WHAT AM I? - By Orison Swett Marden

I AM — ?

I am stored-up happiness.

I lead the way to peace, power, and plenty. I bring you freedom from anxiety and worry over the living problem.

I am a friend alike of the rich and the poor.

I am common sense applied to life in all sorts of ways.

I am a tower of strength in youth and a staff in old age.

I increase hope, confidence, assurance, certainty as to the future.

I was one of the chief factors in the winning of the World War.

I am the best form of insurance against poverty and failure.

I remove the shadow of the poorhouse.

I make for health, for efficiency, for the highest possible welfare of the individual. I kill that "rainy day" dread; in fact, I do away with the "rainy day" altogether.

I put hope into the heart of man, a light into human eyes that was never there before.

I put people in a position to take advantage of all sorts of opportunities for investment, for advancement, to take advantage of chances that, but for me, would be lost.

I mean the best physicians, the most skilled surgeons, the best hospitals in case of need, as well as the best health resorts.

I make possible a needed vacation, rest, recreation and travel. I mean leisure, more living with natural art and with the beautiful things in the world.

I mean better opportunities for your children, better schools, better clothing, a more refining environment, greater security for their future.

I show you how to make the most of your income; how to expend the margin to the best advantage; how to make the wisest investments of your time, your strength and your ability as well as your money.

I am the friend of man, a civilization builder. I not only give an upward tendency to the life of the individual, but also to the life of a nation. I sustain and preserve the highest welfare of the race.

I safeguard the future; I enable you to work with confidence, to look up and not down, to rise superior to your surroundings.

I keep thousands of people out of the penitentiary; prevent them from committing theft and other crimes.

I increase the confidence of others in struggling young men and add tremendously to their credit.

I am an employee's best recommendation, for I belong to a large and most excellent family. Every employer knows that the employee who cultivates me has many other sterling qualities, such as honesty, thoroughness, ambition, reliability, foresight, prudence.

I am a symbol of character, of stability, of self-control; a proof that a man is not a victim of his appetites and weaknesses, but their master.

I am often the savior of a man, cutting off indulgences and vicious habits, putting health in the place of dissipation and insuring a clear brain instead of a cloudy, befuddled one.

I am the enemy of that great curse of mankind — debt — which wrecks multitudes of homes, causes divorce, blasts love, and destroys all peace of mind.

I am that which helps a man to lift his head above the crowd; to be independent, self-reliant, and to stand for something in the world.

Multitudes of families are homeless, moneyless, and are enduring all sorts of hardship, privation, and humiliation because the husbands and fathers never took me into partner-ship.

The failure army, to-day, is largely recruited by people who never learned to know me, who ridiculed the suggestion of needing me, who rather despised and looked down on me as standing for meanness and penuriousness and as being an enemy of their enjoyment.

I am the best friend of woman. I make her a better businesswoman, a better housekeeper, a better wife and mother, a better citizen. I help her to make herself independent, self-reliant, and teach her how to finance herself.

However you make your living, whether by the work of your hand or of your brain, in a trade or in a profession, at home or in the shop, whether your income be small or large, you will always be placed at a disadvantage, will always be taking chances with your future security and happiness, unless you have me as a working partner.

I am an incentive to high living, the simple life and high thinking. I urge spending upward, living upward, dwelling in honesty, in simplicity, living the life that is worthwhile, the genuine life, the life that will give enduring satisfaction.

I am the beginning of real success; that which puts a foundation under your air castles, that which makes your dreams come true, which builds that "home of my own" to which every healthy, ambitious young person looks forward as the culmination of his hopes.

I AM THRIFT