On The Want Of Money Rhetorical Analysis

We live in a world in which our monetary wealth dictates all aspects of how we live, including our class, values, and necessities that contribute to a “happy” life. On the contrary Mr. William Hazlitt exposes the awful truth behind on what the effects of money, or a lack thereof, can do to a person. Hazlitt writes to connect and reveal to the audience that money causes us to have shared and common bad experiences, and that we are not in this alone. In his essay, “On The Want of Money”, Hazlitt is a voice for those who refuse to let pieces of paper define who they are, and does so using rhetorical appeals and sharp changes of tone to demonstrate his argument about how possessing or lacking money is a lose-lose situation in the long run.

Almost anyone can understand the struggles that come from a strive for personal wealth, so using that as a basis for Ethos is a smart move on behalf of Hazlitt. The average person’s “want” for money is a characteristic that most everyone can …show more content…
For example, passages like, “To be in want of it, is to pass through life with little credit or pleasure; it is to live out of the world, or to be despised if you come into it; it is not to be sent for to court, or asked out to dinner, or noticed in the street”, and “it is to be scrutinized by strangers, and neglected by friends; it is to be a thrall to circumstances, an exile in one's own country”, signify an initial sense of uneasiness and repent, as Hazlitt seems unsure of money’s true purpose, good or bad. But later on, Hazlitt goes on much cheerier and almost humorous as he writes of the treatment one will get for possessing the wealth that so many endeavor after. This is seen in lines like, “The wiseacres will possibly, however, crowd round your coffin, and raise a monument at a considerable expense, and after a lapse of time, to commemorate your genius and your misfortunes!”, being the final line of the

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