Riches are for spending, and spending for honor and good actions;
therefore, extraordinary expense must be limited by the worth of the
occasion; for voluntary undoing may be as well for a man’s country as
for the kingdom of heaven; but ordinary expense ought to be limited
by a man’s estate, and governed with such regard, as it be within his
compass, and not subject to deceit and abuse of servants, and ordered
to the best show, that the bills may be less than the estimation
abroad. Certainly, if a man will keep but of even hand, his ordinary
expenses ought to be but to the half of his receipts; and, if he think
to wax rich, but to the third part. It is no baseness for the greatest
to descend and look into their own estate. Some forbear it, not upon
negligence alone, but doubting to bring themselves into melancholy, in
respect they shall find it broken; but wounds cannot be cured without
searching. He that cannot look into his own estate at all, had need
both choose well those whom he employeth, and change them often; for
new are more timorous, and less subtle. He that can look into his
estate but seldom, it behooveth him to turn all to certainties. A man
had need, if he be plentiful in some kind of expense, to be as saving
again in some other: as, if he be plentiful in diet, to be saving in
apparel; if he be plentiful in the hall, to be saving in the stable;
and the like. For he that is plentiful in expenses of all kinds, will
hardly be preserved from decay. In clearing[324] of a man’s estate,
he may as well hurt himself in being too sudden, as in letting it run
on too long; for hasty selling is commonly as disadvantageable as
interest. Besides, he that clears at once will relapse; for, finding
himself out of straits, he will revert to his customs; but he that
cleareth by degrees induceth a habit of frugality, and gaineth as
well upon his mind as upon his estate. Certainly, who hath a state
to repair, may not despise small things; and, commonly, it is less
dishonorable to abridge petty charges, than to stoop to petty
gettings. A man ought warily to begin charges, which once begun will
continue; but in matters that return not, he may be more magnificent.