I believe that thrift is essential to well-ordered living.

The sentence frames thrift not merely as a money-saving tactic but as a moral and practical discipline that undergirds an orderly life. Read this way, “thrift” implies restraint, planning, and the habit of matching means to ends—virtues often associated with self-control and long-term stability. The claim also suggests a broader social ethic: households, businesses, and institutions function better when resources are managed carefully rather than squandered. In Rockefeller’s case, the sentiment aligns with a common late‑19th/early‑20th‑century American ideal that personal character and economic prudence are intertwined, and that prosperity is best sustained by habits of economy and method.