Some of the generalizations of this homespun and quaint thinker,
too, were interesting. Talking of credit, for example, he once said:
"When a fellow is a beginner it's a good thing if he has a credit
face."
I thought it was some sort of commercial term he was using, and
when I asked him what it meant he said: "Why, some people are
just born with the kind of face that makes the woolen merchant or
the bank president trust them. They are not more honest than
some other fellows. Indeed, some of them are plain pickpockets,
but they have a credit face, so you have got to trust them. You just
can't help it."
"And if they don't pay?"
"But they do. They get credit from somebody else and pay the
jobber or the banker. Then they get more credit from these people
and pay the other fellows. People of this kind can do a big
business without a cent of capital. In Russia a fellow who pays his
bills is called an honest man, but America is miles ahead of
Russia. Here you can be the best pay in the world and yet be a
crook. You wouldn't say that every man who breathes God's air is
honest, would you? Well, paying your bills in America is like
breathing.
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