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The Richest Man in Babylon (Paperback)
by George S. Clason
| Category:
Personal finance, Wealth, Self help |
| Market price: ¥ 98.00
MSL price:
¥ 88.00
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MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
Don't be fooled by the size of this timeless classic on personal finance. You'll be electrified by those simple but powerful financial lessons in the book. |
| If you want us to help you with the right titles you're looking for, or to make reading recommendations based on your needs, please contact our consultants. |
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Author: George S. Clason
Publisher: Signet, Reissue edition
Pub. in: February, 2004
ISBN: 0451205367
Pages: 160
Measurements: 7.0 x 4.2 x 0.5 inches
Origin of product: USA
Order code: BA00075
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- Awards & Credential -
An overwhelmingly bestselling book on personal finance, this book has so far sold more than 2 million copies. It ranks #357 on Amazon.com as of December 19, 2006. This book is also one of the MSL Top Ten Personal Success Recommendations. |
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- MSL Picks -
This "book of cures for lean purses" is a guide to financial understanding. It offers insights that will aid you acquire money, keep money and make your surpluses earn more money. In order to show this, the book takes us back to Babylon, the cradle in which was nurtured the basic principles of finance now recognized and used the world over. Babylon became the wealthiest city of the ancient world because its citizens were the richest people of their time. They appreciated the value of money. They practiced sound financial principles in acquiring money, keeping money and making their money earn more money.
In the pages of history, there lives no city more glamorous than Babylon. Its very name conjures visions of wealth and splendor. Its treasures of gold and jewels were fabulous. One naturally pictures such a wealthy city as located in a suitable setting of tropical luxury surrounded by rich natural resources of forests and mines. Such was not the case. It was located beside the Euphrates River, in a flat, arid valley. Babylon is an outstanding example of man's ability to achieve great objectives, using whatever available means at his disposal. All of the resources supporting this large city were man-developed. All of its riches were man-made.
Seven Cures for a Lean Purse
Babylon's riches, of course, did not happen overnight. Its wealth was the result of the wisdom of its people. They first learned how to become wealthy and practiced what they knew. Here are the seven steps or "cures" to ensure a wealthier life:
Step 1: Start Thy Purse to Fattening
For each ten coins you earn, spend only nine.
Step 2: Control Thy Expenditures
Budget your expenses that you may have coins to pay for your necessities, pay for your enjoyments and gratify your worthwhile desires without spending more than nine-tenths of your earnings.
Step 3: Make Thy Gold Multiply
Put each coin to labor so that it may reproduce its kind.
Step 4: Guard Thy Treasures from Loss
Guard your treasures from loss by investing only where the principal is safe, where it may be reclaimed if you desire so, and where you will not fail to collect a fair rental.
Step 5: Make of Thy Dwelling a Profitable Investment
Own your own home.
Step 6: Insure a Future Income
Provide in advance for the needs of your growing age and the needs of your family.
Step 7: Increase Thy Ability to Earn
Cultivate your own powers, study and become wiser, become more skillful, and respect yourself.
Widely regarded as the greatest thing ever written on personal finance, The Richest Man in Babylon has been definitely a timeless classic that is a must-read for everyone. Over 300 readers give this book a collective rating of 5 stars on Amazon.com, which is very unusual from our perspective. It's a great gift to children or grandchildren. MSL highly recommends this book to everyone.
Target readers:
Managers, entrepreneurs, professionals, people longing to change their life by starting up their own business.
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From the Publisher:
Beloved by millions, this timeless classic holds the key to all you desire and everything you wish to accomplish. This is the book that reveals the secret to personal wealth.
Countless readers have been helped by the famous "Babylonian parables," hailed as the greatest of all inspirational works on the subject of thrift, financial planning, and personal wealth. In language as simple as the Bible, these fascinating and informative stories set you on a sure path to prosperity and its accompanying joys. Acclaimed as a modern-day classic, this celebrated bestseller offers an understanding of - and solution to - our personal financial problems that will guide you through a lifetime. This is the book that holds the secrets to acquiring money, keeping money, and making money earn more money.
Read the book and recommend it to loved ones and get on the road to riches.
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| View All 7 Digests |
Increase thy ability to earn.
As a man perfecteth himself in his calling even so doth his ability to earn increase.
The more wisdom we know, the more we mat earn. That man who seeks to learn more of his craft shall be richly rewarded.
Thus the seventh and last remedy for a lean purse is to cultivate thy own powers, to study and become wiser, to become more skillful, to so act as to respect thyself.
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Insure a future income.
Therefore do I say that it behooves a man to make preparation for a suitable income in the days to come, when he is no longer young, and to make preparations for his family should he be no longer with them to comfort and support them.
The man who, because of his understanding of the laws of wealth, acquireth a growing surplus, should give thought to those future days. He should plan certain investments or provisions that may endure safely for many years, yet will be available when the time arrives which he has so wisely anticipated.
No man can afford not to insure a treasure for his old age and the protection of his family, no matter how prosperous his business and investments may be.
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Make of thy dwelling a profitable investment.
Thus come many blessings to the man who owneth his own house. And greatly will it reduce his cost of living, making available more of his earnings for pleasures and the gratification of his desires. This, then, is the fifth cure for a lean purse: Own thy own home.
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Guard thy treasures from loss.
The first sound principle of investment is security for thy principal. Is it wise to be intrigued by larger earnings when thy principal may be lost? I say not.
This, then, is the fourth cure for a lean purse, and of great importance if it prevent thy purse from being emptied once it has become well filled. Guard thy treasure from loss by investing only where thy principal is safe, where it may be reclaimed if desirable, and where thou will not fail to collect a fair rental. Consult with wise men. Secure the advice of those experienced in the profitable handling of gold. Let their wisdom protect thy treasure from unsafe investments.
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| View all 8 comments |
Los Angles Times (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-29 00:00>
What can a book written in the 1920s tell modern investors about their finances? A whole lot if it's George Clason's delightful set of parables that explain the basics of money. |
D. Nishimoto (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-29 00:00>
The Richest Man in Babylon has very secular message for today: 1. Own your own home 2. Prepare for a suitable income in days to come 3. Learn skills that increase capability. This increase in capacity will lead to higher wage payments 4. Gain Recognition and praise as a foundation for more prestige that can be used to increase Gold and Silver. Prestige is the fuel for gaining credibility and trust that will seal bigger business deals 5. Pay debts with promptness 6. Care for family matters 7. Don't rely on luck to seize profits 8. Seize profits by acting immediately on opportunities.
Solomon was a true capitalist. Solomon taught in his proverbs to give to the poor. The people loved Solomon. Solomon increased commerce between Israel and other nations bringing products and services too Israel. Competition among the merchants drove down price. As price dropped because of abundance, the poor man could NOW afford exclusive products and services. Solomons capitalistic ideas of commerce, gifting, and abundance blessed the whole nation. As a result of the abundance, Israel rejoiced in the most glorious period of their history: 1. Political and economic unity reduced the need for war. 2. Commerce drove out poverty, as abundance, made price attractive for the masses 3. Consumer confidence raised and people felt more confident in buying 4. Money became more available too fund new growth oriented business ventures 5. The nation reserve of Gold and Silver increased into the trillions of dollars creating immense stability.
What happened? Solomon moral beliefs dissolved as he married wives from with pagan beliefs. The moral decade included breaking laws of God that had been the source of prosperity. The end results was corruption, war, and fragmentation of the Kingdom of Israel and both power and glory dissipating into the journals of history. Unification of Israel will occur as the nation conforms back with God's laws. The great tragedy of Solomon and David was not in the fallacy of their wisdom, but their forsaking of their God and his laws.
The Richest Man in Babylon is a study of contrasts between secular intellectual financial thought and religious morality. Man's wealth is finite, whereas, God's wealth is infinite. Man's accumulation of Gold and silver distributes wealth based on laws of abundance and scarcity; God's wealth accumulation is infinite without end. A rich man attracts many friends and a poor man is separated from the community. God loves both the rich and the poor.
Proverbs 19:4 (4. Wealth maketh many friends; but the poor is separated from his neighbor)
Proverbs 22:2 (The rich and poor meet together: the Lord is the maker of them all)
God's wisdom is a tree of life, an inheritance greater than Gold or silver, a more valuable possession than Gold or silver. God grants the righteous man an eternal inheritance and capacity for increase, life everlasting and joy everlasting. God's wisdom brings happiness and contentment.
Proverbs 3:5,6 (5. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding 6. In all they ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.)
The Rich man of Babylon seeks the praise and recognition associated with his prestige from wealth. The righteous man is reward wealth but he uses his wealth to feed the hungry and cloth the naked and create jobs.
Proverbs 11:25 (The liberal soul shall be made fat and he that watereth shall be watered also himself)
Proverbs 11:30 (The fruit of righteousness is a tree of life; and he that winneth souls is wise.)
The Rich man of Babylon believes opportunity is a temptation, preserves his wealth through capital gains and taxes, and loans his wealth generation after generation exploiting the common through usury taxes (interest) and offering no long-term forgiveness of debt.
Idolatry is not recognizing God for the increase and accumulation of material items. Failures to be acknowledge God as the source of all increase is Idolatry. The Rich man of Babylon says, "Behold, from my humble earnings I had begotten a hoard of gold slaves, each laboring and earning more gold. As they labored for me, so their children also labored and their children's children until great was the income from their combined efforts." Greed is their God, "It is wise that we must first secure small amounts and learn to protect them" and guard the treasure from loss by investing where principle is safe. The fallacy is the accumulation of Gold and silver is not wealth. The creation of jobs and work is wealth. The Rich man of Babylon becomes the exclusive, rich baron, whose taxes oppress the poor.
Proverbs 22:7 (The rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender)
The righteous man eventually forgives debts, a year of Jubilee, salvation from oppression. The Rich Man of Babylon demands payment in full without any mercy, yet his own oppression will leave him hungry. Excessive Debt burdens are a milestone that drown productivity and impoverish the masses. Debt should be temporary and not long-term. Long-term debt cause want because interest accumulation siphons away the Gold and silver.
Proverbs 22:16 (He that oppresseth the poor to increase his riches, and he that giveth to the rich, shall surely come to want).
The Rich Man of Babylon keeps 10% of his increase for himself; he profits from his Gold and silver; he seeks wise advisors to assist in money investment/loans creating more Gold and silver; he avoids unfamiliar businesses or purposes; and he is fearful of thieves, who desire to steal his Gold and silver; avoids becoming a slave through debt to another Rich Man of Babylon. The righteous man of God gives 10% of his increase in tithes to God. The Rich Man of Babylon says, "don't spend, if you lack the money". The righteous man says, "The Lord will provide" and lives prudently, without decadence, void of opulence, and clean and modest. The Rich Man of Babylon says, "put your money to work" seeking capital gains, whereas, the righteous man says, "distribute your excess to feed the hungry" by creating innovation, more efficient agriculture, and scientific breakthroughs and in labor there is wealth. A righteous man bless the nation through increase prosperity and abundance creating cheap resources, he does not covet wealth for accumulation sake. The righteous man seeks wisdom because he knows that Gold and silver comes and goes.
Proverbs 23:4 (4. Labour not to be rich: cease from thine own wisdom)
Proverbs 24:5 (5. A wise man is strong, yea, a man of knowledge increaseth strength.)
Proverbs 23:12 (12. Apply thine heart unto instruction, and thine ears to the words of knowledge)
The Rich man of Babylon believes his pyramid of wealth makes him invincible to death, obscurity, war, and scorn. War has no friends or allies and the Rich man of Babylon high wall is conceit, a fool and his money.
Proverbs 18:11 (The rich man's wealth is his strong city, and as an high wall in his own conceit) |
Sandy Beach (MSL quote), USA
<2006-12-29 00:00>
The Richest Man In Babylon is a good guide for anyone whether they want to amass wealth or just live comfortably.
According to the book it doesn't matter what your income is, anyone can save money, all it takes is the proper perspective. This book gives you way to look at money that many of us have been taught, but may have forgotten. As other reviewers pointed out, this is basic, common sense information, but good advice bears repeating. Each of my children have a copy of this book and began a savings program before age 16.
I think the biggest point the book makes is, it does not matter what your income level is, anyone can save 10% of their income if they really think it is important enough to do, and that small amount on a weekly basis is hardly missed at the time, while growing over time to be a substantial amount. As Albert Einstein pointed out, there is nothing more powerful than compound interest and that is what you get by saving just 10% of all of your income. I highly recommend this book for kids old enough to read on up to anyone who needs to be reminded of the simple beauty of good advice. |
B. Shenoy (MSL quote), India
<2006-12-29 00:00>
This is a very simple and practical book on personal finance. Narrated in short stories from the ancient city of Babylon, the basic principles of handling ones personal finances have remained the same- to live within one's means, save for the rainy day and not to be greedy while looking at investment options. The advice to pay oneself first - keep aside at least ten percent of your income and the savings set aside in prudent and safe investments multiply manifold over a long period is at the core of this book. It is not necessary that one has to be stingy to save. It is a matter of planning and personal discipline.
The stories and the characters are very interesting and is a good weekend read. This makes the book enjoyable to age groups. |
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