WEBVTT

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Napoleon Hill Golden Rules three, how
to develop character through autosuggestion. This brings

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us to an appropriate place at which
to explain the method through which your author

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has literally made himself over during a
period of approximately five years. Before we

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go into these details, let us
remind you of the common tendency of human

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beings to doubt that which they do
not understand, and all that they cannot

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prove to their own satisfaction, either
by similar experiences of their own or by

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observation. Let us also remind you
that this is no age for a doubting

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Thomas. Your author, while a
comparatively young man, has nevertheless seen the

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birth of some of the world's greatest
inventions, the uncovering, as it were,

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of some of the so called hidden
secrets of nature, and he is

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well within the bounds of accuracy when
he reminds you that during the last sixty

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years, science has lifted the curtains
that separated us from the light of truth

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and brought into use more tools of
culture, development and progress than had been

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discovered in all the previous history of
the human race. Within comparatively recent years,

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we have seen the birth of the
incandescent electric light, the typesetting machine,

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the printing press, the X ray, the telephone, the automobile,

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the airplane, the submarine, the
wireless telegraphy, and myriad other organized forces

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which serve mankind and tend to separate
him from the animal instincts of the dark

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ages out of which he has risen. As these lines are being written,

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we are informed that Thomas A.
Edison is at work on a contrivance which

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he believes will enable the departed spirits
of men to communicate with us here on

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Earth. If such a thing is
possible, and if the announcement should come

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from East Orange, New Jersey,
tomorrow morning, that Edison has completed his

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machine and communicated with the spirits of
departed men. This writer, for one,

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would not scoff at the statement.
If we did not accept it as

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true until we had seen proof.
We would at least hold an open mind

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on the subject, because we have
witnessed enough of the impossible during the past

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thirty years to convince us that there
is but little that is strictly impossible when

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the human mind sets itself to a
task with that grim determination that knows no

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defeat. If modern history informs us
correctly, the best railroad men in the

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country scoffed at the idea that Westinghouse
could stop a train by jamming air on

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the brakes. But those same men
lived to see a law passed in the

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New York legislature compelling railroad companies to
use this foolish contrivance. And if it

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had not been for that law,
the present speed of railroad trains and the

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safety with which we may travel would
not be possible. We are reminded to

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state also that had the illustrious Napoleon
bonaparte not scoffed at Robert Fulton's request for

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an interview, the French capital might
be sitting on English soil to day,

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and France might be the mistress over
all of the British Empire. Fulton sent

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word to Napoleon that he had invented
a steam engine that would carry a boat

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against the wind. But Napoleon,
never having seen such a contrivance, sent

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back word that he had no time
to fool with cranks, and furthermore,

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ships could not sail against the wind
because ships never had been sailed that way.

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Well within the memory of your author, a bill was introduced in Congress

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asking for an appropriation with which to
experiment with an airplane which Samuel Pierpont Langley

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had worked out, but the appropriation
was promptly denied, and Professor Langley was

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scoffed at as being an impractical dreamer
and a crank. No one had ever

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seen a man fly a machine in
the air, and no one believed it

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could be done. But we are
becoming a bit more liberal in our viewpoint

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concerning powers which we do not understand, at least those of us who do

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not wish to become the laughing stock
of later generations. Are we felt impelled

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to remind you of these impossibilities of
the past which turned out to be realities,

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before taking you behind the curtains of
our own life and displaying for your

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benefit certain principles which we have reason
to believe will be hard for the uninitiated

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to accept until they have been try
ride out, and proved sound. We

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will now proceed to unfold to you
the most astonishing, and we might well

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say, the most miraculous experience of
our entire past, an experience which is

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related solely for the benefit of those
who are earnestly seeking ways and means to

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develop in themselves those qualities which constitute
positive character. When we first commenced to

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understand the principle of auto suggestion several
years ago, we adopted a plan for

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making practical use of it in developing
certain qualities which we admired in certain men

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who are familiar characters in history.
Viz. Just before going to sleep at

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night, we made it a practice
to close our eyes and see in our

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imagination. Please get this clearly fixed
in your mind. What we saw was

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deliberately placed in our mind as instructions
or as a direct command to our subconscious

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mind, and as a blueprint for
it to build by through our imagination,

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and was in no way attributed to
anything occult or in a field of uncharted

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phenomena. A large council tables standing
on the floor in front of us,

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we then pictured in our imagination certain
men seated around that table, those men

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from whose characters and lives we wished
to appropriate certain qualities to be deliberately built

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into our own character through the principle
of auto suggestion. For example, some

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of the men whom we selected to
take an imaginary place at the imaginary council

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table were Lincoln, emmer Son,
Socrates, Aristotle, Napoleon, Jefferson,

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Albert Hubbard, the man from Galilee, and Henry Ward Beecher, the well

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known English horator. Our purpose was
to impress our subconscious mind through auto suggestion,

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with the thought that we were developing
certain qualities which we admired most in

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each of these and in other great
men. Night after night, for an

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hour or more at a time,
we went through this imaginary meeting at the

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council table. As a matter of
fact, we continue the practice to this

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day, adding a new character to
the council table as often as we find

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someone from whom we wished to take
certain qualities through emulation. From Lincoln.

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We wanted the qualities for which he
was most noted, earnestness of purpose,

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a fair sense of justice toward all, both friends and foes alike, an

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ideal which had for its object the
uplift of the masses, the common people,

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the courage to break precedence and to
establish new ones when circumstances demanded it.

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All these qualities which we had so
much admired in Lincoln, we set

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out to develop in our own character
while looking upon that imaginary council table,

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by actually commanding our subconscious mind to
use the picture, which it saw at

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the council table as a plan to
build from. We wished to take from

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Napoleon the quality of dogged persistency.
We wanted his strategic ability to turn adverse

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circumstances to good account. We wanted
his self confidence in his wonderful ability to

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inspire and lead men. We wanted
his ability to organize his own faculties and

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his fellow workers, because we knew
that real power came only through intelligently organized

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and properly directed efforts. From Emerson, we wanted that remarkably keen insight into

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the future for which he was noted. We wanted his ability to interpret nature's

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handwriting as it is manifested in flowing
brooks, singing birds, laughing children,

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the blue skies, the starry heavens, the green grass, and the beautiful

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flowers. We wanted his ability to
interpret human emotions, his ability to reason

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from cause to effect and inversely,
from effect back to cause. We wanted

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Albert Hubbard's power of words and his
ability to interpret the trend of the times.

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We wanted his ability to combine words
so they would convey the exact pictures

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of the thoughts we created. We
wanted his ability to write in a rhythmic

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strain that would be unquestioned as to
its meaning or its sincerity. We wanted

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Beecher's magnetic power to grip the hearts
of an audience in public address, his

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ability to speak with force and conviction
that moved an audience to laughter or to

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tears, and made his listeners feel
with him mirth and melody, sorrow and

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good cheer. As I saw those
men sitting there before me, seated around

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the imaginary council table, I would
direct my attention to each of them for

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a few minutes, saying to myself
that I was developing those qualities which I

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aimed to appropriate from the character before
me. If you have tears of grief

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to shed for me on account of
my ignorance in going through this imaginary role

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of character building, get ready to
shed them now. If you have words

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of condemnation to utter against my practice, utter them now. If you have

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a feeling of cynicism which seems to
strive for expression in the nature of a

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scowling face, give expression to it
now. Because I am about to relate

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something which ought to and probably will
cause you to stop, look and reason

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up until the time that I began
these imaginary council meetings, I had made

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many attempts at public speaking, all
of which had been dismal failures. The

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very first speech I attempted to deliver, after a week of this practice,

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I so impressed my audience that I
was invite ight it back for another talk

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on the same subject. And from
that day until the time of the writing

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of these lines, I have been
constantly improving. Last year, the demand

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for my services as a public speaker
became so universal that I toured the greater

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portion of the United States, speaking
before the leading clubs, civic organizations,

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schools, and specially arranged meetings.
In the city of Pittsburgh. During the

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month of May nineteen twenty, I
delivered the Magic Ladder to Success before the

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Advertising Club. In my audience were
some of the leading businessmen of the United

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States, officials from the Carnegie Steel
Company, the H. J. Hines

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Pickle Company, the Joseph Horn Department
Store, and other great industries of the

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city. These men were analytical men. Many of them were college and university

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graduates. They were men who knew
when they heard something that was sound.

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At the close of my address,
they gave me what several members of the

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audience afterward told me was the greatest
station ever given a speaker before that club.

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Shortly after my return from Pittsburgh,
I received a medal from the Associated

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Advertising Clubs of the World in memory
of that event, engraved as follows in

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Appreciation of Napoleon Hill, May twentieth, nineteen twenty. Please do not make

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the mistake of interpreting the foregoing as
an outburst of egotism. I am giving

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you facts, names, dates,
and places, and I am doing this

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only for the purpose of showing you
that the quality which I so greatly admired

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in Henry Ward Beecher, I had
actually commenced to develop in myself. This

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quality was devil op ed around the
imaginary council table with my eyes shut,

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while looking at an imaginary figure of
mister Beecher, seated as a member of

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my imaginary board of councilors. The
principle through which I developed this ability was

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auto suggestion. I filled my mind
so full of the thought that I would

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equal and even excel Beecher before I
stopped that no other result could have been

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the outcome. Nor is this the
end of my narrative, a narrative which,

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by the way, the hundreds of
thousands who know me now located in

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nearly every city, town, and
hamlet throughout the United States, can corroborate.

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I began immediately to supplant intolerance with
tolerance. I began to emulate the

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immortal Lincoln in those wonderful qualities of
justice toward all friend and foe alike.

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New power began to come, not
alone to my spoken words, but to

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my pen as well. And I
saw, as plainly as I could see

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the sun on a clear day,
the steady development of that ability to express

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myself with force and conviction by the
written word, which I had so much

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admired in Elbert Hubbard. In speaking
of this very point not many months ago,

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mister Myers, an official of the
Morris Packing Company of Chicago, made

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the remark that my editorials in Hill's
Golden Rule magazine reminded him very forcefully of

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the late Elbert Hubbard, and added
that he had just stated to one of

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his associates a few days previously that
I was not only big enough to fill

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Albert Hubbard's shoes, but that I
had already outgrown them. Again, I

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remind you not to brush these facts
aside lightly, or to charge them to

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egotism. If I write as well
as Hubbard, it is because I have

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aspired to do so first, having
deliberately made use of auto suggestion, to

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charge my mind with the aim and
purpose of not only equalling him, but

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of excelling him, if possible.
I am not unmindful of the fact that

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the display of egotism is an unpardonable
weakness in either a writer or a speaker,

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and no one more readily denounces such
shallowness of mind than this writer.

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However, I must also remind you
that it is not always a sign of

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egotism. When a writer refers to
his own personal experiences for the purpose of

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giving his readers authentic data on a
given subject. Sometimes it requires courage to

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do so. In this particular case, I would refrain from the free use

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of the personal pronoun which has so
frequently crept into this narrative, were it

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not for the fact that to do
so would take away much of the value

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of my work. I am relating
these personal experiences solely because I know they

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are authentic, believing as I do, that it is preferable to run the

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risk of being classed as egotistical.
Rather than use a hypothetical illustration of the

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principle of auto suggestion or right in
a third person