On Independence

   It is not the greatness of a man's means that makes him 
   independent, so much as the smallness of his wants. 
                                                         Cobbett 




   The greatest of all human benefits, that, at least, without 
   which no other benefit can be truly enjoyed, is independence. 

                                                    Park Godwin 





   Happy the man to whom heaven has given a morsel of bread 
   without laying him under the obligation of thanking any other 
   for it than heaven itself. 
                                                      Cervantes 




   The word independence is united to the ideas of dignity and 
   virtue;  the word dependence, to the ideas of inferiority and 
   corruption. 
                                                   J. Bentham 




   Let all your views in life be directed to a solid, however 
   moderate, independence;  without it no man can be happy, nor 
   even honest. 
                                                        Junius 




   Be and continue poor, young man, while others around you grow 
   rich by fraud and disloyalty;  be without place or power, while 
   others beg their way upward;  bear the pain of disappointed 
   hopes, while others gain the accomplishment of theirs by 
   flattery;  forego the gracious pressure of the hand for which 
   others cringe and crawl.  Wrap yourself in your own virtue, and 
   seek a friend and your daily bread.  If you have in such a 
   course grown gray with unblemished honor, bless God, and die. 

                                                     Heinzelmann