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Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).



Additional Transcriber’s Notes are at the end.



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[Illustration: WALLACE D. WATTLES.]



       *       *       *       *       *









THE SCIENCE OF GETTING RICH





  BY

  W. D. WATTLES

  Author of “New Science of Living

  and Healing.”



  PRICE, $1.00



  PUBLISHED BY

  ELIZABETH TOWNE

  HOLYOKE, MASS.

  1910



       *       *       *       *       *



  COPYRIGHT, APRIL 1, 1910

  BY

  WALLACE D. WATTLES









CONTENTS





                                                          PAGE



     I. THE RIGHT TO BE RICH                                 9



    II. THERE IS A SCIENCE OF GETTING RICH                  15



   III. IS OPPORTUNITY MONOPOLIZED                          23



    IV. THE FIRST PRINCIPLE IN THE SCIENCE OF GETTING RICH  31



     V. INCREASING LIFE                                     42



    VI. HOW RICHES COME TO YOU                              53



   VII. GRATITUDE                                           63



  VIII. THINKING IN A CERTAIN WAY                           71



    IX. HOW TO USE THE WILL                                 80



     X. FURTHER USE OF THE WILL                             89



    XI. ACTING IN THE CERTAIN WAY                           99



   XII. EFFICIENT ACTION                                   110



  XIII. GETTING INTO THE RIGHT BUSINESS                    119



   XIV. THE IMPRESSION OF INCREASE                         127



    XV. THE ADVANCING MAN                                  135



   XVI. SOME CAUTIONS, AND CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS         143



  XVII. SUMMARY OF THE SCIENCE OF GETTING RICH             152









PREFACE.





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 is advised

to read Hegel and Emerson; and he will do well to read “The Eternal

News,” a very excellent pamphlet published by J. J. Brown, 300 Cathcart

Road, Govanhill, Glasgow, Scotland. He may also find some help in a

series of articles written by the author, which were published in

_Nautilus_ (Holyoke, Mass.) during the spring and summer of 1909, under

the title “What is Truth?”



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 I. 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.



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 he is 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 praiseworthy. 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, and 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 and 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 may 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.



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 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 to humanity; for you can render God and humanity no greater service

than to make the most of yourself.









CHAPTER II. 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 others 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 a 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 as 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 III. 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. To-day, opportunity is open before the farmer in his

line more than 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

clothe 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

foodstuffs 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 be 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 who will

act and think in a Certain Way.









CHAPTER IV. 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-form, 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

seeth the Father doing.” Man re-shapes 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 interspaces

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 the 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._



Every man has the natural and inherent power to think what he wants to

think, but it requires far more effort to do so than it does to think

the thoughts which are suggested by appearances. To think according

to appearances is easy; to think truth regardless of appearances is

laborious, and requires the expenditure of more power than any other

work man is called upon to perform.



There is no labor from which most people shrink as they do from that

of sustained and consecutive thought; it is the hardest work in the

world. This is especially true when truth is contrary to appearances.

Every appearance in the visible world tends to produce a corresponding

form in the mind which observes it; and this can only be prevented by

holding the thought of the TRUTH.



To look upon the appearance of disease will produce the form of disease

in your own mind, and ultimately in your body, unless you hold the

thought of the truth, which is that there is no disease; it is only an

appearance, and the reality is health.



To look upon the appearances of poverty will produce corresponding

forms in your own mind, unless you hold to the truth that there is no

poverty; there is only abundance.



To think health when surrounded by the appearances of disease, or to

think riches when in the midst of appearances of poverty, requires

power; but he who acquires this power becomes a MASTER MIND. He can

conquer fate; he can have what he wants.



This power can only be acquired by getting hold of the basic fact which

is behind all appearances; and that fact is that there is one Thinking

Substance, from which and by which all things are made.



Then we must grasp the truth that every thought held in this substance

becomes a form, and that man can so impress his thoughts upon It as to

cause them to take form and become visible things.



When we realize this, we lose all doubt and fear, for we know that we

can create what we want to create; we can get what we want to have, and

can become what we want to be. As a first step toward getting rich, you

must believe the three fundamental statements given previously in this

chapter; and in order to emphasize them, I repeat them here:--



_There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which,

in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces

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._



You must lay aside all other concepts of the universe than this

monistic one; and you must dwell upon this until it is fixed in

your mind, and has become your habitual thought. Read these creed

statements over and over again; fix every word upon your memory, and

meditate upon them until you firmly believe what they say. If a doubt

comes to you, cast it aside as a sin. Do not listen to arguments

against this idea; do not go to churches or lectures where a contrary

concept of things is taught or preached. Do not read magazines or books

which teach a different idea; if you get mixed up in your faith, all

your efforts will be in vain.



Do not ask why these things are true, nor speculate as to how they can

be true; simply take them on trust.



The science of getting rich begins with the absolute acceptance of this

faith.









CHAPTER V. INCREASING LIFE.





You must get rid of the last vestige of the old idea that there is a

Deity whose will it is that you should be poor, or whose purposes may

be served by keeping you in poverty.



The Intelligent Substance which is All, and in all, and which lives

in All and lives in you, is a consciously Living Substance. Being a

consciously living substance, It must have the natural and inherent

desire of every living intelligence for increase of life. Every living

thing must continually seek for the enlargement of its life, because

life, in the mere act of living, must increase itself.



A seed, dropped into the ground, springs into activity, and in the act

of living produces a hundred more seeds; life, by living, multiplies

itself. It is forever Becoming More; it must do so, if it continues to

be at all.



Intelligence is under this same necessity for continuous increase.

Every thought we think makes it necessary for us to think another

thought; consciousness is continually expanding. Every fact we learn

leads us to the learning of another fact; knowledge is continually

increasing. Every talent we cultivate brings to the mind the desire to

cultivate another talent; we are subject to the urge of life, seeking

expression, which ever drives us on to know more, to do more, and to be

more.



In order to know more, do more, and be more we must have more; we must

have things to use, for we learn, and do, and become, only by using

things. We must get rich, so that we can live more.



The desire for riches is simply the capacity for larger life seeking

fulfillment; every desire is the effort of an unexpressed possibility

to come into action. It is power seeking to manifest which causes

desire. That which makes you want more money is the same as that which

makes the plant grow; it is Life, seeking fuller expression.



The One Living Substance must be subject to this inherent law of all

life; it is permeated with the desire to live more; that is why it is

under the necessity of creating things.



The One Substance desires to live more in you; hence it wants you to

have all the things you can use.



It is the desire of God that you should get rich. He wants you to get

rich because he can express himself better through you if you have

plenty of things to use in giving him expression. He can live more in

you if you have unlimited command of the means of life.



The universe desires you to have everything you want to have.



Nature is friendly to your plans.



Everything is naturally for you.



Make up your mind that this is true.



It is essential, however, that _your purpose should harmonize with the

purpose that is in All_.



You must want real life, not mere pleasure or sensual gratification.

Life is the performance of function; and the individual really lives

only when he performs every function, physical, mental, and spiritual,

of which he is capable, without excess in any.



You do not want to get rich in order to live swinishly, for the

gratification of animal desires; that is not life. But the performance

of every physical function is a part of life, and no one lives

completely who denies the impulses of the body a normal and healthful

expression.



You do not want to get rich solely to enjoy mental pleasures, to get

knowledge, to gratify ambition, to outshine others, to be famous. All

these are a legitimate part of life, but the man who lives for the

pleasures of the intellect alone will only have a partial life, and he

will never be satisfied with his lot.



You do not want to get rich solely for the good of others, to lose

yourself for the salvation of mankind, to experience the joys of

philanthropy and sacrifice. The joys of the soul are only a part of

life; and they are no better or nobler than any other part.



You want to get rich in order that you may eat, drink, and be merry

when it is time to do these things; in order that you may surround

yourself with beautiful things, see distant lands, feed your mind, and

develop your intellect; in order that you may love men and do kind

things, and be able to play a good part in helping the world to find

truth.



But remember that extreme altruism is no better and no nobler than

extreme selfishness; both are mistakes.



Get rid of the idea that God wants you to sacrifice yourself for

others, and that you can secure his favor by doing so; God requires

nothing of the kind.



What he wants is that you should make the most of yourself, for

yourself, and for others; and _you can help others more by making the

most of yourself than in any other way_.



You can make the most of yourself only by getting rich; so it is right

and praiseworthy that you should give your first and best thought to

the work of acquiring wealth.



Remember, however, that the desire of Substance is for all, and its

movements must be for more life to all; it cannot be made to work for

less life to any, because it is equally in all, seeking riches and life.



Intelligent Substance will make things for you, but it will not take

things away from some one else and give them to you.



You must get rid of the thought of competition. You are to create, not

to compete for what is already created.



You do not have to take anything away from any one.



You do not have to drive sharp bargains.



You do not have to cheat, or to take advantage. You do not need to let

any man work for you for less than he earns.



You do not have to covet the property of others, or to look at it with

wishful eyes; no man has anything of which you cannot have the like,

and that without taking what he has away from him.



You are to become a creator, not a competitor; you are going to get

what you want, but in such a way that when you get it every other man

will have more than he has now.



I am aware that there are men who get a vast amount of money by

proceeding in direct opposition to the statements in the paragraph

above, and may add a word of explanation here. Men of the plutocratic

type, who become very rich, do so sometimes purely by their

extraordinary ability on the plane of competition; and sometimes

they unconsciously relate themselves to Substance in its great

purposes and movements for the general racial upbuilding through

industrial evolution. Rockefeller, Carnegie, Morgan, _et al._, have

been the unconscious agents of the Supreme in the necessary work of

systematizing and organizing productive industry; and in the end, their

work will contribute immensely toward increased life for all. Their

day is nearly over; they have organized production, and _will soon

be succeeded by the agents of the multitude, who will organize the

machinery of distribution_.



The multi-millionaires are like the monster reptiles of the prehistoric

eras; they play a necessary part in the evolutionary process, but the

same Power which produced them will dispose of them. And it is well to

bear in mind that they have never been really rich; a record of the

private lives of most of this class will show that they have really

been the most abject and wretched of the poor.



Riches secured on the competitive plane are never satisfactory and

permanent; they are yours to-day, and another’s to-morrow. Remember, if

you are to become rich in a scientific and certain way, you must rise

entirely out of the competitive thought. You must never think for a

moment that the supply is limited. Just as soon as you begin to think

that all the money is being “cornered” and controlled by bankers and

others, and that you must exert yourself to get laws passed to stop

this process, and so on; in that moment you drop into the competitive

mind, and your power to cause creation is gone for the time being; and

what is worse, you will probably arrest the creative movements you have

already instituted.



KNOW that there are countless millions of dollars’ worth of gold in the

mountains of the earth, not yet brought to light; and know that if

there were not, more would be created from Thinking Substance to supply

your needs.



KNOW that the money you need will come, even if it is necessary for a

thousand men to be led to the discovery of new gold mines to-morrow.



_Never look at the visible supply; look always at the limitless riches

in Formless Substance, and KNOW that they are coming to you as fast as

you can receive and use them._ Nobody, by cornering the visible supply,

can prevent you from getting what is yours.



So never allow yourself to think for an instant that all the best

building spots will be taken before you get ready to build your house,

unless you hurry. Never worry about the trusts and combines, and get

anxious for fear they will soon come to own the whole earth. Never

get afraid that you will lose what you want because some other person

“beats you to it.” That cannot possibly happen; you are not seeking

anything that is possessed by anybody else; you are causing what you

want to be created from Formless Substance, and the supply is without

limits. Stick to the formulated statement:--



_There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which,

in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces

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._









CHAPTER VI. HOW RICHES COME TO YOU.





When I say that you do not have to drive sharp bargains, I do not mean

that you do not have to drive any bargains at all, or that you are

above the necessity for having any dealings with your fellow men. I

mean that you will not need to deal with them unfairly; you do not have

to get something for nothing, _but can give to every man more than you

take from him_.



You cannot give every man more in cash market value than you take

from him, but you can give him more in use value than the cash value

of the thing you take from him. The paper, ink, and other material in

this book may not be worth the money you paid for it; but if the ideas

suggested by it bring you thousands of dollars, you have not been

wronged by those who sold it to you; they have given you a great use

value for a small cash value.



Let us suppose that I own a picture by one of the great artists, which,

in any civilized community, is worth thousands of dollars. I take it to

Baffin Bay, and by “salesmanship” induce an Eskimo to give a bundle of

furs worth $500 for it. I have really wronged him, for he has no use

for the picture; it has no use value to him; it will not add to his

life.



But suppose I give him a gun worth $50 for his furs; then he has made

a good bargain. He has use for the gun; it will get him many more furs

and much food; it will add to his life in every way; it will make him

rich.



When you rise from the competitive to the creative plane, you can scan

your business transactions very strictly, and if you are selling any

man anything which does not add more to his life than the thing he

gives you in exchange, you can afford to stop it. You do not have to

beat anybody in business. And if you are in a business which does beat

people, get out of it at once.



Give every man more in use value than you take from him in cash

value; then you are adding to the life of the world by every business

transaction.



If you have people working for you, you must take from them more in

cash value than you pay them in wages; but _you can so organize your

business that it will be filled with the principle of advancement_, and

so that each employee who wishes to do so may advance a little every

day.



You can make your business do for your employees what this book is

doing for you. You can so conduct your business that it will be a sort

of ladder, by which every employee who will take the trouble may climb

to riches himself; and given the opportunity, if he will not do so it

is not your fault.



And finally, because you are to cause the creation of your riches from

Formless Substance which permeates all your environment, it does not

follow that they are to take shape from the atmosphere and come into

being before your eyes.



If you want a sewing machine, for instance, I do not mean to tell you

that you are to impress the thought of a sewing machine on Thinking

Substance until the machine is formed without hands, in the room where

you sit, or elsewhere. But if you want a sewing machine, hold the

mental image of it with the most positive certainty that it is being

made, or is on its way to you. After once forming the thought, have

the most absolute and unquestioning faith that the sewing machine is

coming; never think of it, or speak of it, in any other way than as

being sure to arrive. Claim it as already yours.



It will be brought to you by the power of the Supreme Intelligence,

acting upon the minds of men. If you live in Maine, it may be that a

man will be brought from Texas or Japan to engage in some transaction

which will result in your getting what you want.



If so, the whole matter will be as much to that man’s advantage as it

is to yours.



Do not forget for a moment that the Thinking Substance is through all,

in all, communicating with all, and can influence all. The desire of

Thinking Substance for fuller life and better living has caused the

creation of all the sewing machines already made; and it can cause the

creation of millions more, and will, whenever men set it in motion by

desire and faith, and by acting in a Certain Way.



You can certainly have a sewing machine in your house; and it is just

as certain that you can have any other thing or things which you want,

and which you will use for the advancement of your own life and the

lives of others.



You need not hesitate about asking largely; “it is your Father’s

pleasure to give you the kingdom,” said Jesus.



Original Substance wants to live all that is possible in you, and wants

you to have all that you can or will use for the living of the most

abundant life.



If you fix upon your consciousness the fact that the desire you feel

for the possession of riches is one with the desire of Omnipotence for

more complete expression, your faith becomes invincible.



Once I saw a little boy sitting at a piano, and vainly trying to bring

harmony out of the keys; and I saw that he was grieved and provoked

by his inability to play real music. I asked him the cause of his

vexation, and he answered, “I can feel the music in me, but I can’t

make my hands go right.” The music in him was the URGE of Original

Substance, containing all the possibilities of all life; all that there

is of music was seeking expression through the child.



God, the One Substance, is trying to live and do and enjoy things

through humanity. He is saying, “I want hands to build wonderful

structures, to play divine harmonies, to paint glorious pictures; I

want feet to run my errands, eyes to see my beauties, tongues to tell

mighty truths and to sing marvelous songs,” and so on.



All that there is of possibility is seeking expression through men.

God wants those who can play music to have pianos and every other

instrument, and to have the means to cultivate their talents to the

fullest extent; He wants those who can appreciate beauty to be able

to surround themselves with beautiful things; He wants those who can

discern truth to have every opportunity to travel and observe; He wants

those who can appreciate dress to be beautifully clothed, and those who

can appreciate good food to be luxuriously fed.



He wants all these things because it is Himself that enjoys and

appreciates them; it is God who wants to play, and sing, and enjoy

beauty, and proclaim truth, and wear fine clothes, and eat good foods.



“It is God that worketh in you to will and to do,” said Paul.



The desire you feel for riches is the Infinite, seeking to express

Himself in you as He sought to find expression in the little boy at the

piano.



So you need not hesitate to ask largely.



Your part is to focalize and express the desires of God.



This is a difficult point with most people; they retain something of

the old idea that poverty and self-sacrifice are pleasing to God. They

look upon poverty as a part of the plan, a necessity of nature. They

have the idea that God has finished His work, and made all that He

can make, and that the majority of men must stay poor because there

is not enough to go around. They hold to so much of this erroneous

thought that they feel ashamed to ask for wealth; they try not to want

more than a very modest competence, just enough to make them fairly

comfortable.



I recall now the case of one student who was told that he must get in

mind a clear picture of the things he desired, so that the creative

thought of them might be impressed on Formless Substance. He was a very

poor man, living in a rented house, and having only what he earned

from day to day; and he could not grasp the fact that all wealth was

his. So, after thinking the matter over, he decided that he might

reasonably ask for a new rug for the floor of his best room, and an

anthracite coal stove to heat the house during the cold weather.

Following the instructions given in this book, he obtained these things

in a few months; and then it dawned upon him that he had not asked

enough. He went through the house in which he lived, and planned all

the improvements he would like to make in it; he mentally added a bay

window here and a room there, until it was complete in his mind as his

ideal home; and then he planned its furnishings.



Holding the whole picture in his mind, he began living in the Certain

Way, and moving toward what he wanted; and he owns the house now, and

is rebuilding it after the form of his mental image. And now, with

still larger faith, he is going on to get greater things. It has been

unto him according to his faith, and it is so with you and with all of

us.









CHAPTER VII. GRATITUDE.





The illustrations given in the last chapter will have conveyed to the

reader the fact that the first step toward getting rich is to convey

the idea of your wants to the Formless Substance.



This is true, and you will see that in order to do so it becomes

necessary to relate yourself to the Formless Intelligence in a

harmonious way.



To secure this harmonious relation is a matter of such primary and

vital importance that I shall give some space to its discussion here,

and give you instructions which, if you will follow them, will be

certain to bring you into perfect unity of mind with God.



The whole process of mental adjustment and atonement can be summed up

in one word, _gratitude_.



First, you believe that there is one Intelligent Substance, from which

all things proceed; second, you believe that this Substance gives

you everything you desire; and third, you relate yourself to It by a

feeling of deep and profound gratitude.



Many people who order their lives rightly in all other ways are kept

in poverty by their lack of gratitude. Having received one gift from

God, they cut the wires which connect them with Him by failing to make

acknowledgment.



It is easy to understand that the nearer we live to the source of

wealth, the more wealth we shall receive; and it is easy also to

understand that the soul that is always grateful lives in closer

touch with God than the one which never looks to Him in thankful

acknowledgment.



The more gratefully we fix our minds on the Supreme when good things

come to us, the more good things we will receive, and the more rapidly

they will come; and the reason simply is that the mental attitude of

gratitude draws the mind into closer touch with the source from which

the blessings come.



If it is a new thought to you that gratitude brings your whole mind

into closer harmony with the creative energies of the universe,

consider it well, and you will see that it is true. The good things you

already have have come to you along the line of obedience to certain

laws. Gratitude will lead your mind out along the ways by which things

come; and it will keep you in close harmony with creative thought and

prevent you from falling into competitive thought.



Gratitude alone can keep you looking toward the All, and prevent you

from falling into the error of thinking of the supply as limited; and

to do that would be fatal to your hopes.



There is a Law of Gratitude, and it is absolutely necessary that you

should observe the law, if you are to get the results you seek.



The law of gratitude is the natural principle that action and reaction

are always equal, and in opposite directions.



The grateful outreaching of your mind in thankful praise to the Supreme

_is a liberation or expenditure of force; it cannot fail to reach that

to which it is addressed, and the reaction is an instantaneous movement

toward you_.



“Draw nigh unto God, and He will draw nigh unto you.” That is a

statement of psychological truth.



And if your gratitude is strong and constant, the reaction in Formless

Substance will be strong and continuous; the movement of the things you

want will be always toward you. Notice the grateful attitude that Jesus

took; how He always seems to be saying, “I thank Thee, Father, that

Thou hearest me.” You cannot exercise much power without gratitude;

for it is gratitude that keeps you connected with Power.



But the value of gratitude does not consist solely in getting you more

blessings in the future. Without gratitude you cannot long keep from

dissatisfied thought regarding things as they are.



The moment you permit your mind to dwell with dissatisfaction upon

things as they are, you begin to lose ground. You fix attention upon

the common, the ordinary, the poor, and the squalid and mean; and your

mind takes the form of these things. Then you will transmit these

forms or mental images to the Formless, and the common, the poor, the

squalid, and mean will come to you.



To permit your mind to dwell upon the inferior is to become inferior

and to surround yourself with inferior things.



On the other hand, to fix your attention on the best is to surround

yourself with the best, and to become the best.



The Creative Power within us makes us into the image of that to which

we give our attention.



We are Thinking Substance, and thinking substance always takes the form

of that which it thinks about.



The grateful mind is constantly fixed upon the best; therefore it tends

to become the best; it takes the form or character of the best, and

will receive the best.



Also, faith is born of gratitude. The grateful mind continually expects

good things, and expectation becomes faith. The reaction of gratitude

upon one’s own mind produces faith; and every outgoing wave of grateful

thanksgiving increases faith. He who has no feeling of gratitude cannot

long retain a living faith; and without a living faith you cannot get

rich by the creative method, as we shall see in the following chapters.



It is necessary, then, to cultivate the habit of being grateful for

every good thing that comes to you; and to give thanks continuously.



And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should

include all things in your gratitude.



Do not waste time thinking or talking about the shortcomings or wrong

actions of plutocrats or trust magnates. Their organization of the

world has made your opportunity; all you get really comes to you

because of them.



Do not rage against corrupt politicians; if it were not for politicians

we should fall into anarchy, and your opportunity would be greatly

lessened.



God has worked a long time and very patiently to bring us up to where

we are in industry and government, and He is going right on with

His work. There is not the least doubt that He will do away with

plutocrats, trust magnates, captains of industry, and politicians as

soon as they can be spared; but in the meantime, behold they are all

very good. Remember that they are all helping to arrange the lines of

transmission along which your riches will come to you, and be grateful

to them all. This will bring you into harmonious relations with the

good in everything, and the good in everything will move toward you.









CHAPTER VIII. THINKING IN THE CERTAIN WAY.





Turn back to chapter VI., and read again the story of the man who

formed a mental image of his house, and you will get a fair idea of the

initial step toward getting rich. You must form a clear and definite

mental picture of what you want; you cannot transmit an idea unless you

have it yourself.



You must have it before you can give it; and many people fail to

impress Thinking Substance because they have themselves only a vague

and misty concept of the things they want to do, to have, or to become.



It is not enough that you should have a general desire for wealth “to

do good with”; everybody has that desire.



It is not enough that you should have a wish to travel, see things,

live more, etc. Everybody has those desires also. If you were going to

send a wireless message to a friend, you would not send the letters

of the alphabet in their order, and let him construct the message for

himself; nor would you take words at random from the dictionary. You

would send a coherent sentence; one which meant something. When you try

to impress your wants upon Substance, remember that it must be done by

a coherent statement; you must know what you want, and be definite.



You can never get rich, or start the creative power into action, by

sending out unformed longings and vague desires.



Go over your desires just as the man I have described went over his

house; see just what you want, and get a clear mental picture of it as

you wish it to look when you get it.



That clear mental picture you must have continually in mind, as the

sailor has in mind the port toward which he is sailing the ship; you

must keep your face toward it all the time. You must no more lose sight

of it than the steersman loses sight of the compass.



It is not necessary to take exercises in concentration, nor to set

apart special times for prayer and affirmation, nor to “go into the

silence,” nor to do occult stunts of any kind. These things are well

enough, but all you need is to know what you want, and to want it badly

enough so that it will stay in your thoughts.



Spend as much of your leisure time as you can in contemplating your

picture, but no one needs to take exercises to concentrate his mind on

a thing which he really wants; it is the things you do not really care

about which require effort to fix your attention upon them.



And unless you really want to get rich, so that the desire is strong

enough to hold your thoughts directed to the purpose as the magnetic

pole holds the needle of the compass, it will hardly be worth while for

you to try to carry out the instructions given in this book.



The methods herein set forth are for people whose desire for riches is

strong enough to overcome mental laziness and the love of ease, and

make them work.



The more clear and definite you make your picture, then, and the

more you dwell upon it, bringing out all its delightful details, the

stronger your desire will be; and the stronger your desire, the easier

it will be to hold your mind fixed upon the picture of what you want.



Something more is necessary, however, than merely to see the picture

clearly. If that is all you do, you are only a dreamer, and will have

little or no power for accomplishment.



Behind your clear vision must be the purpose to realize it; to bring it

out in tangible expression.



And behind this purpose must be an invincible and unwavering FAITH

that the thing is already yours; that it is “at hand” and you have only

to take possession of it.



Live in the new house, mentally, until it takes form around you

physically. In the mental realm, enter at once into full enjoyment of

the things you want.



“Whatsoever things ye ask for when ye pray, believe that ye receive

them, and ye shall have them,” said Jesus.



See the things you want as if they were actually around you all the

time; see yourself as owning and using them. Make use of them in

imagination just as you will use them when they are your tangible

possessions. Dwell upon your mental picture until it is clear and

distinct, and then take the Mental Attitude of Ownership toward

everything in that picture. Take possession of it, in mind, in the full

faith that it is actually yours. Hold to this mental ownership; do not

waver for an instant in the faith that it is real.



And remember what was said in a preceding chapter about gratitude; be

as thankful for it all the time as you expect to be when it has taken

form. The man who can sincerely thank God for the things which as yet

he owns only in imagination, has real faith. He will get rich; he will

cause the creation of whatsoever he wants.



You do not need to pray repeatedly for the things you want; it is not

necessary to tell God about it every day.



“Use not vain repetitions as the heathen do,” said Jesus to His pupils,

“for your Father knoweth that ye have need of these things before ye

ask Him.”



Your part is to intelligently formulate your desire for the things

which make for a larger life, and to get these desires arranged into a

coherent whole; and then to impress this Whole Desire upon the Formless

Substance, which has the power and the will to bring you what you want.



You do not make this impression by repeating strings of words; you make

it by holding the vision with unshakable PURPOSE to attain it, and with

steadfast FAITH that you do attain it.



The answer to prayer is not according to your faith while you are

talking, but according to your faith while you are working.



You cannot impress the mind of God by having a special Sabbath day set

apart to tell Him what you want, and then forgetting Him during the

rest of the week. You cannot impress Him by having special hours to go

into your closet and pray, if you then dismiss the matter from your

mind until the hour of prayer comes again.



Oral prayer is well enough, and has its effect, especially upon

yourself, in clarifying your vision and strengthening your faith; but

it is not your oral petitions which get you what you want. In order to

get rich you do not need a “sweet hour of prayer”; you need to “pray

without ceasing.” And by prayer I mean holding steadily to your vision,

with the purpose to cause its creation into solid form, and the faith

that you are doing so.



“Believe that ye _receive_ them.”



The whole matter turns on receiving, once you have clearly formed

your vision. When you _have_ formed it, it is well to make an oral

statement, addressing the Supreme in reverent prayer; and from that

moment you must, in mind, receive what you ask for. Live in the new

house; wear the fine clothes; ride in the automobile; go on the

journey, and confidently plan for greater journeys. Think and speak of

all the things you have asked for in terms of actual present ownership.

Imagine an environment, and a financial condition exactly as you want

them, and live all the time in that imaginary environment and financial

condition. Mind, however, that you do not do this as a mere dreamer

and castle builder; hold to the FAITH that the imaginary is being

realized, and to the PURPOSE to realize it. Remember that it is faith

and purpose in the use of the imagination which make the difference

between the scientist and the dreamer. And having learned this fact, it

is here that you must learn the proper use of the Will.









CHAPTER IX. HOW TO USE THE WILL.





To set about getting rich in a scientific way, you do not try to apply

your will power to anything outside of yourself.



You have no right to do so, anyway.



It is wrong to apply your will to other men and women, in order to get

them to do what you wish done.



It is as flagrantly wrong to coerce people by mental power as it is to

coerce them by physical power. If compelling people by physical force

to do things for you reduces them to slavery, compelling them by mental

means accomplishes exactly the same thing; the only difference is in

methods. If taking things from people by physical force is robbery,

then taking things by mental force is robbery also; there is no

difference in principle.



You have no right to use your will power upon another person, even “for

his own good”; for you do not know what is for his good.



The science of getting rich does not require you to apply power or

force to any other person, in any way whatsoever. There is not the

slightest necessity for doing so; indeed, any attempt to use your will

upon others will only tend to defeat your purpose.



You do not need to apply your will to things, in order to compel them

to come to you.



That would simply be trying to coerce God, and would be foolish and

useless, as well as irreverent.



You do not have to compel God to give you good things, any more than

you have to use your will power to make the sun rise.



You do not have to use your will power to conquer an unfriendly deity,

or to make stubborn and rebellious forces do your bidding.



Substance is friendly to you, and is more anxious to give you what you

want than you are to get it.



To get rich, you need only to use your will power upon yourself.



When you know what to think and do, then you must use your will

to compel yourself to think and do the right things. That is the

legitimate use of the will in getting what you want--to use it in

holding yourself to the right course. Use your will to keep yourself

thinking and acting in the Certain Way.



Do not try to project your will, or your thoughts, or your mind out

into space, to “act” on things or people.



Keep your mind at home; it can accomplish more there than elsewhere.



Use your mind to form a mental image of what you want, and to hold that

vision with faith and purpose; and use your will to keep your mind

working in the Right Way.



The more steady and continuous your faith and purpose, the more rapidly

you will get rich, because you will make only POSITIVE impressions

upon Substance; and you will not neutralize or offset them by negative

impressions.



The picture of your desires, held with faith and purpose, is taken up

by the Formless, and permeates it to great distances,--throughout the

universe, for all I know.



As this impression spreads, all things are set moving toward its

realization; every living thing, every inanimate thing, and the

things yet uncreated, are stirred toward bringing into being that

which you want. All force begins to be exerted in that direction; all

things begin to move toward you. The minds of people, everywhere, are

influenced toward doing the things necessary to the fulfilling of your

desires; and they work for you, unconsciously.



But you can check all this by starting a negative impression in the

Formless Substance. Doubt or unbelief is as certain to start a

movement away from you as faith and purpose are to start one toward

you. It is by not understanding this that most people who try to make

use of “mental science” in getting rich make their failure. Every hour

and moment you spend in giving heed to doubts and fears, every hour you

spend in worry, every hour in which your soul is possessed by unbelief,

sets a current away from you in the whole domain of intelligent

Substance. All the promises are unto them that believe, and unto them

only. Notice how insistent Jesus was upon this point of belief; and now

you know the reason why.



Since belief is all important, it behooves you to guard your thoughts;

and as your beliefs will be shaped to a very great extent by the things

you observe and think about, it is important that you should command

your attention.



And here the will comes into use; for it is by your will that you

determine upon what things your attention shall be fixed.



If you want to become rich, you must not make a study of poverty.



Things are not brought into being by thinking about their opposites.

Health is never to be attained by studying disease and thinking about

disease; righteousness is not to be promoted by studying sin and

thinking about sin; and no one ever got rich by studying poverty and

thinking about poverty.



Medicine as a science of disease has increased disease; religion as a

science of sin has promoted sin, and economics as a study of poverty

will fill the world with wretchedness and want.



Do not talk about poverty; do not investigate it, or concern yourself

with it. Never mind what its causes are; you have nothing to do with

them.



What concerns you is the cure.



Do not spend your time in charitable work, or charity movements; all

charity only tends to perpetuate the wretchedness it aims to eradicate.



I do not say that you should be hard-hearted or unkind, and refuse to

hear the cry of need; but you must not try to eradicate poverty in any

of the conventional ways. Put poverty behind you, and put all that

pertains to it behind you, and “make good.”



Get rich; that is the best way you can help the poor.



And you cannot hold the mental image which is to make you rich if you

fill your mind with pictures of poverty. Do not read books or papers

which give circumstantial accounts of the wretchedness of the tenement

dwellers, of the horrors of child labor, and so on. Do not read

anything which fills your mind with gloomy images of want and suffering.



You cannot help the poor in the least by knowing about these things;

and the wide-spread knowledge of them does not tend at all to do away

with poverty.



What tends to do away with poverty is not the getting of pictures of

poverty into your mind, but getting pictures of wealth into the minds

of the poor.



You are not deserting the poor in their misery when you refuse to allow

your mind to be filled with pictures of that misery.



Poverty can be done away with, not by increasing the number of

well-to-do people who think about poverty, but by increasing the number

of poor people who propose with faith to get rich.



The poor do not need charity; they need inspiration. Charity only sends

them a loaf of bread to keep them alive in their wretchedness, or gives

them an entertainment to make them forget for an hour or two; but

inspiration will cause them to rise out of their misery. If you want to

help the poor, demonstrate to them that they can become rich; prove it

by getting rich yourself.



The only way in which poverty will ever be banished from this world

is by getting a large and constantly increasing number of people to

practice the teachings of this book.



People must be taught to become rich by creation, not by competition.



Every man who becomes rich by competition throws down behind him the

ladder by which he rises, and keeps others down; but every man who gets

rich by creation opens a way for thousands to follow him, and inspires

them to do so.



You are not showing hardness of heart or an unfeeling disposition when

you refuse to pity poverty, see poverty, read about poverty, or think

or talk about it, or to listen to those who do talk about it. Use your

will power to keep your mind OFF the subject of poverty, and to keep it

fixed with faith and purpose ON the vision of what you want.









CHAPTER X. FURTHER USE OF THE WILL.





You cannot retain a true and clear vision of wealth if you are

constantly turning your attention to opposing pictures, whether they be

external or imaginary.



Do not tell of your past troubles of a financial nature, if you have

had them; do not think of them at all. Do not tell of the poverty of

your parents, or the hardships of your early life; to do any of these

things is to mentally class yourself with the poor for the time being,

and it will certainly check the movement of things in your direction.



“Let the dead bury their dead,” as Jesus said.



Put poverty and all things that pertain to poverty completely behind

you.



You have accepted a certain theory of the universe as being correct,

and are resting all your hopes of happiness on its being correct; and

what can you gain by giving heed to conflicting theories?



Do not read religious books which tell you that the world is soon

coming to an end; and do not read the writings of muck-rakers and

pessimistic philosophers who tell you that it is going to the devil.



The world is not going to the devil; it is going to God.



It is a wonderful Becoming.



True, there may be a good many things in existing conditions which

are disagreeable; but what is the use of studying them when they are

certainly passing away, and when the study of them only tends to check

their passing and keep them with us? Why give time and attention to

things which are being removed by evolutionary growth, when you can

hasten their removal only by promoting the evolutionary growth as far

as your part of it goes?



No matter how horrible in seeming may be the conditions in certain

countries, sections, or places, you waste your time and destroy your

own chances by considering them.



You should interest yourself in the world’s becoming rich.



Think of the riches the world is coming into, instead of the poverty it

is growing out of; and bear in mind that the only way in which you can

assist the world in growing rich is by growing rich yourself through

the creative method--not the competitive one.



Give your attention wholly to riches; ignore poverty.



Whenever you think or speak of those who are poor, think and speak

of them as those who are becoming rich; as those who are to be

congratulated rather than pitied. Then they and others will catch the

inspiration, and begin to search for the way out.



Because I say that you are to give your whole time and mind and

thought to riches, it does not follow that you are to be sordid or

mean.



To become really rich is the noblest aim you can have in life, for it

includes everything else.



On the competitive plane, the struggle to get rich is a Godless

scramble for power over other men; but when we come into the creative

mind, all this is changed.



All that is possible in the way of greatness and soul unfoldment, of

service and lofty endeavor, comes by way of getting rich; all is made

possible by the use of things.



If you lack for physical health, you will find that the attainment of

it is conditional on your getting rich.



Only those who are emancipated from financial worry, and who have the

means to live a care-free existence and follow hygienic practices, can

have and retain health.



Moral and spiritual greatness is possible only to those who are above

the competitive battle for existence; and only those who are becoming

rich on the plane of creative thought are free from the degrading

influences of competition. If your heart is set on domestic happiness,

remember that love flourishes best where there is refinement, a high

level of thought, and freedom from corrupting influences; and these are

to be found only where riches are attained by the exercise of creative

thought, without strife or rivalry.



You can aim at nothing so great or noble, I repeat, as to become rich;

and you must fix your attention upon your mental picture of riches, to

the exclusion of all that may tend to dim or obscure the vision.



You must learn to see the underlying TRUTH in all things; you must see

beneath all seemingly wrong conditions the Great One Life ever moving

forward toward fuller expression and more complete happiness.



It is the truth that there is no such thing as poverty; that there is

only wealth.



Some people remain in poverty because they are ignorant of the fact

that there is wealth for them; and these can best be taught by showing

them the way to affluence in your own person and practice.



Others are poor because, while they feel that there is a way out,

they are too intellectually indolent to put forth the mental effort

necessary to find that way and travel it; and for these the very

best thing you can do is to arouse their desire by showing them the

happiness that comes from being rightly rich.



Others still are poor because, while they have some notion of science,

they have become so swamped and lost in the maze of metaphysical and

occult theories that they do not know which road to take. They try a

mixture of many systems and fail in all. For these, again, the very

best thing to do is to show the right way in your own person and

practice; an ounce of doing things is worth a pound of theorizing.



The very best thing you can do for the whole world is to make the most

of yourself.



You can serve God and man in no more effective way than by getting

rich; that is, if you get rich by the creative method, and not by the

competitive one.



Another thing. We assert that this book gives in detail the

principles of the science of getting rich; and if that is true, you

do not need to read any other book upon the subject. This may sound

narrow and egotistical, but consider: there is no more scientific

method of computation in mathematics than by addition, subtraction,

multiplication, and division; no other method is possible. There can be

but one shortest distance between two points. There is only one way to

think scientifically, and that is to think in the way that leads by the

most direct and simple route to the goal. No man has yet formulated a

briefer or less complex “system” than the one set forth herein; it has

been stripped of all non-essentials. When you commence on this, lay all

others aside; put them out of your mind altogether.



Read this book every day; keep it with you; commit it to memory, and do

not think about other “systems” and theories. If you do, you will begin

to have doubts, and to be uncertain and wavering in your thought; and

then you will begin to make failures.



After you have made good and become rich, you may study other systems

as much as you please; but until you are quite sure that you have

gained what you want, do not read anything on this line but this book,

unless it be the authors mentioned in the Preface.



And read only the most optimistic comments on the world’s news; those

in harmony with your picture.



Also, postpone your investigations into the occult. Do not dabble in

Theosophy, Spiritualism, or kindred studies. It is very likely that the

dead still live, and are near; but if they are, let them alone; mind

your own business.



Wherever the spirits of the dead may be, they have their own work to

do, and their own problems to solve; and we have no right to interfere

with them. We cannot help them, and it is very doubtful whether they

can help us, or whether we have any right to trespass upon their time

if they can. Let the dead and the hereafter alone, and solve your own

problem; get rich. If you begin to mix with the occult, you will start

mental cross-currents which will surely bring your hopes to shipwreck.

Now, this and the preceding chapters have brought us to the following

statement of basic facts:--



_There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which,

in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces

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._



_In order to do this, man must pass from the competitive to the

creative mind; he must form a clear mental picture of the things he

wants, and hold this picture in his thoughts with the fixed PURPOSE to

get what he wants, and the unwavering FAITH that he does get what he

wants, closing his mind against all that may tend to shake his purpose,

dim his vision, or quench his faith._



And in addition to all this, we shall now see that he must live and act

in a Certain Way.









CHAPTER XI. ACTING IN THE CERTAIN WAY.





Thought is the creative power, or the impelling force which causes the

creative power to act; thinking in a Certain Way will bring riches to

you, but you must not rely upon thought alone, paying no attention to

personal action. That is the rock upon which many otherwise scientific

metaphysical thinkers meet shipwreck--the failure to connect thought

with personal action.



We have not yet reached the stage of development, even supposing such

a stage to be possible, in which man can create directly from Formless

Substance without nature’s processes or the work of human hands; man

must not only think, but his personal action must supplement his

thought.



By thought you can cause the gold in the hearts of the mountains to be

impelled toward you; but it will not mine itself, refine itself, coin

itself into double eagles, and come rolling along the roads seeking its

way into your pocket.



Under the impelling power of the Supreme Spirit, men’s affairs will be

so ordered that some one will be led to mine the gold for you; other

men’s business transactions will be so directed that the gold will be

brought toward you, and you must so arrange your own business affairs

that you may be able to receive it when it comes to you. Your thought

makes all things, animate and inanimate, work to bring you what you

want; but your personal activity must be such that you can rightly

receive what you want when it reaches you. You are not to take it as

charity, nor to steal it; you must give every man more in use value

than he gives you in cash value.



The scientific use of thought consists in forming a clear and distinct

mental image of what you want; in holding fast to the purpose to get

what you want; and in realizing with grateful faith that you _do_ get

what you want.



Do not try to “project” your thought in any mysterious or occult way,

with the idea of having it go out and do things for you; that is wasted

effort, and will weaken your power to think with sanity.



The action of thought in getting rich is fully explained in the

preceding chapters; your faith and purpose positively impress your

vision upon Formless Substance, which has THE SAME DESIRE FOR MORE

LIFE THAT YOU HAVE; and this vision, received from you, sets all the

creative forces at work IN AND THROUGH THEIR REGULAR CHANNELS OF

ACTION, but directed toward you.



It is not your part to guide or supervise the creative process; all you

have to do with that is to retain your vision, stick to your purpose,

and maintain your faith and gratitude.



But you must act in a Certain Way, so that you can appropriate what is

yours when it comes to you; so that you can meet the things you have in

your picture, and put them in their proper places as they arrive.



You can readily see the truth of this. When things reach you, they will

be in the hands of other men, who will ask an equivalent for them.



And you can only get what is yours by giving the other man what is his.



Your pocketbook is not going to be transformed into a Fortunatus’s

purse, which shall be always full of money without effort on your part.



This is the crucial point in the science of getting rich; right here,

where thought and personal action must be combined. There are very

many people who, consciously or unconsciously, set the creative forces

in action by the strength and persistence of their desires, but who

remain poor because they do not provide for the reception of the thing

they want when it comes.



By thought, the thing you want is brought to you; by action you receive

it.



Whatever your action is to be, it is evident that you must act NOW. You

cannot act in the past, and it is essential to the clearness of your

mental vision that you dismiss the past from your mind. You cannot act

in the future, for the future is not here yet. And you cannot tell how

you will want to act in any future contingency until that contingency

has arrived.



Because you are not in the right business, or the right environment

now, do not think that you must postpone action until you get into the

right business or environment. And do not spend time in the present

taking thought as to the best course in possible future emergencies;

have faith in your ability to meet any emergency when it arrives.



If you act in the present with your mind on the future, your present

action will be with a divided mind, and will not be effective.



Put your whole mind into present action.



Do not give your creative impulse to Original Substance, and then sit

down and wait for results; if you do, you will never get them. Act now.

There is never any time but now, and there never will be any time but

now. If you are ever to begin to make ready for the reception of what

you want, you must begin now.



And your action, whatever it is, must most likely be in your present

business or employment, and must be upon the persons and things in your

present environment.



You cannot act where you are not; you cannot act where you have been,

and you cannot act where you are going to be; you can act only where

you are.



Do not bother as to whether yesterday’s work was well done or ill

done; do to-day’s work well.



Do not try to do to-morrow’s work now; there will be plenty of time to

do that when you get to it.



Do not try, by occult or mystical means, to act on people or things

that are out of your reach.



Do not wait for a change of environment before you act; get a change of

environment by action.



You can so act upon the environment in which you are now, as to cause

yourself to be transferred to a better environment.



Hold with faith and purpose the vision of yourself in the better

environment, but act upon your present environment with all your heart,

and with all your strength, and with all your mind.



Do not spend any time in day dreaming or castle building; hold to the

one vision of what you want, and act NOW.



Do not cast about seeking some new thing to do, or some strange,

unusual, or remarkable action to perform as a first step toward getting

rich. It is probable that your actions, at least for some time to come,

will be those you have been performing for some time past; but you are

to begin now to perform these actions in the Certain Way, which will

surely make you rich.



If you are engaged in some business, and feel that it is not the right

one for you, do not wait until you get into the right business before

you begin to act.



Do not feel discouraged, or sit down and lament because you are

misplaced. No man was ever so misplaced but that he could find the

right place, and no man ever became so involved in the wrong business

but that he could get into the right business.



Hold the vision of yourself in the right business, with the purpose to

get into it, and the faith that you will get into it, and are getting

into it; but ACT in your present business. Use your present business

as the means of getting a better one, and use your present environment

as the means of getting into a better one. Your vision of the right

business, if held with faith and purpose, will cause the Supreme to

move the right business toward you; and your action, if performed in

the Certain Way, will cause you to move toward the business.



If you are an employee, or wage earner, and feel that you must change

places in order to get what you want, do not “project” your thought

into space and rely upon it to get you another job. It will probably

fail to do so.



Hold the vision of yourself in the job you want, while you ACT with

faith and purpose on the job you have, and you will certainly get the

job you want.



Your vision and faith will set the creative force in motion to bring

it toward you, and your action will cause the forces in your own

environment to move you toward the place you want. In closing this

chapter, we will add another statement to our syllabus:--



_There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which,

in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces

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 thoughts

upon formless substance, can cause the thing he thinks about to be

created._



_In order to do this, man must pass from the competitive to the

creative mind; he must form a clear mental picture of the things he

wants, and hold this picture in his thoughts with the fixed PURPOSE to

get what he wants, and the unwavering FAITH that he does get what he

wants, closing his mind to all that may tend to shake his purpose, dim

his vision, or quench his faith._



_That he may receive what he wants when it comes, man must act NOW

upon the people and things in his present environment._









CHAPTER XII. EFFICIENT ACTION.





You must use your thought as directed in previous chapters, and begin

to do what you can do where you are; and you must do ALL that you can

do where you are.



You can advance only by being larger than your present place; and no

man is larger than his present place who leaves undone any of the work

pertaining to that place.



The world is advanced only by those who more than fill their present

places.



If no man quite filled his present place, you can see that there must

be a going backward in everything. Those who do not quite fill their

present places are a dead weight upon society, government, commerce,

and industry; they must be carried along by others at a great expense.

The progress of the world is retarded only by those who do not fill the

places they are holding; they belong to a former age and a lower stage

or plane of life, and their tendency is toward degeneration. No society

could advance if every man was smaller than his place; social evolution

is guided by the law of physical and mental evolution. In the animal

world, evolution is caused by excess of life.



When an organism has more life than can be expressed in the functions

of its own plane, it develops the organs of a higher plane, and a new

species is originated.



There never would have been new species had there not been organisms

which more than filled their places. The law is exactly the same for

you; your getting rich depends upon your applying this principle to

your own affairs.



Every day is either a successful day or a day of failure; and it is

the successful days which get you what you want. If every day is a

failure, you can never get rich; while if every day is a success, you

cannot fail to get rich.



If there is something that may be done to-day, and you do not do

it, you have failed in so far as that thing is concerned; and the

consequences may be more disastrous than you imagine.



You cannot foresee the results of even the most trivial act; you do not

know the workings of all the forces that have been set moving in your

behalf. Much may be depending on your doing some simple act; it may be

the very thing which is to open the door of opportunity to very great

possibilities. You can never know all the combinations which Supreme

Intelligence is making for you in the world of things and of human

affairs; your neglect or failure to do some small thing may cause a

long delay in getting what you want.



Do, every day, ALL that can be done that day.



There is, however, a limitation or qualification of the above that you

must take into account.



You are not to overwork, nor to rush blindly into your business in the

effort to do the greatest possible number of things in the shortest

possible time.



You are not to try to do to-morrow’s work to-day, nor to do a week’s

work in a day.



_It is really not the number of things you do, but the EFFICIENCY of

each separate action that counts._



Every act is, in itself, either a success or a failure.



Every act is, in itself, either effective or inefficient.



Every inefficient act is a failure, and if you spend your life in doing

inefficient acts, your whole life will be a failure.



The more things you do, the worse for you, if all your acts are

inefficient ones.



On the other hand, every efficient act is a success in itself, and if

every act of your life is an efficient one, your whole life MUST be a

success.



The cause of failure is doing too many things in an inefficient manner,

and not doing enough things in an efficient manner.



You will see that it is a self-evident proposition that if you do not

do any inefficient acts, and if you do a sufficient number of efficient

acts, you will become rich. If, now, it is possible for you to make

each act an efficient one, you see again that the getting of riches is

reduced to an exact science, like mathematics.



The matter turns, then, on the question whether you can make each

separate act a success in itself. And this you can certainly do.



You can make each act a success, because All Power is working with you;

and All Power cannot fail.



Power is at your service; and to make each act efficient you have only

to put power into it.



Every action is either strong or weak; and when every one is strong,

you are acting in the Certain Way which will make you rich.



Every act can be made strong and efficient by holding your vision while

you are doing it, and putting the whole power of your FAITH and PURPOSE

into it.



It is at this point that the people fail who separate mental power from

personal action. They use the power of mind in one place and at one

time, and they act in another place and at another time. So their acts

are not successful in themselves; too many of them are inefficient.

But if All Power goes into every act, no matter how commonplace, every

act will be a success in itself; and as in the nature of things every

success opens the way to other successes, your progress toward what

you want, and the progress of what you want toward you, will become

increasingly rapid.



Remember that successful action is cumulative in its results. Since the

desire for more life is inherent in all things, when a man begins to

move toward larger life more things attach themselves to him, and the

influence of his desire is multiplied.



Do, every day, all that you can do that day, and do each act in an

efficient manner.



In saying that you must hold your vision while you are doing each

act, however trivial or commonplace, I do not mean to say that it is

necessary at all times to see the vision distinctly to its smallest

details. It should be the work of your leisure hours to use your

imagination on the details of your vision, and to contemplate them

until they are firmly fixed upon your memory.



If you wish speedy results, spend practically all your spare time in

this practice.



By continuous contemplation you will get the picture of what you

want, even to the smallest details, so firmly fixed upon your mind,

and so completely transferred to the mind of Formless Substance, that

in your working hours you need only to mentally refer to the picture

to stimulate your faith and purpose, and cause your best effort to be

put forth. Contemplate your picture in your leisure hours until your

consciousness is so full of it that you can grasp it instantly. You

will become so enthused with its bright promises that the mere thought

of it will call forth the strongest energies of your whole being.



Let us again repeat our syllabus, and by slightly changing the closing

statements bring it to the point we have now reached.



_There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which,

in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces

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._



_In order to do this, man must pass from the competitive to the

creative mind; he must form a clear mental picture of the things he

wants, and do, with faith and purpose, all that can be done each day,

doing each separate thing in an efficient manner._









CHAPTER XIII. GETTING INTO THE RIGHT BUSINESS.





Success, in any particular business, depends for one thing upon your

possessing in a well-developed state the faculties required in that

business.



Without good musical faculty no one can succeed as a teacher of

music; without well-developed mechanical faculties no one can achieve

great success in any of the mechanical trades; without tact and the

commercial faculties no one can succeed in mercantile pursuits.

But to possess in a well-developed state the faculties required in

your particular vocation does not insure getting rich. There are

musicians who have remarkable talent, and who yet remain poor; there

are blacksmiths, carpenters, and so on who have excellent mechanical

ability, but who do not get rich; and there are merchants with good

faculties for dealing with men who nevertheless fail.



The different faculties are tools; it is essential to have good tools,

but it is also essential that the tools should be used in the Right

Way. One man can take a sharp saw, a square, a good plane, and so on,

and build a handsome article of furniture; another man can take the

same tools and set to work to duplicate the article, but his production

will be a botch. He does not know how to use good tools in a successful

way.



The various faculties of your mind are the tools with which you must

do the work which is to make you rich; it will be easier for you to

succeed if you get into a business for which you are well equipped with

mental tools.



Generally speaking, you will do best in that business which will use

your strongest faculties; the one for which you are naturally “best

fitted.” But there are limitations to this statement, also. No man

should regard his vocation as being irrevocably fixed by the tendencies

with which he was born.



You can get rich in ANY business, for if you have not the right talent

for it you can develop that talent; it merely means that you will have

to make your tools as you go along, instead of confining yourself to

the use of those with which you were born. It will be EASIER for you

to succeed in a vocation for which you already have the talents in a

well-developed state; but you CAN succeed in any vocation, for you can

develop any rudimentary talent, and there is no talent of which you

have not at least the rudiment.



You will get rich most easily in point of effort, if you do that for

which you are best fitted; but you will get rich most satisfactorily if

you do that which you WANT to do.



Doing what you want to do is life; and there is no real satisfaction in

living if we are compelled to be forever doing something which we do

not like to do, and can never do what we want to do. And it is certain

that you can do what you want to do; the desire to do it is proof that

you have within you the power which can do it.



Desire is a manifestation of power.



The desire to play music is the power which can play music seeking

expression and development; the desire to invent mechanical devices is

the mechanical talent seeking expression and development.



Where there is no power, either developed or undeveloped, to do a

thing, there is never any desire to do that thing; and where there is

strong desire to do a thing, it is certain proof that the power to do

it is strong, and only requires to be developed and applied in the

Right Way.



All things else being equal, it is best to select the business for

which you have the best developed talent; but if you have a strong

desire to engage in any particular line of work, you should select that

work as the ultimate end at which you aim.



You can do what you want to do, and it is your right and privilege

to follow the business or avocation which will be most congenial and

pleasant.



You are not obliged to do what you do not like to do, and should not do

it except as a means to bring you to the doing of the thing you want to

do.



If there are past mistakes whose consequences have placed you in an

undesirable business or environment, you may be obliged for some time

to do what you do not like to do; but you can make the doing of it

pleasant by knowing that it is making it possible for you to come to

the doing of what you want to do.



If you feel that you are not in the right vocation, do not act too

hastily in trying to get into another one. The best way, generally, to

change business or environment is by growth.



Do not be afraid to make a sudden and radical change if the opportunity

is presented, and you feel after careful consideration that it is the

right opportunity; but never take sudden or radical action when you are

in doubt as to the wisdom of doing so.



There is never any hurry on the creative plane; and there is no lack of

opportunity.



When you get out of the competitive mind you will understand that you

never need to act hastily. No one else is going to beat you to the

thing you want to do; there is enough for all. If one place is taken,

another and a better one will be opened for you a little farther on;

there is plenty of time. When you are in doubt, wait. Fall back on the

contemplation of your vision, and increase your faith and purpose; and

by all means, in times of doubt and indecision, cultivate gratitude.



A day or two spent in contemplating the vision of what you want, and

in earnest thanksgiving that you are getting it, will bring your mind

into such close relationship with the Supreme that you will make no

mistake when you do act.



There is a mind which knows all there is to know; and you can come into

close unity with this mind by faith and the purpose to advance in life,

if you have deep gratitude.



Mistakes come from acting hastily, or from acting in fear or doubt, or

in forgetfulness of the Right Motive, which is more life to all, and

less to none.



As you go on in the Certain Way, opportunities will come to you in

increasing number; and you will need to be very steady in your faith

and purpose, and to keep in close touch with the All Mind by reverent

gratitude.



Do all that you can do in a perfect manner every day, but do it without

haste, worry, or fear. Go as fast as you can, but never hurry.



Remember that in the moment you begin to hurry you cease to be a

creator and become a competitor; you drop back upon the old plane again.



Whenever you find yourself hurrying, call a halt; fix your attention

on the mental image of the thing you want, and begin to give thanks

that you are getting it. The exercise of GRATITUDE will never fail to

strengthen your faith and renew your purpose.









CHAPTER XIV. THE IMPRESSION OF INCREASE.





Whether you change your vocation or not, your actions for the present

must be those pertaining to the business in which you are now engaged.



You can get into the business you want by making constructive use of

the business you are already established in; by doing your daily work

in a Certain Way.



And in so far as your business consists in dealing with other men,

whether personally or by letter, the key-thought of all your efforts

must be to convey to their minds the impression of increase.



Increase is what all men and all women are seeking; it is the urge of

the Formless Intelligence within them, seeking fuller expression.



The desire for increase is inherent in all nature; it is the

fundamental impulse of the universe. All human activities are based on

the desire for increase; people are seeking more food, more clothes,

better shelter, more luxury, more beauty, more knowledge, more

pleasure--increase in something, more life.



Every living thing is under this necessity for continuous advancement;

where increase of life ceases, dissolution and death set in at once.



Man instinctively knows this, and hence he is forever seeking more.

This law of perpetual increase is set forth by Jesus in the parable of

the talents; only those who gain more retain any; from him who hath not

shall be taken away even that which he hath.



The normal desire for increased wealth is not an evil or a

reprehensible thing; it is simply the desire for more abundant life; it

is aspiration.



And because it is the deepest instinct of their natures, all men and

women are attracted to him who can give them more of the means of life.



In following the Certain Way as described in the foregoing pages, you

are getting continuous increase for yourself, and you are giving it to

all with whom you deal.



You are a creative center, from which increase is given off to all.



Be sure of this, and convey assurance of the fact to every man, woman,

and child with whom you come in contact. No matter how small the

transaction, even if it be only the selling of a stick of candy to a

little child, put into it the thought of increase, and make sure that

the customer is impressed with the thought.



Convey the impression of advancement with everything you do, so that

all people shall receive the impression that you are an Advancing Man,

and that you advance all who deal with you. Even to the people whom you

meet in a social way, without any thought of business, and to whom you

do not try to sell anything, give the thought of increase.



You can convey this impression by holding the unshakable faith that

you, yourself, are in the Way of Increase; and by letting this faith

inspire, fill, and permeate every action.



Do everything that you do in the firm conviction that you are an

advancing personality, and that you are giving advancement to everybody.



Feel that you are getting rich, and that in so doing you are making

others rich, and conferring benefits on all.



Do not boast or brag of your success, or talk about it unnecessarily;

true faith is never boastful.



Wherever you find a boastful person, you find one who is secretly

doubtful and afraid. Simply feel the faith, and let it work out in

every transaction; let every act and tone and look express the quiet

assurance that you are getting rich; that you are already rich. Words

will not be necessary to communicate this feeling to others; they will

feel the sense of increase when in your presence, and will be attracted

to you again.



You must so impress others that they will feel that in associating with

you they will get increase for themselves. See that you give them a use

value greater than the cash value you are taking from them.



Take an honest pride in doing this, and let everybody know it; and you

will have no lack of customers. People will go where they are given

increase; and the Supreme, which desires increase in all, and which

knows all, will move toward you men and women who have never heard of

you. Your business will increase rapidly, and you will be surprised at

the unexpected benefits which will come to you. You will be able from

day to day to make larger combinations, secure greater advantages, and

to go on into a more congenial vocation if you desire to do so.



But in doing all this, you must never lose sight of your vision of what

you want, or your faith and purpose to get what you want.



Let me here give you another word of caution in regard to motives.



_Beware of the insidious temptation to seek for power over other men._



Nothing is so pleasant to the unformed or partially developed mind as

the exercise of power or dominion over others. The desire to rule for

selfish gratification has been the curse of the world. For countless

ages kings and lords have drenched the earth with blood in their

battles to extend their dominions; this not to seek more life for all,

but to get more power for themselves.



To-day, the main motive in the business and industrial world is the

same; men marshal their armies of dollars, and lay waste the lives and

hearts of millions in the same mad scramble for power over others.

Commercial kings, like political kings, are inspired by the lust for

power.



Jesus saw in this desire for mastery the moving impulse of that

evil world He sought to overthrow. Read the twenty-third chapter of

Matthew, and see how He pictures the lust of the Pharisees to be

called “Master,” to sit in the high places, to domineer over others,

and to lay burdens on the backs of the less fortunate; and note how

He compares this lust for dominion with the brotherly seeking for the

Common Good to which He calls His disciples.



Look out for the temptation to seek for authority, to become a

“master,” to be considered as one who is above the common herd, to

impress others by lavish display, and so on.



The mind that seeks for mastery over others is the competitive mind;

and the competitive mind is not the creative one. In order to master

your environment and your destiny, it is not at all necessary that you

should rule over your fellow men; and indeed, when you fall into the

world’s struggle for the high places, you begin to be conquered by fate

and environment, and your getting rich becomes a matter of chance and

speculation.



Beware of the competitive mind! No better statement of the principle of

creative action can be formulated than the favorite declaration of the

late “Golden Rule” Jones of Toledo: “What I want for myself, I want for

everybody.”









CHAPTER XV. THE ADVANCING MAN.





What I have said in the last chapter applies as well to the

professional man and the wage-earner as to the man who is engaged in

mercantile business.



No matter whether you are a physician, a teacher, or a clergyman, if

you can give increase of life to others and make them sensible of

the fact, they will be attracted to you, and you will get rich. The

physician who holds the vision of himself as a great and successful

healer, and who works toward the complete realization of that vision

with faith and purpose, as described in former chapters, will come into

such close touch with the Source of Life that he will be phenomenally

successful; patients will come to him in throngs.



No one has a greater opportunity to carry into effect the teachings

of this book than the practitioner of medicine; it does not matter

to which of the various schools he may belong, for the principle of

healing is common to all of them, and may be reached by all alike. The

Advancing Man in medicine, who holds to a clear mental image of himself

as successful, and who obeys the laws of faith, purpose, and gratitude,

will cure every curable case he undertakes, no matter what remedies he

may use.



In the field of religion, the world cries out for the clergyman who

can teach his hearers the true science of abundant life. He who

masters the details of the science of getting rich, together with the

allied sciences of being well, of being great, and of winning love,

and who teaches these details from the pulpit, will never lack for a

congregation. This is the gospel that the world needs; it will give

increase of life, and men will hear it gladly, and will give liberal

support to the man who brings it to them.



What is now needed is a demonstration of the science of life from

the pulpit. We want preachers who can not only tell us how, but who

in their own persons will show us how. We need the preacher who will

himself be rich, healthy, great, and beloved, to teach us how to attain

to these things; and when he comes he will find a numerous and loyal

following.



The same is true of the teacher who can inspire the children with the

faith and purpose of the advancing life. He will never be “out of a

job.” And any teacher who has this faith and purpose can give it to his

pupils; he cannot help giving it to them if it is part of his own life

and practice.



What is true of the teacher, preacher, and physician is true of the

lawyer, dentist, real estate man, insurance agent--of everybody.



The combined mental and personal action I have described is infallible;

it cannot fail. Every man and woman who follows these instructions

steadily, perseveringly, and to the letter, will get rich. The law of

the Increase of Life is as mathematically certain in its operation as

the law of gravitation; getting rich is an exact science.



The wage-earner will find this as true of his case as of any of the

others mentioned. Do not feel that you have no chance to get rich

because you are working where there is no visible opportunity for

advancement, where wages are small and the cost of living high. Form

your clear mental vision of what you want, and begin to act with faith

and purpose.



Do all the work you can do, every day, and do each piece of work in a

perfectly successful manner; put the power of success, and the purpose

to get rich, into everything that you do.



But do not do this merely with the idea of currying favor with your

employer, in the hope that he, or those above you, will see your good

work and advance you; it is not likely that they will do so.



The man who is merely a “good” workman, filling his place to the very

best of his ability, and satisfied with that, is valuable to his

employer; and it is not to the employer’s interest to promote him; he

is worth more where he is.



To secure advancement, something more is necessary than to be too large

for your place.



The man who is certain to advance is the one who is too big for his

place, and who has a clear concept of what he wants to be; who knows

that he can become what he wants to be, and who is determined to BE

what he wants to be.



Do not try to more than fill your present place with a view to pleasing

your employer; do it with the idea of advancing yourself. Hold the

faith and purpose of increase during work hours, after work hours,

and before work hours. Hold it in such a way that every person who

comes in contact with you, whether foreman, fellow workman, or social

acquaintance, will feel the power of purpose radiating from you; so

that every one will get the sense of advancement and increase from

you. Men will be attracted to you, and if there is no possibility for

advancement in your present job, you will very soon see an opportunity

to take another job.



There is a Power which never fails to present opportunity to the

Advancing Man who is moving in obedience to law.



God cannot help helping you, if you act in a Certain Way; He must do so

in order to help Himself.



There is nothing in your circumstances or in the industrial situation

that can keep you down. If you cannot get rich working for the steel

trust, you can get rich on a ten-acre farm; and if you begin to move

in the Certain Way, you will certainly escape from the “clutches” of

the steel trust and get on to the farm or wherever else you wish to be.



If a few thousands of its employees would enter upon the Certain Way,

the steel trust would soon be in a bad plight; it would have to give

its workingmen more opportunity, or go out of business. Nobody has

to work for a trust; the trusts can keep men in so-called hopeless

conditions only so long as there are men who are too ignorant to know

of the science of getting rich, or too intellectually slothful to

practice it.



Begin this way of thinking and acting, and your faith and purpose will

make you quick to see any opportunity to better your condition.



Such opportunities will speedily come, for the Supreme, working in All,

and working for you, will bring them before you.



Do not wait for an opportunity to be all that you want to be; when

an opportunity to be more than you are now is presented and you feel

impelled toward it, take it. It will be the first step toward a greater

opportunity.



There is no such thing possible in this universe as a lack of

opportunities for the man who is living the advancing life.



It is inherent in the constitution of the cosmos that all things shall

be for him and work together for his good; and he must certainly get

rich if he acts and thinks in the Certain Way. So let wage-earning men

and women study this book with great care, and enter with confidence

upon the course of action it prescribes; it will not fail.









CHAPTER XVI. SOME CAUTIONS, AND CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS.





Many people will scoff at the idea that there is an exact science of

getting rich; holding the impression that the supply of wealth is

limited, they will insist that social and governmental institutions

must be changed before even any considerable number of people can

acquire a competence.



But this is not true.



It is true that existing governments keep the masses in poverty, but

this is because the masses do not think and act in the Certain Way.



If the masses begin to move forward as suggested in this book, neither

governments nor industrial systems can check them; all systems must be

modified to accommodate the forward movement.



If the people have the Advancing Mind, have the Faith that they can

become rich, and move forward with the fixed purpose to become rich,

nothing can possibly keep them in poverty.



Individuals may enter upon the Certain Way at any time, and under any

government, and make themselves rich; and when any considerable number

of individuals do so under any government, they will cause the system

to be so modified as to open the way for others.



The more men who get rich on the competitive plane, the worse for

others; the more who get rich on the creative plane, the better for

others.



The economic salvation of the masses can only be accomplished by

getting a large number of people to practice the scientific method set

down in this book, and become rich. These will show others the way, and

inspire them with a desire for real life, with the faith that it can

be attained, and with the purpose to attain it.



For the present, however, it is enough to know that neither the

government under which you live nor the capitalistic or competitive

system of industry can keep you from getting rich. When you enter upon

the creative plane of thought you will rise above all these things and

become a citizen of another kingdom.



But remember that your thought must be held upon the creative plane;

you are never for an instant to be betrayed into regarding the supply

as limited, or into acting on the moral level of competition.



Whenever you do fall into old ways of thought, correct yourself

instantly; for when you are in the competitive mind, you have lost the

co-operation of the Mind of the Whole.



Do not spend any time in planning as to how you will meet possible

emergencies in the future, except as the necessary policies may affect

your actions to-day. You are concerned with doing to-day’s work in a

perfectly successful manner, and not with emergencies which may arise

to-morrow; you can attend to them as they come.



Do not concern yourself with questions as to how you shall surmount

obstacles which may loom upon your business horizon, unless you can see

plainly that your course must be altered to-day in order to avoid them.



No matter how tremendous an obstruction may appear at a distance, you

will find that if you go on in the Certain Way it will disappear as you

approach it, or that a way over, through, or around it will appear.



No possible combination of circumstances can defeat a man or woman who

is proceeding to get rich along strictly scientific lines. No man or

woman who obeys the law can fail to get rich, any more than one can

multiply two by two and fail to get four.



Give no anxious thought to possible disasters, obstacles, panics, or

unfavorable combinations of circumstances; it is time enough to meet

such things when they present themselves before you in the immediate

present, and you will find that every difficulty carries with it the

wherewithal for its overcoming.



Guard your speech. Never speak of yourself, your affairs, or of

anything else in a discouraged or discouraging way.



Never admit the possibility of failure, or speak in a way that infers

failure as a possibility.



Never speak of the times as being hard, or of business conditions as

being doubtful. Times may be hard and business doubtful for those who

are on the competitive plane, but they can never be so for you; you can

create what you want, and you are above fear.



When others are having hard times and poor business, you will find

your greatest opportunities.



Train yourself to think of and to look upon the world as a something

which is Becoming, which is growing; and to regard seeming evil

as being only that which is undeveloped. Always speak in terms of

advancement; to do otherwise is to deny your faith, and to deny your

faith is to lose it.



Never allow yourself to feel disappointed. You may expect to have a

certain thing at a certain time, and not get it at that time; and this

will appear to you like failure.



But if you hold to your faith you will find that the failure is only

apparent.



Go on in the certain way, and if you do not receive that thing, you

will receive something so much better that you will see that the

seeming failure was really a great success.



A student of this science had set his mind on making a certain business

combination which seemed to him at the time to be very desirable,

and he worked for some weeks to bring it about. When the crucial time

came, the thing failed in a perfectly inexplicable way; it was as if

some unseen influence had been working secretly against him. He was not

disappointed; on the contrary, he thanked God that his desire had been

overruled, and went steadily on with a grateful mind. In a few weeks an

opportunity so much better came his way that he would not have made the

first deal on any account; and he saw that a Mind which knew more than

he knew had prevented him from losing the greater good by entangling

himself with the lesser.



That is the way every seeming failure will work out for you, if you

keep your faith, hold to your purpose, have gratitude, and do, every

day, all that can be done that day, doing each separate act in a

successful manner.



_When you make a failure, it is because you have not asked for enough;

keep on, and a larger thing than you were seeking will certainly come

to you._ Remember this.



You will not fail because you lack the necessary talent to do what you

wish to do. If you go on as I have directed, you will develop all the

talent that is necessary to the doing of your work.



It is not within the scope of this book to deal with the science of

cultivating talent; but it is as certain and simple as the process of

getting rich.



However, do not hesitate or waver for fear that when you come to any

certain place you will fail for lack of ability; keep right on, and

when you come to that place, the ability will be furnished to you. The

same source of Ability which enabled the untaught Lincoln to do the

greatest work in government ever accomplished by a single man is open

to you; you may draw upon all the mind there is for wisdom to use in

meeting the responsibilities which are laid upon you. Go on in full

faith.



Study this book. Make it your constant companion until you have

mastered all the ideas contained in it. While you are getting firmly

established in this faith, you will do well to give up most recreations

and pleasures; and to stay away from places where ideas conflicting

with these are advanced in lectures or sermons. Do not read pessimistic

or conflicting literature, or get into arguments upon the matter. Do

very little reading, outside of the writers mentioned in the Preface.

Spend most of your leisure time in contemplating your vision, and in

cultivating gratitude, and in reading this book. It contains all you

need to know of the science of getting rich; and you will find all the

essentials summed up in the following chapter.









CHAPTER XVII. SUMMARY OF THE SCIENCE OF GETTING RICH.





There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which, in

its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces 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.



In order to do this, man must pass from the competitive to the creative

mind; otherwise he cannot be in harmony with the Formless Intelligence,

which is always creative and never competitive in spirit.



Man may come into full harmony with the Formless Substance by

entertaining a lively and sincere gratitude for the blessings

it bestows upon him. Gratitude unifies the mind of man with the

intelligence of Substance, so that man’s thoughts are received by

the Formless. Man can remain upon the creative plane only by uniting

himself with the Formless Intelligence through a deep and continuous

feeling of gratitude.



Man must form a clear and definite mental image of the things he wishes

to have, to do, or to become; and he must hold this mental image in

his thoughts, while being deeply grateful to the Supreme that all

his desires are granted to him. The man who wishes to get rich must

spend his leisure hours in contemplating his Vision, and in earnest

thanksgiving that the reality is being given to him. Too much stress

cannot be laid on the importance of frequent contemplation of the

mental image, coupled with unwavering faith and devout gratitude. This

is the process by which the impression is given to the Formless, and

the creative forces set in motion.



The creative energy works through the established channels of natural

growth, and of the industrial and social order. All that is included

in his mental image will surely be brought to the man who follows the

instructions given above, and whose faith does not waver. What he wants

will come to him through the ways of established trade and commerce.



In order to receive his own when it shall come to him, man must be

active; and this activity can only consist in more than filling his

present place. He must keep in mind the Purpose to get rich through

the realization of his mental image. And he must do, every day, all

that can be done that day, taking care to do each act in a successful

manner. He must give to every man a use value in excess of the cash

value he receives, so that each transaction makes for more life; and

he must so hold the Advancing Thought that the impression of Increase

will be communicated to all with whom he comes in contact.



The men and women who practice the foregoing instructions will

certainly get rich; and the riches they receive will be in exact

proportion to the definiteness of their vision, the fixity of their

purpose, the steadiness of their faith, and the depth of their

gratitude.



       *       *       *       *       *



FURTHER AIDS TOWARD GETTING RICH RIGHT



THE NAUTILUS is published monthly for the express purpose of making

Men and Women Who Can Do What They Will To Do. It abounds in practical

ideas and in the bright inspiration that impels you to USE the ideas.

Use it as first aid!



Wallace D. Wattles, who wrote this book, teaches “Constructive Science”

in every number of the magazine. How to think so as to PROMOTE YOURSELF

is what you want to know. He teaches it!



Elizabeth and William E. Towne teach it, too. They are the editors and

owners of THE NAUTILUS, and their success is worth knowing about and

learning from.



And Thomas Dreier, of the Sheldon School of Salesmanship, writes for

NAUTILUS on business growing. So does Frank Andrews Fall, of the

University of New York. And several others. These folks know how. GET

IN TOUCH with success and successful people through NAUTILUS.



Then there is our Success Department, where everybody is invited to say

his say, and prizes are given for best letters.



THE NAUTILUS teaches and inspires health, wealth, and happiness in ALL

departments of life.



Don’t miss Wallace D. Wattles’ great new serial story, “As a Grain of

Mustard Seed,” which will begin in an early number of the magazine.



Send $1.00 for a year’s subscription to THE NAUTILUS, with a copy of

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Do you want more books on how to succeed? Read Bruce McClelland’s

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Wilcox gave nearly a page of space in the New York Journal; and read

“How to Grow Success,” by Elizabeth Towne, 50c. And don’t you want to

read Wallace D. Wattles’ “New Science of Living and Healing,” price,

50c.? Address



ELIZABETH TOWNE, Dept. TS, HOLYOKE, MASS.



       *       *       *       *       *



Transcriber’s Notes:



Punctuation has been made consistent.



Variations in spelling and hyphenation were retained as they appear in

the original publication.



The following change has been made:



p. 87: purpose changed to propose (who propose with)











End of Project Gutenberg's The Science of Getting Rich, by Wallace D. Wattles