Character Index | Proverb Index

The Miser and His Gold

There was a Miser who hid his gold at the foot of a tree in his garden. Every week he dug it up and gloated over his gains. A robber, who noticed this, dug up the gold and stole off with it. When the Miser next came to gloat over his treasures, he found nothing but the empty hole. He tore his hair, and raised such an outcry that all the neighbors came around him, and he told them how he used to come and visit his gold. "Did you ever take any of it out?" asked one of them. "No," he said, "I only came to look at it." "Then just look at the hole," said a neighbor; "it will do you just as much good."

Townsend version (The Miser)

A miser sold all that he had and bought a lump of gold, which he buried in a hole in the ground by the side of an old wall and went to look at daily. One of his workmen observed his frequent visits to the spot and decided to watch his movements. He soon discovered the secret of the hidden treasure, and digging down, came to the lump of gold, and stole it. The Miser, on his next visit, found the hole empty and began to tear his hair and to make loud lamentations. A neighbor, seeing him overcome with grief and learning the cause, said, "Pray do not grieve so; but go and take a stone, and place it in the hole, and fancy that the gold is still lying there. It will do you quite the same service; for when the gold was there, you had it not, as you did not make the slightest use of it."

L'Estrange version (A Miller Burying His Gold)

A certain covetous, rich churle sold his whole estate, and put it into mony, and then melted down that mony again into one mass, which he bury'd in the ground, with his very heart and soul in the pot for company. He gave it a visit every morning, which it seems was taken notice of, and somebody that observ'd him, found out his hoard one night, and carry'd it away. The next day he missed it, and ran allmost out of his wits for the loss of his gold. Well, (says a neighbour to him) and what's all this rage for? Why you had no gold at all, and so you lost none. You did but fancy all this while that you had it, and you may e'en as well fancy again that you have it still. 'Tis but laying a stone where you layd your mony, and fancying that stone to be your treasure, and there's your gold again. You did not use it when you had it; and you do not want it so long as you resolve not to use it.

Moral

Better no estate at all, then the cares and vexations that attend the possession of it, without the use on't.

Character Index | Proverb Index

Comments? Please use the contact page form.
Copyright © 2002 Tom Simondi, All Rights Reserved