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By] EBT b » relentless, merciless
| beass that hunts its victims
N Bl without stopping—all day, and
“R<PO proventing sleep at might.
'L e M Debt will not let you LIVE
— ..
It humiliates, degrades, dis.
courages and belittles
Debt will not Jet you DIE in peace. It hangs
like & black cloud above the heads of doctors and
nurses, or presses with suffocating weight on your
chest, reminding you up to the last minute that
you have neglected and betrayed those that you
are about to leave helpless.
And with death you do not escape from debt.
It blackens your memory, seils your reputation,
brings you the contemptuous pity that you hate,
and puts an unwelcome burden upon your friends.
lsnytwhum“bdqdmmfimuh
s lifetime only to die in the end, killed by debt
worries, and fearing debt to say at the very last:
““When you are gone I will hunt those that
you leave behind you. I will take their house and
their living and their happiness and peace of mind
and their confidence in you, and your right to ex
pect their respect and affectionate memory.
*“You did not pay me in full, but they shall pay
in full and more.™ .
ke i e 5 S 8
If debt, when t first approaches smiling, easy,
convincing, looked as it does a little later, you
would out off your right hand rather than signm
the first note and borrow the first dollar.
But debt is a vice deep and powerful. And,
Ifke every vios, its approach is convincing, whee
dling and disarming.
The artist tells the story well in this picture—
the fawning, little, playful puppy of whom you
have no fear soon grows into the powerful, sharp.
toothed beast that hunts
¢ &0 :
IT you ave going through life in debt nobody
knows better than you that you might as well
travel and compete with a 500-pound sack tied
sround your neok.
You have seen pictures of miserable criminals
in Ohina walking the streets with great heavy
blocks of wood fastened round their necks, with
holes for their arms to hold them rigid and help
less as they go about.
They are absolutely helpless, for if they fall
they cannot rise unless some compassionate being
will lift them up. Any man may kick them, insult
them, spit at them; they cannot and they dare
not strike back, for they are bound, and the
slighteat push will put them down,
Just so it iz with the man in debt. One more
push and he falls. If his friends will not pick
him up he must stay down. 4
He canpot assert his rights. He is a debtor, a
*glave to the lender.”’ He must take what comes
to him, pay higher interest, ask ever more politely.
He is not & man; he is a criminal against him
gelf and family, carrying around just such a bur
den, just such a disadvantage, as that heavy
square blook that the Ohinese law fastens to the
coolie’s neck,
e & ¢
Dabt does not mean only what you have bor
rowed in the pasi. It means HANDICAP IN THE
PRESENT.
You may have the ability, energy and integrity
of the man next to you, but he, FREE FROM
DEBT, will be chosen before you.
““A good man,’’ your employer says as he looks
toward you, consulting your assistant, ‘‘but I
want & man to be absolutely trusted for this place,
and I can't really feel safe with a man I know to
be in debt. I know he is honest, in intention. I
am sorry for his family, and I know they need
what this would mean to him. But my mind must
be at rest concerning the man who handles my
money. I know what the temptation of debt is,
for I went through it. You must recommend some
one else.”’
And though you might feel that you would die
rather than take a dollar dishonestly, the chance
has passed you and you stand still because MEN
DO NOT TRUST A MAN IN DEBT.
You cannot complain. For a man who borrows
to-day may die tO-mOITOW.
If he dies the debt is not paid and the creditor
ts defrauded. You feel your integrity. But the
cold business man on whose approval your prog
ress depends sees little difference between you
who borrow and say, ‘‘Oh, I know I will live and
pay it back,”’ and the other man who takes money
from the till *‘just for a few hours’’ and ‘says,
“‘Oh, I know I will win this time and pay it back.’
The man in debt does not merely destroy the
DEBT—Fight It in 1915
confidence of others in his integrity and good
faith,
He brands himeelf to the world AN INOOM.
PETENT.
The employer has rejected him for advance.
ment 1o & place of trust because he may not prove
honest, rejects him also for & place in which keen,
capable management is needed because he has
already proved himself incapable.
“Yes, T know,” says the employer when ad.
vancement is urged, ‘‘the man is intelligent, more
s than the one I shall probably pick out.
““But he is in debt all the time. He is constant.
ly asking for an advance in his salary. I know
that the mortgage on his home is bigger than when
he bought it.
‘‘His balance is wrong, and his balance wheel
is wrong.
““Here I want judgment and & mind that does
not deceive itself. This man is all that you say,
I will admit, but he has proved that he cannot
manage HIE OWN AFFAIRS. Oan't manage his
own salary, his own family—a small matter. I
am not going to risk giving him this branch and
this payroll.
““I would like to give the young man a chance.
But he must prove that he can manage HIS AF.
FAIRS before I will let him commence manag
ing MINE. You must recommend somebody else
for this advancement.'’
Aguin the block of debt fastened around your
neck has held you back, and you stand still while
another passes you.
g 9 8
The cursed part of debt is the fact that to the
man who staggers under the load it represents
often not personal selfishness but goodness of
heart and generosity.
You have wanted your wife ‘‘to look as well
as other women,'’ and have some happiness in
her youth instead of waiting till she is too old
to enjoy what you will give her.
8o you have run in debt for her to make her
happy, and you have hit upon the one certain
plan for making her permanently unhappy. Bhe
must share your anxiety, evil moods and the hu.
miliations common to the wife of a man in debt.
Or your load of debt represents affection for
your children.
If they do not go NOW to the best school, the
fashionable school, and make the acquaintances
that will help them all through life, they can
NEVER go.
If they are not as well dressed, as much in.
dulged, as thoroughly spoiled as the rich man’s
children, you feel that you are neglecting their
happiness. And you say to yourself: »
‘‘Better risk a little now, go into debt for their
sake, since it is only drawing upon the future,
only spending for them now the money I am
going to have. I must make them happy while
they are young and can really be happy. I am
willing to carry the load if their life is gay.’
And you have hit upon the sure method of mak
ing them unhappy, spoiling them with that which
you must take away when the inevitable day of
reckoning comes and risking that security through
ohildhood in case of your death which you owe
to them FIRST AND ABOVE ALL.
. & @
Keep out of debt if you are free. For the aeep
breath that you can draw, and the straight look
that you can turn on any man, and the fact that
the dollar in your hand is YOURS, are worth more
than all the phantom convenience and fletitious
‘‘seizing of opportunity’’ that borrowing could
give you.
Are you in the easy stage of debt, the pleasant
stage, much loved at home for your generosity,
much liked by your friends for your liberality,
heartily welcomed by the merchants who know
well that the man beginning debt is the freest
spender and best customer, and ‘‘perfeotly good
for the present'’?
If you are in that easy, pleasant stage, drifting
toward the end like a man in sleep, WAKE UP
and get out of debt,
Struggle back to the solid ground of independ
ence while yet you may.
Every disgraced, discredited, bleary-eyed, pit
iable bankrupt failure began where you are now.
Now YOU COAN GET FREE, like the man who
has taken his first few doses of morphine. Later
only heaven’s mercy and a most violent effort
of the will can save you. And they may fail—
they do usually.
Are you one of the unhappy miliion, one of
those spirits struggling in the hell of debt that
is like Dante’s Tier of the Inferno, where men
struggled and rolled in pitch, occasionally thrust.
werright, 1915, by the Star Company. Great Britaln Rights Reserved
22
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Debt Is Slavery.
Debt Is Humiliation and the Heaviest Handicap in Life.
You Are the Slave of the Man to Whom You Owe Money,
Working for Him, Always Uphill, Hard and Ungrateful Struggling.
Get Out of Debt, if You Are in It, Before 1915 Shall End.
Keep Out of Debt,if You Are Luckily Free.
ing up an arm, lifting up the face to breathe, only
to sink back again?
If you are there, heaven help you. And hard as
it is, make the effort to help yourself.
It can be done; it has been done; it is done
every day.
It is a hard, flinty climb back up the hill down
which you coasted so swiftly and smoothly. But
the hill can be climbed.
CLIMB IT.
Slowly and painfully, paying little by little,
BORROWING never, doing without, learning to
look on necessities as luxuries. You can do it.
Those dreadful souls in Dante’s lake of boil
ing pitch could not climb out, for God’s immov
able will kept them there,
Editorial Section, Hearst’s Sunday American, Atlanta, February 28, 1915
But you can get out if you will. DO IT.
2 & ¢
Many things we wish our readers for this year
just begun.
We wish them strength of will, good purposes
in which to use the will
We wish you 366 good days. Every ome caxr
be better than any before it if you do the very
best. For the very best means a step upward,
however little the step.
We wish you happiness in your work, in your
family, in your friends, a peaceful mind to enjoy
the beauty of this wonderful earth, and success
in your efforts.
We thank you for the loyalty to us in the year
that has just ended, and hope we shall share with
you in the effort to do better through the year
that begins.
For our first Sunday Editorial in this year we
have taken this disagreeable subject of debt be
cause it is an American curse.
You that are mercifully free should give this
editorial to someone who needs it.
Give it to some young man or woman joyously
starting down the hill.
Or give it to some miserable soul at the bottom,
He may thank you, and we shall thank you,