The Science of Getting Rich, Great And Well E-Book

Wallace D. Wattles

• Herausgeber: Jazzybee Verlag
• Kategorie: Ratgeber
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Seitenzahl: 373

Beschreibung

The purpose of the lessons in this book is to raise the mental and spiritual vibrations of the student - to inspire hope, faith, courage - to awaken larger thought within the mind, inspire greater plans and purposes and awaken the dormant energy in the life to fire the enthusiasm and call into active service hidden talent which the student, possibly, does not dream at his present stage of unfoldment, he possesses. In short our purpose is to awaken men from mental slumber, show the unlimited resources in human nature, the unseen yet open doors to mental wealth first, then as a natural sequence to wealth in material conditions, and thus enlarge and ennoble the life as well as add to its material expressions. This edition includes all three of Wattles' masterworks: The Science of Getting Rich The Science of Being Great The Science of Being Well

Leseprobe

The Science of Getting Rich, Great And Well

Extended Annotated Edition

Wallace D. Wattles

Contents:

The Science of Getting Rich, Great And Well

PREFACE BY B. F. AUSTIN

The Science of Getting Rich

Foreword

CHAPTER 1 The Right To Be Rich

CHAPTER 2 There is A Science of Getting Rich

CHAPTER 3 Is Opportunity Monopolized?

CHAPTER 4 The First Principle in The Science of Getting Rich

CHAPTER 5 Increasing Life

CHAPTER 6 How Riches Come to You

CHAPTER 7  Gratitude

CHAPTER 8 Thinking in the Certain Way

CHAPTER 9 How to Use the Will

CHAPTER 10 Further Use of the Will

CHAPTER 11 Acting in the Certain Way

CHAPTER 12 Efficient Action

CHAPTER 13 Getting into the Right Business

CHAPTER 14 The Impression of Increase

CHAPTER 15 The Advancing Man

CHAPTER 16 Some Cautions, and Concluding Observations

CHAPTER 17 Summary of the Science of Getting Rich

The Science of Being Great

Authors Preface

Chapter 1 Any Person May Become Great

Chapter 2 Heredity and Opportunity

Chapter 3 The Source of Power

Chapter 4 The Mind of God

Chapter 5 Preparation

Chapter 6 The Social Point of View

Chapter 7 The Individual Point of View

Chapter 8 Consecration

Chapter 9 Identification

Chapter 10 Idealization

Chapter 11 Realization

Chapter 12 Hurry and Habit

Chapter 13 Thought

Chapter 14 Action at Home

Chapter 15 Action Abroad

Chapter 16 Some Further Explanations

Chapter 17 More About Thought

Chapter 18 Jesus' Idea of Greatness

Chapter 19 A View of Evolution

Chapter 20 Serving God

Chapter 21 A Mental Exercise

Chapter 22 A Summary of the Science of Being Great

Biographical Note

The Science of Being Well

Author’s Preface

Chapter 1 The Principle of Health

Chapter 2 The Foundations of Faith

Chapter 3 Life and Its Organisms

Chapter 4 What To Think

Chapter 5 Faith

Chapter 6 Use of the Will

Chapter 7 Health from God

Chapter 8 Summary of the Mental Actions

Chapter 9 When To Eat

Chapter 10 What To Eat

Chapter 11 How To Eat

Chapter 12 Hunger and Appetites

Chapter 13 In a Nutshell

Chapter 14 Breathing

Chapter 15 Sleep

Chapter 16 Supplementary Instructions

Chapter 17 A Summary of the Science of Being Well

The Science of Getting Rich, Great And Well, W. D. Wattles

Jazzybee Verlag Jürgen Beck

86450 Altenmünster, Germany

ISBN: 9783849612733

www.jazzybee-verlag.de

[email protected]

Cover Design: © James Steidl - Fotolia.com

The Science of Getting Rich, Great And Well

PREFACE BY B. F. AUSTIN

The purpose of the lessons in this book is to raise the mental and spiritual vibrations of the student - to inspire hope, faith, courage - to awaken larger thought within the mind, inspire greater plans and purposes and awaken the dormant energy in the life to fire the enthusiasm and call into active service hidden talent which the student, possibly, does not dream at his present stage of unfoldment, he possesses.

In short our purpose is to awaken men from mental slumber, show the unlimited resources in human nature, the unseen yet open doors to mental wealth first, then as a natural sequence to wealth in material conditions, and thus enlarge and ennoble the life as well as add to its material expressions.

The purpose of the true teacher - who is ever the true physician as well - must always be the "more abundant life" of which the Nazarene spoke and taught. To disclose that life, abounding life, in all its fullness and beauty and point out the laws by which it is gained, with wealth as a natural sequence, is the purpose of the three lessons on which we are entering.

A PROPHECY OF RESULTS FROM THESE LESSONS

Prophecies based on observation and experience, and knowledge of natural law, are exceedingly instructive and valuable. We predict most confidently that every student of these lessons will have after reading them - and especially after their re-reading and study - a larger store of information on the subject of Success in Life, brighter hopes, more enthusiasm, more "vim," "grit" and "gumption" in business, and will attack his life work with such enlarged wisdom and such intense energy that hereafter his life will become in every way more successful and bring him into larger freedom, greater happiness and power and ampler resources financially.

In short, no one can apply the teachings of these lessons without his life becoming larger, nobler and purer, and more enjoyable in the possession of mental and material wealth. And the life that receives and applies these teachings will be like a fertilizing stream in the desert, making it bud and blossom like the rose.

THE REASONS FOR THIS PROPHECY

With absolute confidence I make this prophecy, because I shall give you not theories, spun from the imagination of the poet or novelist or from some dreamy philosopher in the seclusion of his study, or some penny-a-liner who is paid so much per page for his theories, but the actual results of human experience and a study of nature's laws and especially of the laws of financial gain. I shall give you "the kernel" of the best teachings of a score of our ablest psychologists and new thought writers in concentrated form. And I shall give the personal testimony of those who have risen from poverty to wealth through discovery of the laws of financial success and their application to the life. The principles here laid down have been tested over and over again in the laboratory of life's experiences and found correct and practicable.

Moreover I myself have proved them and I illustrate these principles and prove their value in my own life.

Another reason why we most confidently predict success to the students of this course is the fact that the teachings are rational, being in accord with life and human experience, and based on laws that are now known and recognized as governing the accumulation of wealth. These is nothing of mystical charm, no miracle involved, nothing of the "cheap nostrum" order about them. Our method is simply reason amplified and set to work, energy awakened and employed, laws discovered and followed out - with the one inevitable result: enlarged and ennobled character, mental and material wealth.

NO SPECIAL ENDOWMENT REQUIRED FOR MONEYMAKING

The way to competence, if not wealth, is open to every man of sound body and mind who will study and apply these laws. The fact that great riches belong to the few, and that some men seem to stumble on riches and others seek them in vain for a life time - generally without knowledge of the law or application in the life - has led some to suppose that a special endowment of nature is necessary to enable one to attain wealth. Doubtless a few men without a theoretical knowledge of the law have applied it in their lives, and unquestionably some few men seem to come into wealth by "chance" or "luck," yet there is really no such thing as chance in a universe of law - and the vast majority of men who have won wealth have either through their own mentality, or by the teachings of others, or by inspiration, come to know the law and apply it in their own lives.

Every man of sound mind and body, we repeat, can become master of conditions in his life - in place of being enslaved, as the multitudes are, by these conditions. There is a pathway from poverty to wealth, from obscurity to fame, from weakness to strength, from the servile and pigmy condition of mind and life, to Kingship in mind and in estate. The door of opportunity is open - or, at least, unlocked.

NATURE PLANS ABUNDANCE FOR ALL

Another introductory consideration worthy our attention is the fact that the evident plan of God as revealed in nature is abundance for all. Poverty is no part of nature's plan - but the very reverse is true: Nature designed abundance for all. Her provision for man's wants covers not only his necessities but a super abundance is the law of Nature's beneficence. The tracing of disease, poverty and suffering to the design of God was, indeed, a part of the Old Theology, which is now practically dead and superseded by the New Theology which traces all of these evils to ignorance and neglect of law.

As children of God we inherit not only the right to life, but to all that makes life worth living. But every life is "cabin'd, cribbed, confined" by poverty. In fact freedom, power, happiness, education, culture, travel, books, art, music, recreation - the things that made life worth the living - are really impossible without wealth.

Not only is our own life robbed of its full and happy expression by poverty, but man's service of his fellowmen is limited on every hand by poverty. Men who possess in their own mentality great truths that would instruct and inspire the multitude, or great plans for reforming our deplorable social and economic system, or great purposes of charity toward the needy, or great reforms they would like to see realized find themselves hampered and hindered in all their noble work by "lack of funds."

The world - sad to state - estimates a man not by his knowledge, or his character, so much as by the size of his bank account. A public lecturer said recently in my hearing and was applauded in saying it he respected no man who did not have a good bank account.

Harsh as this may appear, we shall show there is at least a small measure of justice in it by pointing out that Poverty is essentially a Mental Disease, and that from the standpoint of character itself - in this age of golden opportunities - it is no credit to a man to be poor.

OUR DESIRES ARE PROPHECIES AND SHOW THE POSSIBILITY OF WEALTH

All students of nature and of man recognize that the possession of a desire within the soul for any real or supposed good, is a natural prophecy proving there is somewhere in Nature's realm a source of satisfaction for that desire. If my student, then, believes in a Personal God as the designer of all things, can he possibly conclude that God intended to mock us by desires impossible of fulfillment? If so, as Helen Wilmans aptly declares, these desires implanted within us are simply "promissory notes on a ruined bank." Again, if these desires for wealth are not true prophecies, man is destined as he emerges from barbarism to civilization, to increasing misery and suffering, since desires multiply and intensify as man advances along the upward path of evolution. All studies, therefore, of nature and the human soul tend to convince us that man's life should have an abundance of temporal good - in short that man should rule his conditions and not be ruled by them.

EVERY MAN'S DUTY TO MAKE ALL THE MONEY HE CAN HONESTLY

At first sight it might seem that inheritors of great wealth - having no need of more money and no love of business or labor - might be excused from the task of money making. Not so, however. Every man who enjoys the advantages of our wonderful civilization, who eats the food some toiler has grown, or wears the garments some toiler has made, who enjoys the protection which is freely granted to all, owes a personal debt to the world. Despite his large bank account and broad acres he is but a refined "pauper" if in some way he does not add to the wealth of the world.

And no man has enough wealth to supply, not only his own need, but to fully meet the claims of a world in sickness, suffering and sorrow, and to plan and prosecute the great living reforms of this age.

A man should demand of himself, of society, of his God, abundance of temporal good. The stream of abundance should flow with increasing volume into his life, and the stream of beneficence should flow with equal freedom out of his heart and life, to supply the higher needs of humanity. "Freely receive; freely give." The ideal life is the one in which a liberal kingly income is assured - and man in the royalty and beneficence of his nature should give like a king.

No life can reach its maximum of enjoyment, power and usefulness without wealth.

IS THERE GREAT DANGER IN ACQUIRING WEALTH?

Undoubtedly - but greater dangers still in the lack of wealth. The one great danger in acquiring money and in possessing it, is the danger of becoming a slave to gold. This is one of the vilest forms of slavery and, perhaps, no other form of idolatry is quite so benumbing to all the higher and diviner qualities of manhood as avarice. The miser is of all characters most despised and illustrates the truth of the old proverb "Money is a good servant but a hard master." No other type of character exhibits such unreasoning folly and seems so fully to merit the rebuke: "Thou Fool." The one safeguard in the acquisition of wealth is the constant, unremitting cultivation of the human sympathies and the exercise of benevolence. Without this, the acquisition of money is generally attended by a freezing up of the moral nature and a growing love for money for purely selfish purposes, or for money's sake, ending in avarice and the wretched condition of the miser. It is quite easy to see how the rigid economy many feel called upon to exercise in rising from poverty to wealth, and the constant mental habit of reaching out in desire and act for material gain, would in the lapse of years work a transformation of character, so that men who set out in life with an ambition to acquire a fortune for the uplift of humanity, find with the gaining of the fortune they have lost all benevolent desire. This is an unspeakable calamity to multitudes of men who become enslaved not by money, but by the love of money, and miss the grandest opportunity of a life dowered with the possession of money - the privilege of using wealth to enrich themselves and their fellows with that increasing knowledge, happiness and virtue, that constitute the eternal riches of the soul.

Better a thousandfold for a man that he live and die under the disadvantages and limitations and hardships of poverty and retain the spirit of brotherhood and humanity in his heart, than to acquire the wealth of Croesus and shrink his soul up to the littleness, meanness and wretchedness of a miser.

A very good test of our own soul attitude toward money, a very fair indication of how we would use great wealth if it came to us, may be had in the serious answer of the question: How are we using the measure of wealth which is ours today? How much have we contributed to purely benevolent objects this past year?

A man should ever recognize his own kingship and demand a liberal income from the world, and it is his business to see to it that all obstacles in himself and his environment are removed which would hinder a generous flow of Nature's great stream of Opulence toward himself. And then he should live like a king, and be as generous as a king, with his fellowmen.

WE SEEK TO INTENSIFY YOUR DESIRES FOR WEALTH

In place of encouraging contentment with Poverty, we preach the Gospel of Discontent. We would whet your desires for wealth and intensify your love - not of money - but of the good things in life which money represents. It is a misinterpretation of life and of all true religion to deny either the vast advantages of money on the one hand, or the right and duty of all men to possess and use it in as large a degree as is consistent with honor and justice. The inherent desires of men, the demands of the world today upon us in our complex civilization, the Law of Opulence everywhere seen in Nature, all prove that men ought to conquer conditions and amass wealth.

The Science of Getting Rich

Foreword

THIS book is pragmatical, not philosophical; a practical manual, not a treatise upon theories. It is intended for the men and women whose most pressing need is for money; who wish to get rich first, and philosophize afterward. It is for those who have, so far, found neither the time, the means, nor the opportunity to go deeply into the study of metaphysics, but who want results and who are willing to take the conclusions of science as a basis for action, without going into all the processes by which those conclusions were reached.

It is expected that the reader will take the fundamental statements upon faith, just as he would take statements concerning a law of electrical action if they were promulgated by a Marconi or an Edison; and, taking the statements upon faith, that he will prove their truth by acting upon them without fear or hesitation. Every man or woman who does this will certainly get rich; for the science herein applied is an exact science, and failure is impossible. For the benefit, however, of those who wish to investigate philosophical theories and so secure a logical basis for faith, I will here cite certain authorities.

The monistic theory of the universe the theory that One is All, and that All is One; That one Substance manifests itself as the seeming many elements of the material world -is of Hindu origin, and has been gradually winning its way into the thought of the western world for two hundred years. It is the foundation of all the Oriental philosophies, and of those of Descartes, Spinoza, Leibnitz, Schopenhauer, Hegel, and Emerson.

The reader who would dig to the philosophical foundations of this is advised to read Hegel and Emerson for himself.

In writing this book I have sacrificed all other considerations to plainness and simplicity of style, so that all might understand. The plan of action laid down herein was deduced from the conclusions of philosophy; it has been thoroughly tested, and bears the supreme test of practical experiment; it works. If you wish to know how the conclusions were arrived at, read the writings of the authors mentioned above; and if you wish to reap the fruits of their philosophies in actual practice, read this book and do exactly as it tells you to do.

The Author

CHAPTER 1 The Right To Be Rich

WHATEVER may be said in praise of poverty, the fact remains that it is not possible to live a really complete or successful life unless one is rich. No man can rise to his greatest possible height in talent or soul development unless he has plenty of money; for to unfold the soul and to develop talent he must have many things to use, and he cannot have these things unless he has money to buy them with.

A man develops in mind, soul, and body by making use of things, and society is so organized that man must have money in order to become the possessor of things; therefore, the basis of all advancement for man must be the science of getting rich.

The object of all life is development; and everything that lives has an inalienable right to all the development it is capable of attaining.

Man's right to life means his right to have the free and unrestricted use of all the things which may be necessary to his fullest mental, spiritual, and physical unfoldment; or, in other words, his right to be rich.

In this book, I shall not speak of riches in a figurative way; to be really rich does not mean to be satisfied or contented with a little. No man ought to be satisfied with a little if he is capable of using and enjoying more. The purpose of Nature is the advancement and unfoldment of life; and every man should have all that can contribute to the power; elegance, beauty, and richness of life; to be content with less is sinful.

The man who owns all he wants for the living of all the life he is capable of living is rich; and no man who has not plenty of money can have all he wants. Life has advanced so far, and become so complex, that even the most ordinary man or woman requires a great amount of wealth in order to live in a manner that even approaches completeness. Every person naturally wants to become all that they are capable of becoming; this desire to realize innate possibilities is inherent in human nature; we cannot help wanting to be all that we can be. Success in life is becoming what you want to be; you can become what you want to be only by making use of things, and you can have the free use of things only as you become rich enough to buy them. To understand the science of getting rich is therefore the most essential of all knowledge.

There is nothing wrong in wanting to get rich. The desire for riches is really the desire for a richer, fuller, and more abundant life; and that desire is praise worthy. The man who does not desire to live more abundantly is abnormal, and so the man who does not desire to have money enough to buy all he wants is abnormal.

There are three motives for which we live; we live for the body, we live for the mind, we live for the soul. No one of these is better or holier than the other; all are alike desirable, and no one of the three—body, mind, or soul—can live fully if either of the others is cut short of full life and expression. It is not right or noble to live only for the soul and deny mind or body; and it is wrong to live for the intellect and deny body or soul.

We are all acquainted with the loathsome consequences of living for the body and denying both mind and soul; and we see that real life means the complete expression of all that man can give forth through body, mind, and soul. Whatever he can say, no man can be really happy or satisfied unless his body is living fully in every function, and unless the same is true of his mind and his soul. Wherever there is unexpressed possibility, or function not performed, there is unsatisfied desire. Desire is possibility seeking expression, or function seeking performance.

Man cannot live fully in body without good food, comfortable clothing, and warm shelter; and without freedom from excessive toil. Rest and recreation are also necessary to his physical life .

He cannot live fully in mind without books and time to study them, without opportunity for travel and observation, or without intellectual companionship.

To live fully in mind he must have intellectual recreations, and must surround himself with all the objects of art and beauty he is capable of using and appreciating.

To live fully in soul, man must have love; and love is denied expression by poverty.

A man's highest happiness is found in the bestowal of benefits on those he loves; love finds its most natural and spontaneous expression in giving. The man who has nothing to give cannot fill his place as a husband or father, as a citizen, or as a man. It is in the use of material things that a man finds full life for his body, develops his mind, and unfolds his soul. It is therefore of supreme importance to him that he should be rich.

It is perfectly right that you should desire to be rich; if you are a normal man or woman you cannot help doing so. It is perfectly right that you should give your best attention to the Science of Getting Rich, for it is the noblest and most necessary of all studies. If you neglect this study, you are derelict in your duty to yourself, to God and humanity; for you can render to God and humanity no greater service than to make the most of yourself.

CHAPTER 2 There is A Science of Getting Rich

THERE is a Science of getting rich, and it is an exact science, like algebra or arithmetic. There are certain laws which govern the process of acquiring riches; once these laws are learned and obeyed by any man, he will get rich with mathematical certainty.

The ownership of money and property comes as a result of doing things in a certain way; those who do things in this Certain Way, whether on purpose or accidentally, get rich; while those who do not do things in this Certain Way, no matter how hard they work or how able they are, remain poor.

It is a natural law that like causes always produce like effects; and, therefore, any man or woman who learns to do things in this certain way will infallibly get rich.

That the above statement is true is shown by the following facts:

Getting rich is not a matter of environment, for, if it were, all the people in certain neighborhoods would become wealthy; the people of one city would all be rich, while those of other towns would all be poor; or the inhabitants of one state would roll in wealth, while those of an adjoining state would be in poverty.

But everywhere we see rich and poor living side by side, in the same environment, and often engaged in the same vocations. When two men are in the same locality, and in the same business, and one gets rich while the other remains poor, it shows that getting rich is not, primarily, a matter of environment. Some environments may be more favorable than others, but when two men in the same business are in the same neighborhood, and one gets rich while the other fails, it indicates that getting rich is the result of doing things in a Certain Way.

And further, the ability to do things in this certain way is not due solely to the possession of talent, for many people who have great talent remain poor, while other who have very little talent get rich.

Studying the people who have got rich, we find that they are an average lot in all respects, having no greater talents and abilities than other men. It is evident that they do not get rich because they possess talents and abilities that other men have not, but because they happen to do things in a Certain Way.

Getting rich is not the result of saving, or "thrift"; many very penurious people are poor, while free spenders often get rich.

Nor is getting rich due to doing things which others fail to do; for two men in the same business often do almost exactly the same things, and one gets rich while the other remains poor or becomes bankrupt.

From all these things, we must come to the conclusion that getting rich is the result of doing things in a Certain Way.

If getting rich is the result of doing things in a Certain Way, and if like causes always produce like effects, then any man or woman who can do things in that way can become rich, and the whole matter is brought within the domain of exact science.

The question arises here, whether this Certain Way may not be so difficult that only a few may follow it. This cannot be true, as we have seen, so far as natural ability is concerned. Talented people get rich, and blockheads get rich; intellectually brilliant people get rich, and very stupid people get rich; physically strong people get rich, and weak and sickly people get rich.

Some degree of ability to think and understand is, of course, essential; but in so far natural ability is concerned, any man or woman who has sense enough to read and understand these words can certainly get rich.

Also, we have seen that it is not a matter of environment. Location counts for something; one would not go to the heart of the Sahara and expect to do successful business.

Getting rich involves the necessity of dealing with men, and of being where there are people to deal with; and if these people are inclined to deal in the way you want to deal, so much the better. But that is about as far as environment goes.

If anybody else in your town can get rich, so can you; and if anybody else in your state can get rich, so can you.

Again, it is not a matter of choosing some particular business or profession. People get rich in every business, and in every profession; while their next door neighbors in the same vocation remain in poverty.

It is true that you will do best in a business which you like, and which is congenial to you; and if you have certain talents which are well developed, you will do best in a business which calls for the exercise of those talents.

Also, you will do best in a business which is suited to your locality; an ice-cream parlor would do better in a warm climate than in Greenland, and a salmon fishery will succeed better in the Northwest than in Florida, where there are no salmon.

But, aside from these general limitations, getting rich is not dependent upon your engaging in some particular business, but upon your learning to do things in a Certain Way. If you are now in business, and anybody else in your locality is getting rich in the same business, while you are not getting rich, it is because you are not doing things in the same Way that the other person is doing them.

No one is prevented from getting rich by lack of capital. True, as you get capital the increase becomes more easy and rapid; but one who has capital is already rich, and does not need to consider how to become so. No matter how poor you may be, if you begin to do things in the Certain Way you will begin to get rich; and you will begin to have capital. The getting of capital is a part of the process of getting rich; and it is a part of the result which invariably follows the doing of things in the Certain Way. You may be the poorest man on the continent, and be deeply in debt; you may have neither friends, influence, nor resources; but if you begin to do things in this way, you must infallibly begin to get rich, for like causes must produce like effects. If you have no capital, you can get capital; if you are in the wrong business, you can get into the right business; if you are in the wrong location, you can go to the right location; and you can do so by beginning in your present business and in your present location to do things in the Certain Way which causes success.

CHAPTER 3 Is Opportunity Monopolized?

NO man is kept poor because opportunity has been taken away from him; because other people have monopolized the wealth, and have put a fence around it. You may be shut off from engaging in business in certain lines, but there are other channels open to you. Probably it would be hard for you to get control of any of the great railroad systems; that field is pretty well monopolized. But the electric railway business is still in its infancy, and offers plenty of scope for enterprise; and it will be but a very few years until traffic and transportation through the air will become a great industry, and in all its branches will give employment to hundreds of thousands, and perhaps to millions, of people. Why not turn your attention to the development of aerial transportation, instead of competing with J.J. Hill and others for a chance in the steam railway world?

It is quite true that if you are a workman in the employ of the steel trust you have very little chance of becoming the owner of the plant in which you work; but it is also true that if you will commence to act in a Certain Way, you can soon leave the employ of the steel trust; you can buy a farm of from ten to forty acres, and engage in business as a producer of foodstuffs. There is great opportunity at this time for men who will live upon small tracts of land and cultivate the same intensively; such men will certainly get rich. You may say that it is impossible for you to get the land, but I am going to prove to you that it is not impossible, and that you can certainly get a farm if you will go to work in a Certain Way.

At different periods the tide of opportunity sets in different directions, according to the needs of the whole, and the particular stage of social evolution which has been reached. At present, in America, it is setting toward agriculture and the allied industries and professions. Today, opportunity is open before the factory worker in his line. It is open before the business man who supplies the farmer more than before the one who supplies the factory worker; and before the professional man who waits upon the farmer more than before the one who serves the working class.

There is abundance of opportunity for the man who will go with the tide, instead of trying to swim against it.

So the factory workers, either as individuals or as a class, are not deprived of opportunity. The workers are not being "kept down" by their masters; they are not being "ground" by the trusts and combinations of capital. As a class, they are where they are because they do not do things in a Certain Way. If the workers of America chose to do so, they could follow the example of their brothers in Belgium and other countries, and establish great department stores and co-operative industries; they could elect men of their own class to office, and pass laws favoring the development of such co-operative industries; and in a few years they could take peaceable possession of the industrial field.

The working class may become the master class whenever they will begin to do things in a Certain Way; the law of wealth is the same for them as it is for all others. This they must learn; and they will remain where they are as long as they continue to do as they do. The individual worker, however, is not held down by the ignorance or the mental slothfulness of his class; he can follow the tide of opportunity to riches, and this book will tell him how.

No one is kept in poverty by a shortness in the supply of riches; there is more than enough for all. A palace as large as the capitol at Washington might be built for every family on earth from the building material in the United States alone; and under intensive cultivation, this country would produce wool, cotton, linen, and silk enough to cloth each person in the world finer than Solomon was arrayed in all his glory; together with food enough to feed them all luxuriously.

The visible supply is practically inexhaustible; and the invisible supply really IS inexhaustible.

Everything you see on earth is made from one original substance, out of which all things proceed.

New Forms are constantly being made, and older ones are dissolving; but all are shapes assumed by One Thing.

There is no limit to the supply of Formless Stuff, or Original Substance. The universe is made out of it; but it was not all used in making the universe. The spaces in, through, and between the forms of the visible universe are permeated and filled with the Original Substance; with the formless Stuff; with the raw material of all things. Ten thousand times as much as has been made might still be made, and even then we should not have exhausted the supply of universal raw material.

No man, therefore, is poor because nature is poor, or because there is not enough to go around.

Nature is an inexhaustible storehouse of riches; the supply will never run short. Original Substance is alive with creative energy, and is constantly producing more forms. When the supply of building material is exhausted, more will be produced; when the soil is exhausted so that food stuffs and materials for clothing will no longer grow upon it, it will be renewed or more soil will be made. When all the gold and silver has been dug from the earth, if man is still in such a stage of social development that he needs gold and silver, more will produced from the Formless. The Formless Stuff responds to the needs of man; it will not let him be without any good thing.

This is true of man collectively; the race as a whole is always abundantly rich, and if individuals are poor, it is because they do not follow the Certain Way of doing things which makes the individual man rich.

The Formless Stuff is intelligent; it is stuff which thinks. It is alive, and is always impelled toward more life.

It is the natural and inherent impulse of life to seek to live more; it is the nature of intelligence to enlarge itself, and of consciousness to seek to extend its boundaries and find fuller expression. The universe of forms has been made by Formless Living Substance, throwing itself into form in order to express itself more fully.

The universe is a great Living Presence, always moving inherently toward more life and fuller functioning.

Nature is formed for the advancement of life; its impelling motive is the increase of life. For this cause, everything which can possibly minister to life is bountifully provided; there can be no lack unless God is to contradict himself and nullify his own works.

You are not kept poor by lack in the supply of riches; it is a fact which I shall demonstrate a little farther on that even the resources of the Formless Supply are at the command of the man or woman will act and think in a Certain Way.

CHAPTER 4 The First Principle in The Science of Getting Rich

THOUGHT is the only power which can produce tangible riches from the Formless Substance. The stuff from which all things are made is a substance which thinks, and a thought of form in this substance produces the form.

Original Substance moves according to its thoughts; every form and process you see in nature is the visible expression of a thought in Original Substance. As the Formless Stuff thinks of a form, it takes that form; as it thinks of a motion, it makes that motion. That is the way all things were created. We live in a thought world, which is part of a thought universe. The thought of a moving universe extended throughout Formless Substance, and the Thinking Stuff moving according to that thought, took the form of systems of planets, and maintains that form. Thinking Substance takes the form of its thought, and moves according to the thought. Holding the idea of a circling system of suns and worlds, it takes the form of these bodies, and moves them as it thinks. Thinking the form of a slow-growing oak tree, it moves accordingly, and produces the tree, though centuries may be required to do the work. In creating, the Formless seems to move according to the lines of motion it has established; the thought of an oak tree does not cause the instant formation of a full-grown tree, but it does start in motion the forces which will produce the tree, along established lines of growth.

Every thought of form, held in thinking Substance, causes the creation of the form, but always, or at least generally, along lines of growth and action already established.

The thought of a house of a certain construction, if it were impressed upon Formless Substance, might not cause the instant formation, of the house; but it would cause the turning of creative energies already working in trade and commerce into such channels as to result in the speedy building of the house. And if there were no existing channels through which the creative energy could work, then the house would be formed directly from primal substance, without waiting for the slow processes of the organic and inorganic world.

No thought of form can be impressed upon Original Substance without causing the creation of the form.

Man is a thinking center, and can originate thought. All the forms that man fashions with his hands must first exist in his thought; he cannot shape a thing until he has thought that thing.

And so far man has confined his efforts wholly to the work of his hands; he has applied manual labor to the world of forms, seeking to change or modify those already existing. He has never thought of trying to cause the creation of new forms by impressing his thoughts upon Formless Substance.

When man has a thought-force, he takes material from the forms of nature, and makes an image of the form which is in his mind. He has, so far, made little or no effort to co-operate with Formless Intelligence; to work "with the Father." He has not dreamed that he can "do what he Seth the Father doing." Man reshapes and modifies existing forms by manual labor; he has given no attention to the question whether he may not produce things from Formless Substance by communicating his thoughts to it. We propose to prove that he may do so; to prove that any man or woman may do so, and to show how. As our first step, we must lay down three fundamental propositions.

First, we assert that there is one original formless stuff, or substance, from which all things are made. All the seemingly many elements are but different presentations of one element; all the many forms found in organic and inorganic nature are but different shapes, made from the same stuff. And this stuff is thinking stuff; a thought held in it produces the form of the thought. Thought, in thinking substance, produces shapes. Man is a thinking center, capable of original thought; if man can communicate his thought to original thinking substance, he can cause the creation, or formation, of the thing he thinks about. To summarize this:-

There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which, in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interstices of the universe.

A thought, in this substance, Produces the thing that is imaged by the thought.

Man can form things in his thought, and, by impressing his thought upon formless substance, can cause the thing he thinks about to be created.

It may be asked if I can prove these statements; and without going into details, I answer that I can do so, both by logic and experience.

Reasoning back from the phenomena of form and thought, I come to one original thinking substance; and reasoning forward from this thinking substance, I come to man's power to cause the formation of the thing he thinks about.

And by experiment, I find the reasoning true; and this is my strongest proof.

If one man who reads this book gets rich by doing what it tells him to do, that is evidence in support of my claim; but if every man who does what it tells him to do gets rich, that is positive proof until some one goes through the process and fails. The theory is true until the process fails; and this process will not fail, for every man who does exactly what this book tells him to do will get rich.

I have said that men get rich by doing things in a Certain Way; and in order to do so, men must become able to think in a certain way.

A man's way of doing things is the direct result of the way he thinks about things.

To do things in a way you want to do them, you will have to acquire the ability to think the way you want to think; this is the first step toward getting rich.

To think what you want to think is to think TRUTH, regardless of appearances.