Pagina 193 van 734

Stinginess, on the contrary, is incurable: old age, for instance,

and incapacity of any kind, is thought to make people Stingy; and

it is more congenial to human nature than Prodigality, the mass

of men being fond of money rather than apt to give: moreover it

extends far and has many phases, the modes of stinginess being

thought to be many. For as it consists of two things, defect of

giving and excess of receiving, everybody does not have it

entire, but it is sometimes divided, and one class of persons

exceed in receiving, the other are deficient in giving. I mean

those who are designated by such appellations as sparing,

close-fisted, niggards, are all deficient in giving; but other

men's property they neither desire nor are willing to receive, in

some instances from a real moderation and shrinking from what is

base.