suceeds

Updated: September 18, 2025

I know the ordinary course with such tradesmen is this: 'It is true, says the poor man, 'I am running down, and I have lost so much in such a place, and so much by such a chapman that broke, and, in short, so much, that I am worse than nothing; but come, I have such a thing before me, or I have undertaken such a project, or I have such an adventure abroad, if it suceeds, I may recover again; I'll try my utmost; I'll never drown while I can swim; I'll never fall while I can stand; who knows but I may get over it? In a word, the poor man is loth to come to the fatal day; loth to have his name in the Gazette, and see his wife and family turned out of doors, and the like; who can blame him? or who is not, in the like case, apt to take the like measures? for it is natural to us all to put the evil day far from us, at least to put it as far off as we can.

Daniel Defoe - The Complete English Tradesman (1839 ed.)