“My objection to your coming is on a point of
prudence, and I earnestly entreat you, as you have any regard for your future
peace and prosperity, to weigh well what I am going to say. Poverty, I assure
you, is a very wretched thing. The prayer of Agur in the
Bible is excellent, ‘Give me neither poverty nor riches, lest I be
full and deny Thee, and say, who is the Lord? or lest I be poor and steal,
and take the name of my God in vain.’ I should not of course
express the reasons of my wish in my own behalf, or in behalf of any one in
whom I was interested, in so
| 198 | WILLIAM GODWIN |
