With all the talk about frugality, budget-crunches, stimulus packages, bail-outs a person could actually get confused about whether debt loads are a good thing. I recently came across a quote attributed to Abraham Lincoln on this topic. He said:
“You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot help the small men by tearing down the big men.
You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich. You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling down the wage payer.
You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatreds.
You cannot establish security on borrowed money. You cannot build character and courage by taking away man’s initiative and independence.
You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.”
Please think about these timeless principles and keep in touch with your congressmen and senators, that deficit spending is not a long term solution to economic crisis. Marilyn
Amen!!! What more can I say – that quote sums it all up!!
I really liked this quote, Marilyn, but I wanted to be sure it really was said by Lincoln before quoting it myself. I did some searching and found this: ‘
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot help small men by tearing down big men.
You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatreds.
You cannot establish security on borrowed money.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away a man’s initiative and independence.
You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.
William J. H. Boetcker, 1916 (often attributed to Lincoln)