It can easily be
avoided if he asks himself two questions: Have I surplus means for all
possible requirements which will enable me to pay without
inconvenience the utmost sum for which I am liable under this
endorsement? Secondly: Am I willing to lose this sum for the friend
for whom I endorse? If these two questions can be answered in the
affirmative he may be permitted to oblige his friend, but not
otherwise, if he be a wise man. And if he can answer the first
question in the affirmative it will be well for him to consider
whether it would not be better then and there to pay the entire sum
for which his name is asked. I am sure it would be. A man's means are
a trust to be sacredly held for his own creditors as long as he has
debts and obligations.
Notwithstanding my refusal to endorse the Morgan renewal, I was
invited to accompany the parties to New York next morning in their
special car for the purpose of consultation. This I was only too glad
to do. Anthony Drexel was also called in to accompany us. During the
journey Mr. McCullough remarked that he had been looking around the
car and had made up his mind that there was only one sensible man in
it; the rest had all been "fools." Here was "Andy" who had paid for
his shares and did not owe a dollar or have any responsibility in the
matter, and that was the position they all ought to have been in.
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