Remember that Scrooge resides in the Victorian era, a time when "hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts." And Scrooge is quite aware of this, and do not forget Scrooge's business partner, Jacob Marley, who is condemned because of his lust for gold and for his lack of altruism; he may have influenced Scrooge, and then there is Marley's death. By leaving Scrooge alone, Scrooge is forced to fend for himself, and realizing that there are "hundreds of thousands of people" suffering he had better learn to take care of himself, and the only way of doing that is to trust in gold/money, for gold will not disappoint him as people can and have.

Dickens paints the picture of an unlikeable but sympathetic character in Scrooge.  In Stave II we see a young boy, neglected at a run-down, cold boarding school over the holidays.  His only companions are those he finds in literature.  The next viewing shows us a repeat of the same.  Scrooge is older, yet still alone over Christmas until Fan, his beloved sister, comes to get him.  She relates that she asked their father again if Scrooge could come home for the holidays, and this time he relented.  We see in Scrooge's father a cold, distant, neglectful figure.  Later in the stave we see what happened to his engagement with Belle, his fiance.  Stating that he was no longer the man she fell in love with, that his "pursuit of gain" had become the top priority in his life rather than her, she breaks off their engagement.  She is only the second person that Dickens shows Scrooge as having cared for, and when Fan died sometime after that, he must have truly felt isolated.  While circumstances are certainly no excuse for behavior, it is not a far stretch to see that this series of events - all around the holiday season - have contributed to the creation of Scrooge as we meet him in Stave I.