) Space bows
before such a man, and shrivels itself up into a mere nothing. Land and
water are alike to such a one. It matters not to him whether the waves
roll beneath his possessions, or the solid ground upholds them.
ST. CECILIA sits at the feet of this great exponent of fiscal expansion,
and TUBAL CAIN dwells serenely in his court-yards. (_That is to say,
just wait until you hear his new brass band!_) Now, who would not be as
this financial monarch? Who would not say: "I, too, can do these
things?" (_That is to say, which of us would not gladly take every cent
the good FISK possesses, and let him beg his bread from door to door, if
we only got a decent chance?_) If it were not for such shining examples
of the power of wealth and the glories that it is capable of placing
before our eyes, the souls of ordinary men would much less frequently be
moved to extraordinary effort in the line of pecuniary progress. (_That
is to say, if old_ FISK _did not change the ballet in his Twelve
Temptations so often, and did not keep on getting new dancers, and
dressing them all up different every week or two, we would not have to
raise a dollar and half so frequently to go and see the confounded
thing_.
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