It has been said that the love of money is the root of all evil. The want of money is so quite as truly. - Samuel Butler

Most artists, whether in religion, music, literature, painting, or what not, are shopkeepers in disguise. They hide their shop as much as they can, and keep pretending that it does not exist, but they are essentially shopkeepers and nothing else.

And should we not be guilty of consummate folly if we were to reject advantages which we cannot obtain otherwise, merely because they involve a greater gain to others than to ourselves?

One of the first businesses of a sensible man is to know when he is beaten, and to leave off fighting at once.