“
We used to lodge in the same house with a Russian Jew, who was a furrier. That man was interested in money, if you like. It was a passion, an enthusiasm, an ideal. He could have led a comfortable, easy life and still have made enough money to put something by for his old age. But for his high abstract ideal of money he suffered more than Michelangelo ever suffered for his art. He used to work nineteen hours a day, and the other five he slept, lying under his bench, in the dirt, breathing into his lungs the stink and the broken hairs. He is now very rich indeed and does nothing with his money, doesn't want to do anything, doesn't know what one does with it. He desires neither power nor pleasure. His desire for lucre is purely disinterested. He reminds me of Brownings 'Grammarian". I have great admiration for him.
- Antic Hay, page 20
