ecessary to get it. The first
accumulation costs by far the most, and the rate of increase by profits
at first seems pitiful. Among the metaphors which partially illustrate
capital--all of which, however, are imperfect and inadequate--the
snow-ball is useful to show some facts about capital. Its first
accumulation is slow, but as it proceeds the accumulation becomes rapid
in a high ratio, and the element of self-denial declines. This fact,
also, is favorable to the accumulation of capital, for if the
self-denial continued to be as great per unit when the accumulation had
become great, there would speedily come a point at which further
accumulation would not pay. The man who has capital has secured his
future, won leisure which he can employ in winning secondary objects of
necessity and advantage, and emancipated himself from those things in
life which are gross and belittling. The possession of capital is,
therefore, an indispensable prerequisite of educational, scientific,
and moral goods. This is not saying that a man in the narrowest
circumstances may not be a good man. It is saying that the extension
and elevation of all the moral and metaphysical interests of the race
are conditioned on that extension of civilization of which capital is
the prerequisite, and that he who has capital can participate in and
move along with the highest developments of his time. Hence it appears
that the man who has his self-denial before him, however good may be
his intention, cannot be as the man who has his self-denial behind him.
Some seem to think that this is very unjust, but they get their notions
of justice from some occult source of inspiration, not from observing
the facts of this world as it has been made and exists.

The maxim, or injunction, to which a study of capital leads us is, Get
capital. In a community where the standard of living is high, and the
conditions of production are favorable, there is a wide margin within
which an individual may practise self-denial and win capital without
suffering, if he has not the charge of a family. That it requires
energy, courage, perseverance, and prudence is not to be denied. Any
one who believes that any good thing on this earth can be got without
those virtues may believe in the philosopher's stone or the fountain of
youth. If there were any Utopia its inhabitants would certainly be very
insipid and characterless.

Those who have neither capital nor land unquestionably have a c