PART I
Rich of all Countries, unite!
2.
Take it as a postulate, for the time being. I couldn't give a thorough evidence: but everybody might grant that, having quite the same availability of benefits, (including but not limited to money, of course - since health and other intangible assets such as family-harmony play a role in the general picture), some person is feeling pretty rich and some other pretty unfortunate though both dwell in virtual quarters very much alike.
It is an inner stance and I would dare say that the road to Richness out of Poverty is an inward journey. But this is somewhat anticipating a conclusion that looks rather awkward, if put simply in this way, and smells a lot like a further attempt to manipulate humans through some new kind of "opium of the people".
Therefore I better declare immediately my key assessment: it is extremely difficult for a Poor to become Rich and this treatise of mine is not to be conceived as a handbook for becoming Rich. My discourse is plainly addressed to those who ARE actually rich, (that is, according to our definition stated above, who feel fortunate and content in their position). The Poor would hardly find anything good in it. The Poor are generally bound to remain Poor. Translated from our jargon these words simply suggest that the wanting, the greedy, the unsatisfied are hardly ready to change their mental habits and will find little or no attraction in these lines.
It is written somewhere in the gospel: The Poor will always be with you. And in my wife's Country they use to say Wir sind unsere Vergangenheit, die uns gemacht hat, die wir sind: which means that we are moulded by our past, and if you have been grown up with "poor" people who perhaps have got a lot of money but have no quietude, pursuing tirelessly their avidity and craving, you have really poor chances to achieve the inner peace of the true Rich.
The true Rich have simply a propensity to be content with their daily gifts: and this disposition, in fact, is the greatest gratuitous gift they got. The Poor, being unable to appreciate this particular gift, remain helplessly poor, even if they are attaining a lot of material "success": they remain thirsty all their life.
Up to this point this tract might seem just a further pious message to encourage "the good" and condemn "the bad" to eternal unhappiness. That would be really a mean pathetic piece of cheap highminded propaganda and I want to stress again that I am not trying to convert anybody to "virtue", to ameliorate the world and hence contribute to the wellbeing of next millennium.
The Rich, by our definition, are not necessarily "virtuous": they are just content.
If then we want to elaborate, and suggest that gladness and inner peace come out most easily if one cares (quietly) for unperishable, lasting pleasures and achievements, and these lasting pieces of joy are surely not to be found in the materiality of petty selfish gratifications and in banknotes to buy them, well, we affirm something about which many would agree. So, by and large, probably being a nice good fellow pursuing unselfishness and compassion is a hallmark of the true Rich, who found out for themselves in which regions of their inner self is the most enduring joy. But this is not the purpose of my message. I am not trying to convert anybody to virtue, generosity and so forth. Perhaps quite the opposite, with a grain of salt.