TO
set about getting rich in a scientific way, you do not try to apply your will
power to anything outside of yourself.
Your
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 purpose
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.