expensive living, and thousands more undo themselves by that; but, among
all our vices, nothing ruins a tradesman so effectually as the neglect
of his business: it is true, all those things prompt men to neglect
their business, but the more seasonable is the advice; either enter upon
no trade, undertake no business, or, having undertaken it, pursue it
diligently: drive your trade, that the world may not drive you out of
trade, and ruin and undo you. Without diligence a man can never
thoroughly understand his business and how should a man thrive, when he
does not perfectly know what he is doing, or how to do it? Application
to his trade teaches him how to carry it on, as much as his going
apprentice taught him how to set it up. Certainly, that man shall never
improve in his trading knowledge, that does not know his business, or
how to carry it on: the diligent tradesman is always the knowing and
complete tradesman.

Now, in order to have a man apply heartily, and pursue earnestly, the
business he is engaged in, there is yet another thing necessary, namely,
that he should delight in it: to follow a trade, and not to love and
delight in it, is a slavery, a bondage, not a business: the shop is a
bridewell, and the warehouse a house of correction to the tradesman, if
he does not delight in his trade. While he is bound, as we say, to keep
his shop, he is like the galley-slave chained down to the oar; he tugs
and labours indeed, and exerts the utmost of his strength, for fear of
the strapado, and because he is obliged to do it; but when he is on
shore, and is out from the bank, he abhors the labour, and hates to come
to it again.

To delight in business is making business pleasant and agreeable; and
such a tradesman cannot but be diligent in it, which, according to
Solomon, makes him certainly rich, and in time raises him above the