Even so it is with money: its power of doing good has no other equivalent in this world than its power of doing evil: it is like fire--used for hospitable warmth, or wide-wasting ravages; like air--the gentle zephyr, or the destroying hurricane.

Nevertheless, all is for this world--this world only; a matter extraneous to the spirit, always foreign, often-times adversary: let a man beware of lading himself with that thick clay.
I see a cygnet on the broad Pactolus, stemming the waters with its downy breast; and anon, it would rise upon the wing, and soar to other skies; so, taking down that snow-white sail, it seeks for a moment to rest its foot on shore, and thence take flight: alas, poor bird! thou art sinking in those golden sands, the heavy morsels clog thy flapping wing--in vain--in vain thou triest to rise--Pactolus chains thee down.
Even such is wealth unto the wisest; wealth at its purest source, exponent of labour and of mind.

But, to the frequent fool, heaped with foulest dross--for the cygnet of Pactolus and those golden sands, read--the hippopotamus wallowing in the Niger, and smothered in a bay of mud..