. "I
love," he said, "accumulating dollars and bank notes, and my enjoyment
is in counting them; if my relatives who will inherit my fortune, take
as much pleasure in spending it as I have had in making it, they will
be quite welcome to their joy." Not many people, I fancy, will agree
with the old bachelor's view of life. I once suggested to a
multi-millionaire of New York that it was time for him to retire from
active work, leaving his sons to carry on his business. He told me
that he would be unhappy without work and that he enjoyed the demands
his business made on him each day.

Many a man's life has been shortened by his retiring from business. It
is the mind rather than the body that lives, and apart from their
business these men have no thoughts and therefore no life. A man's
idea of happiness is greatly governed by his personal tastes, and is
influenced by his environment, his education and the climate. The form
which it is to assume may vary with persons of different tastes and
positions, but it should not be carried out for his own benefit solely
and it should not be injurious to his health or to his intellectual and
spiritual improvement, nor should it be detrimental to the interests of
other people.

[1] "To call" in the sense of "to visit".--A. R. L., 1996.

Chapter 7. American Freedom and Equality

When an Oriental, who, throughout his life, has lived in his own
country where the will of his Sovereign is supreme, and the personal
liberty of the subject unknown, first sets foot on the soil of the
United States, he breathes an atmosphere unlike anything he has ever
known, and experiences curious sensations which are absolutely new.
For the first time in his life he feels that he can do whatever he
pleases without restraint, and that he can talk freely to people
without fear. When he takes up a newspaper and reads statements about
different persons in high positions which are not at all creditable to
them, and learns that no serious consequences happen to the writers, he
is lost in wonderment. After a little time he begins to understand
that this is the "land of the free and the home of the brave", and that
in America everybody is on an equality. The President, the highest
official in the United States, is neither more nor less than a citizen;
and should he, which is very unlikely, commit an offense, or do
anything in contravention of the law, he would be tried in a Court of
Justice in the