Scripting · “You Assign the Meaning”
The Seven Cures for a Lean Purse
To work through the seven ordered rules for turning a thin income into growing wealth, written into a personal plan.
The seven, in order: (1) Save a tenth.
(2) Budget — control spending.
(3) Invest savings so they multiply.
(4) Guard your capital from loss.
(5) Where it fits, own your home.
(6) Provide a future income.
(7) Keep increasing your ability to earn. Write each as a real commitment for your own money, and review it.
What it is
This is George S. Clason’s complete, ordered programme for building wealth from a thin income, given in The Richest Man in Babylon (1926) as the king’s commission to Arkad to teach the people.
Where “pay yourself first” is the single keystone, the Seven Cures are the whole curriculum: a sequenced rule-set that takes someone from a “lean purse” to financial security. The point of treating it as a practice (rather than a list to nod at) is to write your own seven — to translate each ancient cure into a concrete, present-day commitment for your own money, on paper, where it can be reviewed and acted on. The seven, in Clason’s order, are:
(1) start thy purse to fattening; (2) control thy expenditures; (3) make thy gold multiply; (4) guard thy treasures from loss; (5) make of thy dwelling a profitable investment; (6) insure a future income; (7) increase thy ability to earn.
The Method
Write each cure as a real commitment for your own situation:
- Start thy purse to fattening. Keep at least one-tenth of all you earn — pay yourself first. Write the fraction and where it goes.
- Control thy expenditures. Budget. Distinguish necessary expenses from desires, and live below your means so the tenth is never threatened. Write your necessary-expense budget.
- Make thy gold multiply. Put savings to productive work so they earn more — invest, don’t just hoard. Write how your savings will be employed.
- Guard thy treasures from loss. Protect capital first: invest only where principal is safe and on sound counsel; refuse the get-rich-quick. Write your loss-guard rules.
- Make of thy dwelling a profitable investment (“own thy own home”). Where it fits your circumstances, owning rather than renting can build equity. Write whether and when this applies to you.
- Insure a future income. Provide for retirement and for your family’s security after you — set aside for the years you cannot work. Write your future-income plan.
- Increase thy ability to earn. Cultivate skill, knowledge, and reputation so your income rises. Write the next skill you’ll build. (Sourcing note: the seven cures are Clason’s published framework, paraphrased and attributed; archaic phrasings are summarized, not reproduced in full.)
Source & Lineage
The Seven Cures are Clason’s, framed in 1926 as Arkad teaching a class of Babylonians at the king’s request. The set repackages sound, universal personal-finance behaviour as ancient wisdom. It feeds directly into modern budgeting curricula, the “pay yourself first” tradition, retirement-saving culture, and the FIRE movement, and is restated by later money writers.
Common refinements
Reading, not writing. The value is in translating each cure into your numbers and commitments, not admiring the list.
- Treating “own thy home” as a command. Homeownership is right for some and wrong for others; weigh it, don’t obey it.
- Chasing cure 3 before cure 4. Multiplying gold without guarding it is how people lose savings; protection of principal comes first.
- Refinement: Review the written seven quarterly; tick what’s running, fix what’s slipped.