\u201cOh! captive, bound, and double-ironed,\u201d cried the phantom, \u201cnot to know, that ages of incessant labour by immortal creatures, for this earth must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is all developed. Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life’s opportunities misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBut you were always a good man of business, Jacob,\u201d faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself.<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cBusiness!\u201d cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. \u201cMankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n It held up its chain at arm’s length, as if that were the cause of all its unavailing grief, and flung it heavily upon the ground again.<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cAt this time of the rolling year,\u201d the spectre said, \u201cI suffer most. Why did I walk through crowds of fellow-beings with my eyes turned down, and never raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise Men to a poor abode? Were there no poor homes to which its light would have conducted me?\u201d<\/p>\n Scrooge was very much dismayed to hear the spectre going on at this rate, and began to quake exceedingly.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/strong>Charles Dickens<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n