by

Ralph Waldo Emerson on Being a Jackass


"Do not tell me, as a good man did today, of my obligation to put all poor men in good situations.  Are they my poor?  I tell thee, thou foolish philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent I give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not belong."

Ralph W. Emerson, Self-Reliance