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The Poor Debtor
by
Not long after, a person came into his store, and from some cause mentioned the name of Moale.
“He’s an honest man–that I am ready to say of him,” remarked Mr. Petron.
“Honest, but very poor,” was replied.
“He’s doing well now, I believe,” said the merchant.
“He’s managing to keep soul and body together, and hardly that.”
“He’s paying off his old debts.”
“I know he is; but I blame him for injuring his health and wronging his family, in order to pay a few hundred dollars to men a thousand times better off in the world than he is. He brought me twenty dollars on an old debt yesterday, but I wouldn’t touch it. His misfortunes had long ago cancelled the obligation in my eyes. God forbid! that with enough to spare, I should take the bread out of the mouths of a poor man’s children.”
“Is he so very poor?” asked Mr. Petron, surprised and rebuked at what he heard.
“He has a family of six children to feed, clothe, and educate; and he has it to do by his unassisted labour. Since he was broken up in business some years ago, he has had great difficulties to contend with, and only by pinching himself and family, and depriving both of nearly every comfort, has he been able to reduce the old claims that have been standing against him. But he has shortened his own life ten years thereby, and has deprived his children of the benefits of education, except in an extremely limited degree–wrongs that are irreparable. I honour his stern integrity of character, but think that he has carried his ideas of honesty too far. God gave him these children, and they have claims upon him for earthly comforts and blessings to the extent of his ability to provide. His misfortunes he could not prevent, and they were sent as much for the chastisement of those who lost by him as they were for his own. If, subsequently, his greatest exertion was not sufficient to provide more than ordinary comforts for the family still dependent upon him, his first duty was to see that they did not want. If he could not pay his old debts without injury to his health or wrong to his family, he was under no obligation to pay them; for it is clear, that no claims upon us are so imperative as to require us to wrong others in order to satisfy them.”
Here was another new doctrine for the ears of the merchant–doctrine strange, as well as new. He did not feel quite so comfortable as before about the recovered debt of fifty dollars. The money still lay upon his desk. He had not yet entered it upon his cash-book, and he felt now less inclined to do so than ever. The claims of humanity, in the abstract, pressed themselves upon him for consideration, and he saw that they were not to be lightly thrust aside.
In order to pay the fifty dollars, which had been long due to the merchant, Mr. Moale had, as alleged, denied himself and family at every point, and overworked himself to a degree seriously injurious to his health; but his heart felt lighter after the sense of obligation was removed.
There was little at home, however, to make him feel cheerful. His wife, not feeling able to hire a domestic, was worn down with the care and labour of her large family; the children were, as a necessary consequence, neglected both in minds and bodies. Alas! there was no sunshine in the poor man’s dwelling.
“Well, Alice,” said Mr. Moale, as his wife came and stood by the board upon which he sat at work, holding her babe in her arms, “I have paid off another debt, thank heaven?”
“Whose?”
“Petron’s. He believed me a rogue and treated me as such. I hope he thinks differently now.”
“I wish all men were as honest in their intentions as you are.”