The Young Man's Guide, William Andrus Alcott [best business books of all time txt] 📗

as the young are daily, and often hourly exposed to, and against which it is especially important, not only to their own reputation, but to their success in business, that they should be on their guard. I will just enumerate a few others, for my limits preclude the possibility of any thing more than a bare enumeration.

1. Suffering borrowed articles to be injured by our negligence. 2. Detaining them in our possession longer than the lender had reason to expect. 3. Employing them for purposes not contemplated by the lender. 4. The returning of an article of inferior value, although in appearance like that which was borrowed. 5. Passing suspected bank bills, or depreciated counterfeit or clipped coin. Some persons are so conscientious on this point, that they will sell a clipped piece for old metal, rather than pass it. But such rigid honesty is rather rare. 6. The use of pocket money, by the young, in a manner different from that which was known to be contemplated by the parent, or master who furnished it. 7. The employment of time in a different manner from what was intended; the mutilating, by hacking, breaking, soiling, or in any other manner wantonly injuring buildings, fences, and other property, public or private;—and especially crops and fruit trees. 8. Contracting debts, though ever so small, without the almost certain prospect of being able to pay them. 9. Neglecting to pay them at the time expected. 10. Paying in something of less value than we ought. 11. Breaches of trust. 12. Breaking of promises. 13. Overtrading by means of borrowed capital.

Section III. Method in Business.

There is one class of men who are of inestimable value to society—and the more so from their scarcity;—I mean men of business. It is true you could hardly offer a greater insult to most persons than to say they are not of this class; but you cannot have been very observing not to have learned, that they who most deserve the charge will think themselves the most insulted by it.

Nothing contributes more to despatch, as well as safety and success in business, than method and regularity. Let a person set down in his memorandum book, every morning, the several articles of business that ought to be done during the day; and beginning with the first person he is to call upon, or the first place he is to go to, finish that affair, if possible, before he begins another; and so on with the rest.

A man of business, who observes this method, will hardly ever find himself hurried or disconcerted by forgetfulness. And he who sets down all his transactions in writing, and keeps his accounts, and the whole state of his affairs, in a distinct and accurate order, so that at any time, by looking into his books, he can see in what condition his concerns are, and whether he is in a thriving or declining way;—such a one, I say, deserves properly the character of a man of business; and has a pretty fair prospect of success in his plans.[6] But such exactness seldom suits the man of pleasure. He has other things in his head.

The way to transact a great deal of business in a little time, and to do it well, is to observe three rules. 1. Speak to the point. 2. Use no more words than are necessary, fully to express your meaning. 3. Study beforehand, and set down in writing afterwards, a sketch of the transaction.

To enable a person to speak to the point, he must have acquired, as one essential pre-requisite, the art of thinking to the point. To effect these objects, or rather this object, as they constitute in reality but one, is the legitimate end of the study of grammar; of the importance of which I am to speak elsewhere. This branch is almost equally indispensable in following the other two rules; but here, a thorough knowledge of numbers, as well as of language, will be demanded.

Section IV. Application to Business.

There is one piece of prudence, above all others, absolutely necessary to those who expect to raise themselves in the world by an employment of any kind; I mean a constant, unwearied application to the main pursuit. By means of persevering diligence, joined to frugality, we see many people in the lowest and most laborious stations in life, raise themselves to such circumstances as will allow them, in their old age, that relief from excessive anxiety and toil which are necessary to make the decline of life easy and comfortable.

Burgh mentions a merchant, who, at first setting out, opened and shut his shop every day for several weeks together, without selling goods to the value of two cents; who by the force of application for a course of years, rose, at last, to a handsome fortune. But I have known many who had a variety of opportunities for settling themselves comfortably in the world, yet, for want of steadiness to carry any scheme to perfection, they sunk from one degree of wretchedness to another for many years together, without the least hopes of ever getting above distress and pinching want.

There is hardly an employment in life so trifling that it will not afford a subsistence, if constantly and faithfully followed. Indeed, it is by indefatigable diligence alone, that a fortune can be acquired in any business whatever. An estate procured by what is commonly called a lucky hit, is a rare instance; and he who expects to have his fortune made in that way, is about as rational as he who should neglect all probable means of earning, in hopes that he should some time or other find a treasure.

There is no such thing as continuing in the same condition without an income of some kind or other. If a man does not bestir himself, poverty must, sooner or later, overtake him. If he continues to expend for the necessary charges of life, and will not take the pains to gain something to supply the place of what he deals out, his funds must at length come to an end; and the misery of poverty fall upon him at an age when he is less able to grapple with it.

No employment that is really useful to mankind deserves to be regarded as mean. This has been a stumbling stone to many young men. Because they could not pursue a course which they deemed sufficiently respectable, they neglected business altogether until so late in life that they were ashamed to make a beginning. A most fatal mistake. Pin making is a minute affair, but will any one call the employment a mean one? If so, it is one which the whole civilized world encourage, and to which they are under lasting obligation daily. Any useful business ought to be reputable, which is reputably followed.

The character of a drone is always, especially among the human species, one of the most contemptible. In proportion to a person's activity for his own good and that of his fellow creatures, he is to be regarded as a more or less valuable member of society. If all the idle people in the United States were to be buried in one year, the loss would be trifling in comparison with the loss of only a very few industrious people. Each moment of time ought to be put to proper use, either in business, in improving the mind, in the innocent and necessary relaxations and entertainments of life, or in the care of the moral and religious part of our nature. Each moment of time is, in the language of theology, a monument of Divine mercy.

Section V. Proper Time of Doing Business.

There are times and seasons for every lawful purpose of life, and a very material part of prudence is to judge rightly, and make the best of them. If you have to deal, for example, with a phlegmatic gloomy man, take him, if you can, over his bottle. This advice may seem, at first view, to give countenance to a species of fraud: but is it so? These hypochondriacal people have their fits and starts, and if you do not take them when they are in an agreeable state of mind, you are very likely to find them quite as much below par, as the bottle raises them above. But if you deal with them in this condition, they are no more themselves than in the former case. I therefore think the advice correct. It is on the same principles, and in the same belief, that I would advise you, when you deal with a covetous man, to propose your business to him immediately after he has been receiving, rather than expending money. So if you have to do with a drunkard, call on him in the morning; for then, if ever, his head is clear.

Again; if you know a person to be unhappy in his family, meet him abroad if possible, rather than at his own house. A statesman will not be likely to give you a favorable reception immediately after being disappointed in some of his schemes. Some people are always sour and ill humored from the hour of rising till they have dined.

And as in persons, so in things, the time is a matter of great consequence; an eye to the rise and fall of goods; the favorable season of importing and exporting;—these are some of the things which require the attention of those who expect any considerable share of success.

It is not certain but some dishonest person, under shelter of the rule, in this chapter, may gratify a wish to take unfair advantages of those with whom he deals. But I hope otherwise; for I should be sorry to give countenance, for one moment, to such conduct. My whole purpose (in this place) is to give direction to the young for securing their own rights; not for taking away the rights of others. The man who loves his neighbor as himself, will not surely put a wrong construction on what I have written. I would fain hope that there is no departure here or elsewhere, in the book, from sound christian morality; for it is the bible, on which I wish to see all moral rules based.

Section VI. Buying upon Trust.

'Owe no man any thing,' is an apostolic injunction; and happy is he who has it in his power to obey. In my own opinion, most young men possess this power, did they perceive the importance of using it by commencing right. It is not so difficult a thing always to purchase with ready money, as many people imagine. The great difficulty is to moderate our desires and diminish our wants within bounds proportioned to our income. We can expend much, or live on little; and this, too, without descending to absolute penury. It is truly surprising to observe how people in similar rank, condition, and circumstances, contrive to expend so very differently. I have known instances of young men who would thrive on an income which would not more than half support their neighbors in circumstances evidently similar.

Study therefore to live within your income. To this end you must calculate. But here you will be obliged to learn much from personal experience, dear as her school is, unless you are willing to learn from that of others. If, for example, your income is $600 a year, and you sit down at the commencement of the year and calculate on expending $400, and saving the remainder, you will be very liable to fail in your calculation. But if you call in the experience of wiser heads who have travelled the road of life before you, they will tell you that after you have made every reasonable allowance for necessary expenses during the year, and believe yourself able to lay up $200, you will not, once in ten times, be able to