”

“ Again, the influx of money into a country is spoken of as "prosperity," although it is quite possible that the prosperity may be the prosperity of a few, and those few already the most prosperous class. ”

“ Thirdly, we have ample resources and great treasures of wealth; our labour and courage having preserved the patrimony of each of us undiminished. This, in the mind of a good sovereign, is the best fruit of prosperity. ”

“ I desire to call your attention to some of the features of a marvelous prosperity that now exists in the United States. Perhaps the truest criterion of the real prosperity of a nation such as ours, can best be ascertained by taking into account the prosperity of the agricultural interests of the country. If in that industry our people are prosperous you may rest assured that all other branches of industry are prosperous. ”

“ O how portentous is prosperity!
How, comet-like, it threatens, while it shines! ”

“ This is the law of prosperity: When apparent adversity comes, be not cast down by it, but make the best of it, and always look forward for better things, for conditions more prosperous. ”

“ Don't you know, that the general prosperity of the country was never greater than now! Why the wealth of the nation is growing at a marvelous rate! Never before, were fortunes made so easily! The way is open for every industrious man ”

“ If we will take a highly commended course of horse-shoeing or oratorio-writing, prosperity will be our immediate reward. If we will buy some excellent books of reference, they will teach us to grow rich. ”

“ By constitution, by habit, by circumstances, our people are intensely active; and this activity, for want of other objects, has been turned into the channels of material prosperity. If, therefore, you merely affirm their excessive eagerness in acquisition, I grant it ”

“ It has been well said that in the past we have paid attention only to the acumulation of prosperity, and that from henceforth we must pay equal attention to the proper distribution of prosperity. This is true. ”

“ Prosperity suits some people, and they blossom best in a glow of sunshine; others need the shade, and are the sweeter for a touch of frost. ”

“ The real nature of this exchange is made unclear by the indirect, or induced, gratification derived from wealth. Wealth gives to its owner power, prestige, the esteem of his fellows, and pride in evidences of success and growing prosperity. ”

“ Here is ample reason why such periods, even in the most unfavourable circumstances, may easily be times of great gain to those whose prosperity usually passes, in the estimation of society, for national prosperity. ”

“ Social prosperity means the man happy, the citizen free, the nation great. ”

“ Observing this, theorists make their appearance, and, founding a system on their individual sentiments, tell us: Want is wealth, labour is wealth, obstacles to material prosperity are prosperity. To multiply obstacles is to support industry. ”

“ At the age of fifty, with an ample fortune, he relinquished a business, in which he had most diligently laboured, when the full tide of prosperity was flowing in upon him, in order that he might devote his time, and the means placed by Providence at his disposal, to the cause of neglected and suffering humanity. ”

“ Apply them to mankind at large, and perhaps, after all, they are true. The fact of national prosperity and contentment implies, necessarily, the prosperity and contentment of the greater number of the individuals of which the nation consists. In other words, the average man who is past middle life has obtained what he strove for—success in his calling. ”

“ The first degree of prosperity in a rude population with few needs develops prolificness; a later degree of prosperity, accompanied by all the feelings and ideas stimulated by the development of education and a democratic environment, leads to a gradual reduction of prolificness. ”

“ Chapter 7 The Realization of Prosperity It is granted only to the heart that abounds with integrity, trust, generosity and love to realize true prosperity. The heart that is not possessed of these qualities cannot know prosperity, for prosperity, like happiness, is not an outward possession, but an inward realization. ”

“ I dwell on this prospect with every satisfaction which an ardent love for my country can inspire, since there is no truth more thoroughly established than that there exists in the economy and course of nature an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness; between duty and advantage; between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity; ”

“ We justly pride ourselves on our marvelous material prosperity, and such prosperity must exist in order to establish a foundation upon which a higher life can be built; but unless we do in very fact build this higher life thereon, the material prosperity itself will go but for very little. ”

“ For the good of the people, poverty or simplicity was on the whole more profitable than riches. “People say, and with truth, ‘It takes a strong man to bear prosperity,’ and ‘A man can endure many things but not good fortune.’ ... ”

“ The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our gross domestic product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart -- not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good. ”

“ Act thus, and you will provide an additional guarantee for the continued contentment, and happiness, and well-being of the great body of the people. Act thus, and you will have done whatever human sagacity can do for the promotion of commercial prosperity. ”

“ It has never really touched us in an acute and sensible way, and in spite of it we have enjoyed marvelous prosperity which is due really to the circumstances of advantage and favor which we have enjoyed here. ”

“ The commercial spirit is the spirit of profit, not patriotism; of credit, not honor; of individual gain, not national prosperity; of trade and dickering, not principle. ”

“ The spirit of enterprise will be depressed by vague anxiety as to the future, by the apprehension-paralysis, and I need not tell you as experienced business men what all this means as to that confidence which is necessary to set in motion the rich man's money and the poor man's labor, and thus to develop general prosperity. ”

“ Few of us can stand prosperity. Another man’s, I mean. ”