Sam may try a fine while before he will make one of his empty sacks stand upright.  If he were not half daft he would have left off that job before he began it, and not have been an Irishman either.  He will come to his wit’s end before he sets the sack on its end.  The old proverb, printed at the top, was made by a man who had burned his fingers with debtors, and it just means that when folks have no money and are over head and ears in debt, as often as not they leave off being upright, and tumble over one way or another.  He that has but four and spends five will soon need no purse, but he will most likely begin to use his wits to keep himself afloat, and take to all sorts of dodges to manage it.

Nine times out of ten they begin by making promises to pay on a certain day when it is certain they have nothing to pay with.  They are as bold at fixing the time as if they had my lord’s income; the day comes round as sure as Christmas, and then they haven’t a penny-piece in the world, and so they make all sorts of excuses and begin to promise again.  Those who are quick to promise are generally slow to perform.  They promise mountains and perform mole-hills.  He who gives you fair words and nothing more feeds you with an empty spoon, and hungry creditors soon grow tired of that game.  Promises don’t fill the belly.  Promising men are not great favorites if they are not performing men.  When such a fellow is called a liar he thinks he is hardly done by; and yet he is so, as sure as eggs are eggs, and there’s no denying it, as the boy said when the gardener caught him up the cherry-tree.

A HAND-SAW IS A GOOD THING, BUT NOT TO SHAVE WITH.

Our friend will cut more than he will eat, and shave oft something more than hair, and then he will blame the saw.  His brains don’t lie in his beard, nor yet in the skull above it, or he would see that his saw will only make sores.  There’s sense in choosing your tools, for a pig’s tail will never make a good arrow, nor will his ear make a silk purse.  You can’t catch rabbits with drums, nor pigeons with plums.  A good thing is not good out of its place.  It is much the same with lads and girls; you can’t put all boys to one trade, nor send all girls to the same service.  One chap will make a London clerk, and another will do better to plough, and sow, and reap, and mow, and be a farmer’s boy.  It’s no use forcing them; a snail will never run a race, nor a mouse drive a wagon.

    “Send a boy to the well against his will,
    The pitcher will break, and the water spill.”

With unwilling hounds it is hard to hunt hares.  To go against nature and inclination is to row against wind and tide.  They say you may praise a fool till you make him useful.  I don’t know so much about that, but I do know that if I get a bad knife I generally cut my finger, and a blunt axe is more trouble than profit.  No, let me shave with a razor if I shave at all, and do my work with the best tools I can get.