The art of money getting: Or, Golden Rules for Making Money

About this book

The work is a practical self‑help treatise on personal finance, written by the 19th‑century showman Phineas Taylor Barnum under the title *The Art of Money Getting*. It opens with a direct address to readers who aspire to “independence,” asserting that the path to wealth is as simple as spending less than one earns. Barnum then expands the notion of “economy” beyond penny‑pinching, warning against the false thrift that masks wasteful habits, and he illustrates his points with vivid anecdotes, from a frugal farmer’s candle to a gentleman’s costly sofa. The author’s central thesis is that true prosperity comes from disciplined saving, careful accounting, and a modest lifestyle, rather than from the pursuit of appearances.

Barnum’s voice is conversational and moralising, steeped in the language and social concerns of the post‑Civil‑War United States. He mixes references to Benjamin Franklin, Dickens, and contemporary customs with a brisk, didactic tone that reads like a lecture hall sermon. Readers who enjoy earnest, example‑driven advice on budgeting, as well as those interested in Victorian‑era attitudes toward wealth, modesty, and social status, will find this book both instructive and a window into the period’s cultural mindset.

Opening lines

Those who really desire to attain an independence, have only to set their minds upon it, and adopt the proper means, as they do in regard to any other object which they wish to accomplish, and the thing is easily done. But however easy it may be found to make money, I have no doubt many of my hearers will agree it is the most difficult thing in the world to keep it. The road to wealth is, as Dr. Franklin truly says, "as plain as the road to the mill." It consists simply in expending less than we earn; that seems to be a very simple problem. Mr. …

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