Money is a sort of instinct. It's a sort of property of nature in a person to make money. It's nothing you do. It's no trick you play. It's a sort of permanent accident of your own nature; once you start, you make money, and you go on. . . But you've got to begin. . . You've got to get in. You can do nothing if you are kept outside. You've got to beat your way in. Once you've done that, you can't help it!
The universal regard for money is the one hopeful fact in our civilization. Money is the most important thing in the world. It represents health, strength, honor, generosity and beauty . . . . Not the least of its virtues is that it destroys basic people as certainly as it fortifies and dignifies noble people.
Trade it may help, society extend,
But lures the Pirate, ant corrupts the friend:
It raises armies in a nation's aid,
But bribes a senate, and the land's betray'd.
I never attempt to make money on the stock market. I buy on the assumption that they could close the market the next day and not reopen it for five years.