CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
PART 1
PART II
THE PENDULUM OF GIVING AND GETTING
PROLOGUE
SINCE the childhood of the race mankind has been haunted by the knowledge that all around him are riches and supplies sufficient to more than satisfy his every want—if only he could lay his hands on the key to make those riches available.
You find this thought running through the ancient Chinese and East Indian legends, you meet it in the tales of Aladdin and Ali Baba from the Arabian Nights, you come across it in the folklore and myth of every bygone people. Van Dyke tells of it in the “Lost Word” and Longfellow in “Sandalphon”.
In most of these tales, the key takes the form of some magic word, as in the story of Ali Baba, where his “Open, Sesame!” opened to him the door of the robbers’ treasure cave, containing uncounted riches.
Even among the Jewish Rabbis, there was a secret cult called the “Cabala”, which believed that writing was revealed to man as a means of penetrating the Divine mysteries, and that every letter, every word and number, even every accent in the Scriptures contains a hidden meaning. And by their system of interpretations, they arrived at this hidden meaning.
But there was one word that was lost, and this word was the most important of all—the secret name of God! One of the very foundation stones of the ancient Jewish religion was that the knowledge of the secret name of God enabled anyone who possessed it to perform the most marvelous deeds.
This secret name was said to have been revealed to Moses by God Himself, taught by him to Aaron and handed down to the High Priests of Israel. It was the secret enshrined in the Holy of Holies. It was the supreme object of all attainment, for with it one could do anything.
The possession of this secret name was believed to be the power by which Moses was able to overcome all the might of the Pharaohs, to bring down the ten plagues upon Egypt while keeping his own people free, to divide the Red Sea, to lead the Israelites through the wilderness to the edge of the Promised Land. Elijah had it, and Elisha—all the great wonder-workers of antiquity—and by it they cured the sick and the crippled, by it they defeated great armies, by it they even raised the dead.
This sounds incredible, of course, but the strange part is that it is true! To him who knows the secret name of God, all things are possible. It is the Lost Word of Power, the “Open Sesame!” of Aladdin, the “Schem-Hammaphoraseh” of the Israelites. What is more, YOU can learn it. Not only learn it, but USE it! How?
“The Word is nigh unto us,” we are assured in Deuteronomy, “even in our hearts and in our mouths.” But how get hold of it?
In the Book of Job, we are told that “If there be a messenger with us, an interpreter, we shall be delivered from going down into the pit.” And again in Job, we are assured that by acquainting ourselves with God, we shall not only be at peace, but shall lay up gold as dust and have plenty of silver.
On through both the Old and the New Testaments, we are told that if we possess certain understanding, all things we desire shall be ours—riches and honor, health, happiness and triumph over our enemies. And again and again we are given the records of those who triumphed through such understanding.
The Bible might well be called the Book of Promise, so many and so varied are the promises of good in it. And through all of these promises there runs this common element—the idea that if we acquire certain wisdom, certain understanding, all good things will be given us.
Job makes them contingent upon rightly interpreting a certain message. The Psalms speak of their attainment, through “ways made known unto Moses”. Solomon adjures us to seek first understanding, and all else will follow.
Similar promises are to be found in the Vedas and the sacred books of other old religions.
For an idea to persist through so many ages, it must have at least a grain of truth back of it. And that there is more than a grain of truth in these promises, we think you will agree when you have read the following.
“Lord, of a thousand worlds, I AM;
I’ve reigned since Time began;
And night and day, in cyclic sway,
Pass by while their deeds I can.
Yea, Time shall cease ere I find release,
For I AM the Soul of Man.”
PART I
The Lost Word of Power
“Thou shall also decree a thing and it shall be established unto thee.”
Job 22:28.
“YOU know, of course that, reduced to the ultimate everything in this universe is merely a form of energy—so many protons and electrons revolving about each other with the speed of express trains. You and I and the chairs, on which we sit, the desks where we work, the trains we ride on, the houses we live in, are merely so much electrical energy, with varying degrees of density.
All about us, in the air we breathe, in the interstellar spaces, everywhere, is more of this same energy—only in its free state, uncondensed.
The process of condensing this infinite supply of energy is going on all the time. So, likewise, is the process of freeing it. Every living growing organism is continually condensing energy. Every living and dying organism is constantly releasing it. Each move you make, each breath you take, releases a certain amount of energy in the waste matter you throw off through your nostrils and pores.
But—and here is something everyone does not know—every thought you think releases or condenses energy, through its action upon your nerve centers.
To get at the principle behind this, let us go back for a moment to the first forms of life upon earth, for while forms keep changing through the ages, principles remain the same. When you want to see how a principle works, study it first in its simplest form, then watch it continue its unvaried way through all the changing forms that follow.
It matters not whether you choose plant or animal life; it is bound to start with the single cell. And the first cell, plant and animal alike, rested upon the waters, where it could ABSORB the nutriment it needed from the waters about it.
Through all the different gradations of vegetable and animal life, that one basic principle has never changed. Every live cell, no matter whether in man or vegetable, is just as much immersed in water today as was the original cell that rested on the face of the waters millions of years ago. Not only has that, but it still depended upon the water around it for all its nourishment. There are differences in the outer form, in the controlling brain, but no difference in the life principle. All life is cell life. And all cell life depends for its nourishment upon the water by which it is surrounded. Hearts, brains, stomachs, limbs—these every cell in our complicated organisms fully supplied with water containing the elements those cells need for life.
But the farther an organism gets from the single cell resting alone upon the waters, the more complicated its functioning becomes and the more difficult to maintain life. Yet the life-principle is a stubborn principle, and has shown its power—not once or twice, but literally millions of times, to overcome any obstacle, to draw to itself from the elements around it WHATEVER IT NEEDS FOR SURVIVAL AND GROWTH.
When the different species of animals increased and began to prey upon one another, what happened? Did the weak then perish from the earth? On the contrary! They promptly developed means of escape or defense. One species grew a shell, another sting, a third greater speed, a fourth secreted an ink-like fluid that so colored the waters about as to make it invisible! Always each form of life showed that it had within itself power to draw to it whatever elements it needed for survival.
Why, then, have so many species perished from the earth? What became of the pterodactyl, the tyrannosaurus, the mammoth, the dinosaur, all the other giant monsters of antiquity? The same thing that became of Egypt and Persia, Greece and Rome. They perished—not from weakness, but from STRENGTH! They grew so great and powerful that they thought they had all the strength they needed within themselves! They stopped reaching out for new life, new energy, new forms. They stopped stirring up the life in them, and complacently let it settle in the form they thought invincible. Naturally they perished!
You see, the whole principle of cell life, from the single cell on the waters to the highest product of creation, man, rests NOT upon storing up energy, but drawing its needs from the waters around it as those needs develop. When you close the openings (pores) in a cell, or wall it round so new elements cannot enter, you kill the cell. So the first essential of cell life is keeping the pores open.
But that would seem to leave the cell without the early forms of cell life get around this, how did they develop their shells, their stings, their scales, their wings? Again by drawing upon the elements around them, but this time each according to what the center of its nervous organism conceived to be its needs. The same water, the same air, surrounded all, but each drew from them the particular elements it needed for survival, just as the seed of wheat draws from the soil one element, the cotton seed another, and the seed of the tobacco plant still a third.
The point is that in the circle of its drawing power (its magnetic circle, we might call it) lies whatever element each cell needs for survival and for expression. But it must keep reaching out for these. It must keep growing. No matter how tight the shell it builds around itself, it must leave openings for new life to come in. If it does not, a man, or a nation, becomes so self-satisfied or so confident of its own strength that it walls itself in and ceases to draw upon the outside for life, it starts to die.
You find that thought expressed in the Bible in a dozen places. “Thus saith the Lord,” cried the Prophet Jeremiah, “cursed be the man that trusted in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord. Blessed is the man that trusted in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is. For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.” And Ezekiel put it—“I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken, and will strengthen that which was sick. But I will destroy the fat and the strong”
You see, life is dynamic—not static. It hates complacency, selfsatisfaction. It wants to be stirred up, it insists upon being drawn upon, and if you won’t do it, throws you into the discard and gives the chance to someone else.
What would happen to a cell in your own body that grew so fat and strong that it closed itself to all the lymph (water) around it? It would dry up and die, would it not, and your lymph would bend its efforts towards getting rid of it to make room for a live cell that would USE the nourishment with which it was surrounded.
The same is true of every form of life. You, for instance, are just a cell in the great God-body of the universe. All about you is the lymph of God—the electrical energy in the ether which contains every element you need for life, for your surroundings, for your expression. The only thing you must do is give it form.
You are giving it form every minute, in your body, your circumstances, and your surroundings. The trouble is you are doing it unconsciously, so more often than not you give it the forms you fear rather than the ones you want. What is the remedy?
1st, to learn how to consciously and intelligently give this energy the form you want it to take.
2nd, to break up the old imperfect or grotesque forms made by fear, and cast them into the discard.
How did the crawfish get its shell? How did the bee get its sting, the serpent its fangs, the bird its wings? They were not created that way. They came through a gradual process of evolution. And what brought them was the need for escape from imminent danger, the urgent need acting galvanically upon the nervous center of each creature, impelling it to draw upon the elements around it for what it felt was necessary to it for survival.
Remember that: It is not the intellect, not the brain that draws things to you. It is your NERVE CENTERS—your solar plexus and radio power stations, their nerve ends your Kingdom come, you can intellectually desire when you get the urge into your FEELINGS, when your whole being vibrates to the Need for it, that you draw to yourself from anywhere and everywhere the elements necessary to its manifestation.
That is why the sincere love of a man for a maid so often draws to him the object of his affections, even though at first she seems entirely indifferent to him. Love sets his nerve centers vibrating with feeling, with desire, and unless neutralized by counter waves of doubt and fear, draws to itself its own.
But it works as surely the other way, too. Fear and jealousy are just as potent energizers of the nerve centers, and they draw to themselves the elements they dwell upon quite as certainly.
You see, nerve centers came before the brain, and as magnetic factors, they are still more potent than the brain. They responded to outside influences before there was any such thing as a brain, and even now, if the brain be removed, the nerve centers continue for a time to react to certain impulses. Darwin noted this in the reflexes of a decapitated frog:
“If a drop of acid be placed on the lower surface of the thigh of a headless frog,” he writes, “it will rub off the drop with the upper surface of the foot of the same leg. If this foot is cut off, it cannot thus act. After some fruitless efforts, therefore, it gives up trying in that way, and at last makes use of the foot of the other leg and succeeds in rubbing off the acid. Notably we have here not merely contractions of muscles but combined and harmonized contractions in due sequence for a special purpose. These are actions that have all the appearance of being guided by intelligence and instigated by will in an animal, the recognized organ of whose intelligence and will (the brain) has been removed.”
Tests have proven the same principle to be true of human tissue. The cells react to certain outside impulses after being removed from the body, exactly as they would when connected with the brain. In short, it is your nerve centers that are the seat of all your reflex actions. And it is your nerve centers that magnetize you for good or ill, for fortune or disaster.
Think back for a moment to some of those times when you have been worried, fearful. Remember what a “gone” feeling it gave you in the pit of your stomach, remember how your nerves were on edge all over your body, so that any sudden noise made you jump, any trifling annoyance exasperated you beyond all reason?
Why? Because your nerves were keyed tight like so many violin strings, and they vibrated to the slightest touch. It is when they are in this state that they are most like radio antennae, drawing to themselves from the whole universe the elements they seek.
But when keyed up by fear or anger or worry, the elements your antennae seek out are those related to their causes, and they usually take form as sickness or trouble or disaster of some kind.
You can key your antennae to just as receptive a pitch through any other emotion, and draw to you every element of good instead of evil.
It is nature in her primitive state at work all over again. To those creatures who feared greatly, she gave shells to shut themselves up in. To the fierce and those easily angered, she gave teeth and claws and sinews for battle. But to those who loved peace, she gave wings to soar aloft, far from all the turmoil and strife, with safety and seclusion in the topmost branches of the tallest trees. To each according to what it conceived to be its own needs.
What are YOUR needs? A job, enough to eat, a place to sleep? Then these are all you will get. Make your needs great ones, worthwhile ones! The life in you is just as capable of drawing to you the elements necessary to fill them. But to get them, you have to break out of your shell; in fact, you have to break up into pieces the shell of circumstance that has formed around you, and start all over like the single cell.
The only biological reason for old age is that the cells of the body become clogged with waste matter, until every pore and passage is literally encased in a hard shell, and though surrounded by life, new life can’t get in! The remedy is the same as for a dry, hard sponge—squeeze it tight, immerse it and let what water will come in. The first time, there won’t be much, but each time you squeeze it, the water will wash out more and more of the impurities that clog it, until finally you have a fresh, clean sponge, capable of drawing to itself and holding the maximum amount of water.
The same principle holds true of you as a cell in the God-body of the universe. You are surrounded by lymph (the water in the body, you know, is called lymph. In the case of the universe, let us take the electrical energy all around us, of which everything is made, as our lymph). Yet you have been getting from it only a bare existence, while others around you no more able, no more worthy; have been drawing down all the comforts of life. What is your trouble?
Get rid right now of any idea that it is because your neighbor is more favored than you, with brains, or opportunity, or education. These help, but they are not decisive factors. The deciding factors are WHAT YOU REQUIRE FROM LIFE and ON WHAT YOU PUT YOUR DEPENDENCE FOR IT!
If trees depended upon root pressure alone to drive the water to their topmost branches, we should have forests of nothing but stunted trees. It is the evaporation of the moisture in the leaves that carries water to the tops of even the tallest trees.
Just so with you. If you depend upon your skill or ability alone, you will never get far. You will be stunted all your life. You will be living in your own shell dependent upon the nourishment your roots can bring to you from the soil immediately around them. In other words, you will be dependent entirely upon the skill of your hands or the work of your head. But that is the smallest part of you. It is when you reach out with all your millions of antennae that you get the whole universe working for you until you tower head and shoulders over all about you.
You are not to draw upon the help of the universe through your friends or relatives or those around you! No, indeed! You are to draw it as all cell life has from the beginning—through your own self, through your nerve centers!
When the crawfish needed a shell, he didn’t borrow the requisites for it from his neighbors. He drew upon the lymph around him for the elements necessary to its making, letting them work through him. And that is what you, too, must do.
But first you must make sure that every pore and passage is open to that lymph. You must break down every wall that hedges you in. You must smash every shell that keeps the good out. You must let go of all fears, all hatreds, all resentments.
When you plant a seed of corn, what is the first thing you do? Break up the ground, is it not? But after a while, that ground settles again, and the rain and wind and sunshine bake it as hard as a shell. What do you do? Break it up—that the warmth and the air and the moisture may freely reach your seed. Only thus can you expect it to increase and multiply an hundredfold.
You are like that seed of corn. You were planted in rich soil, but the storms of circumstance and the heat of struggle have baked it into a hard shell that holds you down. You have to break that shell before you can bring forth fruit.
Your habits of thought, your outlook on life, your circumstances and surroundings, all form part of that shell. You must break them up. You have been accustomed to depend upon your own unaided skill or abilities for your opportunities. You have looked to your customers, or business associates, or your own physical efforts, for your rewards. All these are right enough, if you can be satisfied with the mere work of your hands, but it you are looking for the big rewards, you must break up all dependence upon circumstances and conditions. How shall you break it up?
How is it done throughout all nature? The conditions surrounding you have congealed into their present form as the result of circumstances over a long period of years, so your shell is hard and strong. It will take some breaking. Let us, therefore, choose for our analogy another hard shell, the black walnut.
When the black walnut wants to bring forth fruit, what does it do? It heats, does it not? The heart of it, the kernel of it, germinates so great a desire for growth that it bursts from its shell, breaking the tough casing into pieces.
What follows then? It GIVES all its vitality, all its power, to send forth a shoot—upward, into the air! Not, mind you, a root into the earth to get nourishment and help. First it gives all it has in sending its shoot upward. Only when it has used up the vitality inherent within itself does it put out roots. And what happens then? The warmth of the sun, taking from that shoot all the moisture it has to give, by that very process DRAWS into it from the earth beneath the elements it needs for growth!
You are the kernel, in the shell of circumstance that surrounds you. To burst from that shell takes a desire so strong, so sincere, that it breaks up every dependence upon the conditions that have been supporting it, and sends up the shoot of all it has to offer of skill and ability and possessions, content to stand or fall by the fruit it can bring forth.
Perhaps the easiest way to explain how this works is to quote from the story by Lloyd Douglas—”The Magnificent Obsession” (published by Willett, Clark & Colby). It starts with the account of young Dr. Hudson, despondent, discouraged, his wife just dead after a long illness that had taken his practice and mortgaged his future for years. One day a successful sculptor asked him— “Would you like to be the best doctor in this town”?
He thought the man crazy, but finally consented to go to his home one evening and hear the formula.
“You may be interested to know,” the sculptor explained after the usual preliminaries, “that I was an ordinary stone-cutter until about three years ago, hacking out stamped letters with a compression chisel. From my youth, I had cherished an ambition to do something important in stone. But there was never any money for training; every attempt I had made from time to time, had netted nothing but discouragement.
“One day, I went to the Church my little girl attended, and heard a preacher read what is on this page (pointing to a page torn from the Bible). It evidently meant nothing to him, for he read it in a dull, monotonous chant. And the congregation sat glassy-eyed, the words apparently making no impression. As for me, I was profoundly stirred. The remainder of the hour was torture, for I wanted to get out where I could think.
“Hurrying home to our bare little house, I found—with considerable difficulty, for I was not familiar with the Bible—that page from which the minister had read. There it was—in black and white—the exact process for achieving power to do, be, and have what you want! I experimented.”
With that he handed me the magic page. “Of course,” he explained, “you will not realize the full importance of all this, instantly. It seems simple because it was spoken dispassionately, with no oratorical bombast or prefatory warning that the formula he was about to state was the key to power!”
Edging his chair closer to mine, he laid a long hand on my knee and looked me squarely in the eyes.
“Doctor Hudson—if you had a small, inadequate brick house, and decided to give yourself more room, what would you need for your building? . . . More brick. . . . If you had a small, inadequate steam engine, you would want more steel to construct larger cylinders— not a different kind of steel but merely more room for expansion. .
. . Now—if you had a small, inadequate personality, and wanted to give it a chance to be something mote important, where would you find the building materials?
He seemed waiting for a reply, so I humored him.
“Well—according to the drift of your argument, I presume I would have to build it out of other personalities. Is that what you’re driving at?”
“Precisely!” he shouted. “But—not out of! . . . Into . . . This theory I am talking about doesn’t ask you to build your personality out of other personalities, but into them!”
“I’m afraid it’s all too deep for me,” I admitted, befuddledly.
He rose and stamped back and forth.
“See here! You know all about blood transfusion. That’s in your line. Superb! . . . One man puts his life into another man. . . . Doctor—how do you accomplish a blood transfusion? Tell me in detail!”
“Well—it’s simple enough, except for one obstacle. The blood must be kept from coagulation as it passes from the donor to the recipient. Even when the artery and the vein are attached by a little cannula, the blood soon clogs the glass; so to avoid that stoppage, the vein of the recipient is passed through the cannula and cuffed back over the end of it. Then the cannula, carrying the vein, is inserted into the artery of the donor. The point is, you see, to insure against any outside contact.”
Randolph, the sculptor, seemed mighty pleased, especially with the feature which concerned the problem of coagulation.
“You will notice there,” pointing to the page in my hand, “that the first step toward the achievement of power is an expansion—a projection of one’s self into other personalities. You will see that it has to be done with such absolute secrecy that if, by any chance, the contact is not immediate and direct—if, by any chance, there is a leak along the line of transfer—the whole effect of it is wasted! You have to do it so stealthily that even your own left hand—”
Randolph returned to his chair, and went on in a lowered voice:
“Hudson—the first time I tried it—I can tell you the incident freely because nothing ever came of it, although it had cost me more than I could afford, at the time, to do it—the chap was so grateful he told a neighbor of mine, in spite of my swearing him in. He had been out of work and there had been a long run of sickness in the family, and he was too shabby and down at heel to make a presentable appearance in asking for a job. I outfitted him. He told it. A neighbor felicitated me, next day. So there was more than Sixty Dollars of my hard-earned cash squandered.”
“Squandered!” I shouted, in amazement. “How squandered? Didn’t he get the job?”
Randolph sighed.
“Oh, yes,” he said. “He found a job. I was glad enough for that, of course. But—that didn’t do me any good! You’d better believe— the next time I made an outlay I informed the fellow that if I ever heard of his telling anybody, I would break his neck.”
He laughed merrily at the remembrance of the incident.
“The man thought I was crazy!” he added, wiping his eyes.
“You might well be disgusted with that,” pursued Randolph, “if I were trying to get power, that way, to stack up a lot of money for my own pleasure. All I wanted was the effective release of my latent ability to do something fine! . . . On the night of the day I made my first successful projection of my personality—I cannot tell you what that was—I dare not—I went literally into a closet in my house, and shut the door. That’s the next step in the program, as you have read there on that page. You see—I was very much in earnest about this matter; and, having already bungled one attempt, I was resolved to obey the rules to the letter. . . . Later, I discovered that the principle will work elsewhere than in a closet. Just so you’re insulated.”
“Oh—Randolph—for God’s sake!” I exploded. “What manner of wild talk is this?”
“I confess I can’t understand,” said Randolph impatiently, “why you find this so hard to accept! Why—it’s in line with our experience of every other energy we use! Either we meet its terms, or we don’t get the power. What did Volta’s battery or Faraday’s dynamo amount to practically, until DuFay discovered an insulation that would protect the current from being dissipated through contacts with other things than the object to be energized? . . . Most personalities are just grounded!
That’s all that ails them.
“So I went into a closet; shut the door; closed my eyes; quietly put myself into a spiritually receptive mood, and said, confidently, addressing the Major Personality,—I have fulfilled all the conditions required of me for receiving power! I am ready to have it! I want it! I want the capacity to do just one creditable work of statuary!’
“That was late in the night. I came out of that dark, stifling little closet with a curious sense of mastery. It put me erect, flexed the muscles of my jaw, made my step resilient. I wanted to laugh! I tried to sleep; and, failing of it, walked the streets until dawn. At eight-thirty, I approached the manager of the factory and asked for six months’ leave. When he inquired my reason I told him I had it in mind to attempt a piece of statuary.
” ‘Something we might use, perhaps?’ he asked. ‘I am confident of it,’ I said, surprised at my own audacity. It was enough that I had determined to survive somehow, without wages, for six months; but now I had made an extravagant promise to the manager. He was thoughtful for a while and then said:
” ‘I’ll gives you a chance to try it. For the present, you are to have your usual pay, and a studio to yourself. If you produce something we can place, you will share in the sale. Your hours will be your own business. I should be glad if you succeeded.’
“I began work at once in a flutter of excitement. The clay seemed alive in my hands! That first day was a revelation. It was as if I had not really lived before. All colors were more vivid. I want you to remember that, Hudson. See if you have the same reaction. Grass is greener; the sky is bluer; you hear the birds more distinctly. It sharpens the senses—like cocaine.
“That was on a Friday, the tenth of June. On the first day of September I invited the manager in to see the cast I had made. He
looked at it for a long time without any remark. Then he said, quietly, ‘I have some people who may be interested in this.’
“The next afternoon, the manager’s clients came in—a man and his wife. She was in black. They had recently lost their little boy. She cried at first, heart-breakingly. But, after a while, she smiled. It made me very happy when she smiled. I knew then that I had been able to express my thought.
“I was told to go on with my project and put it into white marble. .
. . Quite incidentally, the people adopted the boy I had used for a model.”
It was about four o’clock when I left Randolph’s house that night. I was in a grand state of mystification. I went home resolved that I would make an experiment similar to his. All that day, I was aware of being on a quiet, unrelenting search for some suitable clinical material to be used for an experiment in the dynamics of personal- ity-projection. . . . The strangest feature of my mood, however, was the fact that the power I had begun, rather vaguely, to grope for— under Randolph’s urging—was not the mere satisfaction of an ambition to make myself important or minister to my own vanity. . . . For the first time, my profession seemed to me not as a weapon of self-defense but a means of releasing myself.
How Dr. Hudson succeeded in projecting his personality through others, and how it made of him not merely all that Randolph had promised—”the best doctor in his town”—but one of the biggest in the world, is all part of the story—a story you may get by sending $2.50 to Willett, Clark & Colby, 440 South Dearborn Street, Chicago, III., and asking for Lloyd C. Douglas’ “Magnificent Obsession”.
But the important part, the part for you to take to your heart and make your own, lies in his secret of success, a secret that will work just as surely for you as it did for him, the secret of multiplying your power by projecting it through other entities, casting your bread upon the waters so it returns increased an hundredfold.
You see, it all cames back to terms of electrical energy, for what is energy but power, and what are personality, skill, ability, riches, but different forms of power? If you want to increase your stock of these, what must you do? Put these to work, must you not? Put them out at interest, as in the parable of the talents. No energy ever expanded until it was released. No seed ever multiplied until it was sown. No talent ever increased until it was used.
You want more power, more riches, greater ability, and a wider field of usefulness. How are you going to get them? Only by putting out at interest that which you have!
And the way to do this lies—NOT in working for riches as such— BUT FOR INCREASE IN THE FORM OF ENERGY YOU HAVE.
Do you know what the most important lesson in the whole Bible is? Do you know what principle was considered so vital that God is said to have used it on three of the six days of creation, and it is repeated no less than six times in the first chapter of Genesis alone? Just this:
“EVERYTHING REPRODUCES AFTER ITS OWN KIND!”
Go back over the miracles of increase in the Bible. What do you find? When the widow of Zaraphath gave Elijah her oil and meal, what did she get? MORE OIL AND MEAL, did she not? Not gold or riches, but INCREASE AFTER ITS KIND.
When another widow begged Elisha to save her sons from bondage, he asked—”What hast thou in the house?” And when told— “Naught save a pot of oil,” it was the oil he increased, was it not?
When the multitude lacked for bread and the Apostles asked Jesus what they should do, He did not turn the stones into bread, or bring forth gold with which to buy it. No. He asked—”How many loaves have you?” And when told five and two fishes, He based His increase upon them.
Where does that leave us? You want more power, more ability, a greater field of usefulness. How are you going to get them? BY PLANTING WHAT YOU HAVE WHERE IT WILL SHOW THE GREATEST INCREASE!
It takes 90% of a locomotive’s power to start the heavy train of cars, but only half of 1% to keep it going. In other words, a locomotive running along a level track at ordinary speed is using only one half of 1% of its power. The rest is reserve energy, needed only for the heavy grades and the starting load.
Suppose every man and woman were such an engine, their job in life the train. Think how few people there are who ever get started. Most are like an engine coupled on to too heavy a train, which puffs and strains and tugs, and tears itself to pieces spinning its wheels, but never gets farther than the one spot. Many of those who do get started fail at the first heavy grade; and at every succeeding grade, numbers are stranded.
Suppose you were to give some of these a push—just enough to start them or to ease them to the top of the grade—wouldn’t you be entitled to half their surplus power when they came to a nice, level stretch of smooth running? Wouldn’t you be like the storekeeper who grub-stakes a prospector—entitled to half his find?
And wouldn’t that excess power be just what you need to carry you to some height you had longed for, but never been able to reach alone, to enable you to perform some task of such Herculean proportions as to put you in the ranks of genius?
That is the Secret of Power—the secret written in the Vedas 2,000 years before Christ, the secret that Jesus gave us a dozen different times in as many different wordings! How to use that secret and what the Lost Word of Power really consists of, will be given in Part II, which follows.
PART II
The Lost Word of Power
IN CONCLUDING Part I of “The Lost Word of Power”, we brought out the fact that it requires 90% of the average locomotive’s power to start its train of cars, but only half of 1% to keep it going on a level stretch of track. Using the simile of everyone as a locomotive, his work in life the train, we agreed that when we helped anyone to start a train too heavy for him alone, we released 99[1]/2% of his powers, and were therefore entitled to a share of that surplus energy.
That is the secret of power as expressed in the Vedas 2,000 years before Christ: ”If any two people will unite their psychic forces, they can conquer the world, even though singly they can do nothing.” That is the secret of power Jesus gave us: “If two of you shall unite as touching anything they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father, which is in Heaven.”
“But,” I can hear you say, “I’ve given to charity all my life. I’m an easy mark for all my friends when they need money, and no panhandler ever passes me by. Yet it’s never gotten me a thing. And there is Jones, too, who has always tithed to his Church, and whose name is on the roll of every charitable enterprise. Yet he got caught in the market, and now hasn’t a thing. Don’t tell me giving to charity brings a man any increase.”
If you were in the business of grub-staking prospectors, hoping thus to come in on half of a great gold mine, you’d be pretty careful of the men you staked, would you not? You’d try to steer clear of lazy, drunken loafers, who were looking merely for a few months’ free grub, because you would know that you might spend all your money grub-staking such, yet you’d never get one cent’s return.
And you would not put your money into a syndicate organized for the purpose of grub-staking miners, unless you had a lot of confidence in the judgment of the men who were going to hand out the supplies. You’d rather trust your own judgment than leave this to most men, wouldn’t you?
Yet when you give to charitable a organization, that is exactly what you are doing—putting your money into an organization for grubstaking rather than attending to it yourself. And when you give to every panhandler, you have as little chance of returns as if you grub-staked a shiftless, drunken prospector.
You see, it is not the giving that counts. It is the INCREASE!
Does that sound selfish? Is it selfish for a farmer to refuse to plant his seed in poor ground, and save it until he finds the right soil? Is it selfish for an engineer to refuse to turn his steam into a broken- down engine, and save it until he can find one capable of developing power?
It does not matter how much money you give—if it fails to produce. The man who spends $100,000 grub-staking prospectors does not get any more out of it than the one who spends $100—if none of them finds gold. $10,000 sunk in a dry hole in the oil fields will not add a single star to your crown, here or hereafter, and neither will the same amount wasted on derelicts.
If you want power from your giving, give where it will produce power. Give to someone who is TRYING, pick one who is straining every nerve to do something with what he has, choose one who will add all his own power to what you give him, and make the two carry him over the top.
But above all, remember this—”Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in Heaven.”
To go back to the simile of the two freight trains, suppose, after you have helped another train over the grade, you or the engineer of it use all your surplus energy to toot your whistle, to tell the world what a fine fellow you are. How much better off are you? You are like the Mississippi steamboat that had to tie up to the bank every time the captain blew the whistle. You have used up all your power. As Jesus put it—
“Therefore, when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily, I say unto you, they have their reward.
“But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth that thine alms may be in secret; and thy Father, who seeth in secret Himself shall reward thee openly.”
That brings us to the next important point. When you give, give freely, gladly, and just as the farmer would be glad to find a new field of virgin soil to plant his seed, or the engineer a new outlet for his power. And look for your reward—NOT to the return of your gift, but to the resultant power!
“Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die,” said Jesus, “it abideth alone. But if it dies, it bringeth forth much fruit.”
In “The Magnificent Obsession,” the people Dr. Hudson helped often tried to pay him back. Invariably he refused to accept it, and when pressed for the reason, his answer was—”Because I’ve already used it all up myself!”
You can lend money, and get 6% or 10% or whatever interest you can get away with. But if you want to increase it—”some thirty, some sixty, and same a hundredfold”—you’ve got to GIVE it as completely as the farmer gives his seed to the ground. Once planted, the seed itself is lost to him forever. It is to its FRUIT that he looks for his reward. Naturally, after he had eaten of that fruit, Dr. Hudson was not going to accept the return of the seed, even when it could be dug up and given back to him.
But how does all this explain the method of breaking up the shell of wrong conditions, drawing upon the elements about you for the right conditions?
When you want to break up anything, the surest way to do it completely is to get at the very heart of it, is it not? Nearest to the heart of almost every man are his possessions. If he will let go of them freely and willingly, he will let go of everything else. When he loses them, he is willing to put his dependence upon God, but as long as he has material possessions to depend upon, he is likely to put more or less of his dependence upon them.
So when conditions become more than you can bear, when difficulties beset you and obstacles hem you in and there seems no human way out, start the break-up of the conditions that surround you by GIVING—giving freely and cheerfully—but giving where it will release power!
Most people will find it hard to do that. As long as it is merely intellectual effort that is required of them, they will follow. But to give after all the work it took to get together those few possessions—that’s different! Yet if you will read “The Magnificent Obsession,” you will see that such giving works. Lest that be construed as making it necessary for you to buy something else before you can learn the secret, let me give you here the story of D. C. Peck, President of The Peck Spring Company of Plainville, Conn.
“A good many years ago,” writes Mr. Peck, “I lived in Chicago, as the representative of a large manufacturing concern in the East. My business yielded a fair income, which enabled me to support a wife and three children.
“My wife, however, was afflicted with a fibroid tumor and was constantly under the Doctor’s Care. It was necessary that I make a business trip East, and upon my return she expected to submit to a surgical operation for its removal.
“One day, while awaiting a train at Waterbury, Conn., I met a man with whom I presently engaged in conversation. He began telling me what was apparently something of great moment to him, of the wonderful healing his wife had received after being given up to die by physicians, through what he called MIND CURE.
“I listened at first with a laugh up my sleeve, for I thought, he is only a crank and doesn’t know what he is talking about. But his sincerity and earnestness finally convinced me that at least he believed in what he was talking about, and learning that he was prominent business man of Hartford, Conn., I began at last to pay some attention to his story and give it real thought.
“Before I reached home, I had felt the dawning of a faith that was entirely new to me, which was that the Creator of humanity had not left them orphans, but was just as desirous of helping them through the life he had given, as he had been in his creation of them.
“Reaching my home, I told my wife what I had heard and what I felt convinced was a better solution of our trouble than a surgical operation, and was very glad to see that she was also impressed with the thought. Bear in mind this was many years ago and Christian Science and New Thought were almost or entirely unheard of.
“On Monday, she went to her Doctor and told him she would not have the operation, but would trust to her Father in Heaven for healing. He called her a fool and prophesied dire results, but we were unshaken. Without going into further details, let me say that within a week her tumor had disappeared and she became a well woman, after years of invalidism.
“It was to me a wonderful revelation. The idea that God cared for His children and would heal their sickness was about too great for belief, not withstanding I had read of His willingness and ability to do it many times. I had read of the Christ coming to earth for THAT VERY PURPOSE, but I didn’t believe it meant me!
“I found that this demonstration had given me something which had been entirely lacking, which was FAITH IN THE UNSEEN FATHER.
“And here comes an apparent contradiction to all the promises. My business, which had been, profitable, began to wane. One misfortune after another followed, and at last, in sheer desperation, I resigned from my company because I COULD NOT MAKE A LIVING AND SUPPORT MY FAMILY.
“Then followed days of agony and depression, when after showing us most wonderfully the answer to our prayer for healing, God had APPARENTLY deserted us. He was leaving us to starve. I had been so engrossed with the wonderful thought of His healing power that I had gone to the sick wherever I could find them and told them of the BETTER WAY. But apparently God had deserted us. Why should we be unable to make a living? Why be left to starve in a great city thousands of miles from friends and relatives who might help us?
“I struggled against my fate as valiantly as I could. Day after day I went forth seeking employment. I answered advertisements but without avail. At length I came to a place where I was at my WITS END. I could DO NO MORE. At this point I might have called for human assistance. But after the wonderful demonstration of DIVINE POWER I had witnessed, I felt that it would be denying that power to do so. And so I promised not to apply to any less a source for help than the Great Giver.
“Instead I closeted myself, telling my wife I would not come forth until I had received an answer to my terrible problem.
“I spent hours searching my Bible for comfort, but comfort seemed to have been withheld.
“At length, very weary and worn, I came to this passage in Ezekiel—’Son of man, behold with thine eyes and ears the things which I will show unto thee, for to this intent wert thou brought hither.’ This may have been written primarily for Ezekiel, but there came such a wave of emotion to me that the words stood out like fire. It was a MESSAGE TO ME ALONE at that particular time.
“I emerged from my closet a changed man.
I had GIVEN UP THE STRUGGLE. Henceforth I was looking for something to be shown me. I ceased looking for employment, and wonderful to relate—to worry. Something BIG was to come soon. The little money I had been enabled to save was soon used, and one morning at breakfast we ate OUR LAST MEAL. Not a penny to buy our dinner and a wife and three children dependent upon us.
“Yet this is what I said to my wife, and strange to relate, without a particle of depression or doubt. ‘I am glad we are brought to this, for now we can prove the truth of God’s saying, that He knoweth our needs.’
“Nothing to do but WAIT. No business, no food, no money. Simply sitting there in silence, JUST WAITING.
“About half past eleven, the mail man brought a letter. It was in an unknown superscription. We broke it open and took out a check for $10.00. A short note accompanied it. ‘The LORD DIRECTS me to send you this check, so please thank HIM and not me.’
“Tearfully I handed the check and note to my wife, saying ‘Here is an EARNEST of what our Father is going to do for us.’ But ten dollars didn’t last forever, although it provided us with a good dinner. Other days were to follow. We tried to find our place in the SCHEME OF THINGS. We were NOT TO BE IDLE and so we continued to preach the Gospel of Healing and Abundance through faith in the UNSEEN. We went to the hospitals and to homes of the poor, endeavoring to make ourselves of some use.
“It will not be necessary, I am sure; to write a biography of our life for you, but just to say that for seven years thereafter we lived in the city of Chicago and were FED. Our family survived, and TRUE TO OUR RESOLUTION, we never asked help from a human being.
“I gave ALL THAT I HAD TO GIVE, for my experience had already taught me that in order to receive, I must give. And all the promises of support were given me. A miracle, as far as human conception of what it consisted of, happened every day. Money came to me from many UNKNOWN SOURCES. When rent was due and we asked for it, it came. I needed a new overcoat, and asked for it. It soon came, and insofar as I know, no human being had ever heard me express my need for one.
“During this period, we certainly had our days of trial. Why not? Every human being must stand the testing. We took many poor, weak ones into our home and FED THEM, and they went forth rejoicing in health. The money to feed them was always provided. But we couldn’t show the appearance of abundance. Enough each DAY was ours, and we were content. We didn’t covet riches and had little thought of them.
“At one time we were engaged in selling real estate, which as most dealers know, is at times a precarious occupation. We were greatly in need of funds, so we decided to apply to the ONE SOURCE of all good. The following promise was the basis of our application.
“WHATSOEVER THINGS YE DESIRE when ye pray, believe that ye have received them and ye shall have them!’
“We do not claim that at the time we understood why we were to claim we had received, for to all appearances we had not, but we decided to be childlike in our faith and abide by the directions. Therefore, we made note in our diary about as follows:
“We have this day made our demand upon the higher power for the exact sum of $400. We need this money for the following purposes:
To pay up a few small bills.
To purchase a stove.
To publish a farm catalog.
“We uttered this demand just once. We felt that to reiterate would imply unbelief.
“But we did not forget to PRAISE GOD that we already had the $400.
“We did this simply because we were told in the promise to believe and chose to obey. Each night upon retiring we religiously uttered praise for something still invisible to outward sight. But we did more. Closing our eyes we tried to visualize the $400. We called to mind a small table entirely empty except for a package of bills labelled $400. They were in denominations of $100. We could see in our mind’s eye the green faces and yellow backs. This visualizing process became a source of great delight, and the REALITY increased continually.
“One evening about three months after making our demand, the phone rang while we were eating supper. Upon answering it, we heard the following from a man whose farm we had listed sometime previously.
” ‘Mr. Peck, I have sold the farm to the party whom you sent to me, and as soon as the deeds are passed, I will send you a check for the commission.’ In about a week his letter came enclosing his check for EXACTLY $400. Really, it was not so much a surprise at it was joy, that I had once more demonstrated that God’s promises are REAL. I entered in my diary: ‘This day the promise I took has been literally fulfilled, Praise the Lord.’
“Scoffers might say, ‘There’s nothing supernatural or wonderful about this. You are in the Real Estate business and liable at any unexpected time to make a sale.’
“But the convincing evidence to my mind was the fact that I had never spent a moment of my time in showing the farm or in making the sale. I had some months before merely mentioned that I had such a farm, to a prospective buyer who was at that time somewhat uncertain that he wanted such a property.
“The circumstances served to open my eyes to the fact that I had a rich Father who had said: ‘Son, thou art ever with me and all that I have is thine.’
“I was encouraged to ask for larger gifts. I was not a property owner, and my business, while affording a living, did not enable me to purchase a home of my own. So I asked next for $2,000, imagining it as I had done with the $400. When the $2,000 came, I asked for other things in the same way.
“The results of the faith engendered by these incidents are that at the present time I am rather a large property owner for the small town in which I live, and am President of a successful business built up from a very small amount of capital.
“Our Father has showered us with blessings exactly as He had promised. We have given up entirely thoughts of what we can GET. The important matter is how and what we can GIVE.”
Giving releases power, just as breaking up any form of condensed energy releases power. But merely releasing energy is not enough. To get good from it, you must direct that power into some engine where it will turn certain wheels and bring back greatly increased power to you.
That is the whole Secret of Power.
To find the Lost Word of Power, we must first define what a “word” is. It is a mental image, is it not? “In the beginning was the Word,” says St. John. In the beginning was the mental image.
To give our word power, we must fill out our mental image with whatever elements it needs to give it life. To see how this is done let us go back again to our single cell. It was surrounded by water, you know, and it drew every element it needed for life from the water around it by absorption. And what it did then, it does now. Every living cell draws the elements it needs for life from the water (or in the case of the higher animals, from the lymph) around it.
But where groups of thousands of millions of cells work together in a single organization, as in the body of any animal, it takes a complicated organism to provide the water and the different elements that must go into it, so mouths and stomachs and hearts and lungs and all the different tubes and passageways had to be evolved. More than that, when it became necessary to pick certain elements for food, means had to be found for finding them, so, the organism put out “feelers”, which presently developed into eyes and ears and hands and feet. But intelligence was required to search for and distinguish the proper elements for food, so nerve centers were formed, with “wires” which came to the surface all over the body and acted like so many antennae, reporting to the central nervous system, or the brain.
Those millions of antennae are good for more than the mere receiving of impressions from the outside. They are hands that can reach out for what they want. They are the sending wires for all the tiny microphones located in your nerve centers that can broadcast a need, and then gather in each necessary element as it appears.
What was it enabled the crawfish to grow a shell, the bee a sting, the bird its wings? Neither more nor less than the nerve centers of these creatures, broadcasting the need for certain new elements lest they perish from the earth, then reaching out for them with their thousands of hands. Fear of annihilation had already broken up their dependence upon their old organisms. They knew they could not with their limited means survive the dangers besetting them, so they set their nerve centers vibrating with the appeal to all the powers of the universe for the elements they conceived necessary for life.
Those same means are just as available to you in any crisis today as to those early forms of life. Instead of only two hands, you have millions. Instead of being dependent upon one or two hooks for the “fish” you need from the lymph about you, you have a net capable of catching a million times as many. And the means of using your net have not varied.
- Break up the shell of circumstance surrounding you. Disclaim it and cast off all dependence upon it.
It is this breaking up that is aimed at in the “affirmations” of the most successful metaphysical religions and the most practical psychologists of today. When a metaphysician repeats—”There is no life, truth, intelligence or substance in matter,” what else does he mean than that he is taking his faith out of the form into which his circumstances or body or surroundings have congealed, breaking them up, and asking for a new deal?
For those who feel inclined to scoff, let me say right now—It works. And any experienced physician will tell you he has seen it work. How does it work?
In the same way it works for the superintendent of a foundry to tell the foreman that a certain casting is no good, he is not going to accept it, and it must be done over. What does the foreman do? Throw that casting into the next heat, fixes his mold more carefully and pours it again.
Your Mind is the Superintendent; your Nerve Centers are your Foundry Foremen with millions of workers at their command in the tiny antennae that come to the surface all over your body. Whatever mold your mind gives to them, in that mold the Nerve Centers cast your circumstances, your surroundings, your body.
But—if you don’t like the casting, you can refuse it, and make your founders melt it down and try again. And it was for this purpose that “affirmations” were first devised.
Because of the efficacy of such affirmations when earnestly and understanding used, I give you below a “breaking up” affirmation for you to use when limitation and lack, or difficulties and trials beset you:
“There is no permanence, no reality to any circumstance or condition unlike God—good. For all is Mind and its creations. God never created anything unlike Himself—good. Therefore there can be no reality in (here specify the troublous circumstance or condition) for it is no part of God’s creation.”
It is the negative affirmation—the breaking up of the wrong conditions. That is the first essential. But if you stopped there, the wrong conditions, or others as bad, would soon return. You must replace them with the right model. That comes next.
2. Set your every nerve center at work, drawing to you from the whole universe all the elements necessary to the fulfillment of your desire. But be sure to give them a model in which those new elements can take shape. Form your mold so clearly, so strongly, that you can actually SEE it in your mind’s eye.
This is just as important as the breaking up of the old conditions. Unless you provide proper molds for the new material, you will be like the man Jesus told of, out of whom a devil was driven. When the devil came back, he found the house swept clean and garnished, but no other occupant there. So he got him seven other devils more wicked than himself, and took possession. ”And the last state of that man was worse than the first. ”
No use breaking up the old imperfect and unsatisfactory shells, if you are going to let the new materials take the same shapes. You must SEE in your mind’s eye that new material flowing to you, you must VISUALIZE it in its perfect shape. Only thus can you “believe that you receive “.
And only thus can you HAVE it!
You see, you are a cell in the great God-body just as any cell in your body is part of you. You are surrounded by lymph as surely as is every cell in your physical body. That lymph contains all the elements you can possibly need for complete expression, and complete expression means happiness and health and success to the fullest degree.
There are no limitations. God does not fatten certain of us and starve others, any more than you favor certain cells of your body to the detriment of others. If any cell does not get all the nourishment it needs, it is because it is not working—or not working a-right.
It matters not how great the demand for any element. There is plenty for all. And as fast us the supply is used, more of that element is poured in by the blood stream. There is never any lack, any limitation. Each cell has only to freely use all it has, in order to absorb as much more of any element as it wants.
The cell’s only danger is not from lack of nourishment around it, but from inability to take it in because of clogged pores and passages. As before stated, the only reason for sickness and old age is failure on the part of the cells to throw out the used elements, and consequent clogging of the passages so they cannot take in the elements necessary to new life.
It is the shell again—allowing circumstances or conditions to congeal to such a point that you are helpless against them. You have to break them up—and keep breaking them.
In certain exercises, stretching and the like, you find the way to break up such conditions in the physical body. And in the methods for GIVING outlined earlier in this lesson, are the ways to break them up in the God-body.
When you have followed those rules, you can set the nerve centers in you seeking and DEMANDING power. Like Randolph in “The Magnificent Obsession”, you have fulfilled the conditions. You have only to put yourself in the right frame of mind to receive it. To do that, “enter into your closet”, in other words, go where you can be quiet and undisturbed, and when you have shut the door, repeat the affirmation given above under No. 1, but add to it:
“I am a perfect cell in the great God-body, surrounded by lymph containing every element I need for complete and perfect expression. I am drawing upon that lymph now for every element of life, every ounce of power, every bit of understanding I need to (here put in whatever thing it is you want to accomplish. Then see it taking form as you bless it.) I bless it, and baptize it God’s own perfect (whatever it is) in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.”
Bless that new form as it takes shape in your mental mold, and hold that mold to it (hold the faith, hold the image before your mind’s eye) until it hardens so all can see it.
And if you want to know the Lost Word of Power—the secret name of God—it is “I AM “. “Before Abraham,” said Jesus, “was I AM.” And throughout the Old Testament, you find frequent references to God as the eternal I AM.
That is the secret of success in all prayer, in everything you do— that there is only one present, only one bit of time you need to worry about—the everlasting now. ‘Whatsoever things ye ask for when ye pray, believe that ye RECEIVE them.” Not, mind you, that you are going to get them in some dim and distant future, but that you HAVE them now!
You are part of the great I AM. You HAVE everything of good now. You ARE perfect. You HAVE health and strength and power and riches and happiness. It remains only for you to make this manifest. How are you to do this?
- By sowing your seeds of the harvest you wish to reap.
- By cultivating it through serenity and faith.
- By visualization—seeing in your mind’s eye the abundant harvest you are praying for.
- By thanking God for it.
Difficulties may beset you, obstacles get in your way, and ill healths hold you down. Bless them! Know that there is only one God and He is good, therefore anything evil that may trouble you is GOOD in disguise. You have heard the old aphorism that— “When Fortune means to man most good; she looks upon him with a threatening eye.”
If you can bless every seeming evil, know that it is really Good working for you in another guise and that it is working with all else of life for your own good, it will quickly show you the silver lining underneath. It is only as you RESIST evil that it turns to harm.
“Resist not evil,” Saint Paul bade us, “but overcome evil with good.” Serene faith, perfect trust that God is working for your good even through what may seem great evil, will turn the greatest misfortune to your gain. Mind you, that doesn’t mean pious resignation
or any cant of that sort. It means active faith, the kind of faith John Burroughs had in mind when he wrote—
“Serene I fold my hands and wait,
Nor care for wind or tide or sea;
I rave no more ‘gainst time or fate,
For, lo! my own shall come to me.
“The stars come nightly to the sky;
The tidal wave unto the sea;
Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high,
Shall keep my own away from me.”
THE PENDULUM OF GIVING AND GETTING
By E. LESLIE-HOOT
How a Simple Plan Brings Abundance To One Thankful Family
There is a pendulum of giving and getting that swings constantly back and forth within our lives, with the same regularity as the pendulum of a clock.
I have come to recognize each “need” as a red light signal, a time to stop and think what and where I can give. Then I turn on the yellow light of preparedness by tuning in to my source, God, for direction. Instantly the green light flashes me I go and supply my need, whether it be a prayer, a condolence, a material gift, or what not.
One day as I started my evening meal I found I had no bread in the house, and I recollected that I had no money in my purse with which to buy it. This was my red light, my “need” warning me that I was becoming remiss in my giving. So I sat down to contemplate what and to whom I could give. Was I withholding something from someone that he wanted and needed? Was God trying to use me as a channel for His good?
A family had recently moved next door. There were two girls, and I had noticed they were rather shabbily dressed. I remembered my blue silk dress hanging in the closet. I had not worn it for some time and did not really need it. Instantly I had the impulse to give it to one of the girls next door. I walked the floor several times holding the dress tucked under my arm. Would they think me presumptuous? Would they be insulted, I wondered? I had never even spoken to them. However, the thought persisted, so I took it over.
Diffidently I knocked on the door and introduced myself. My new neighbors were very cordial, and soon I was explaining why I had come. Then I handed the dress to the larger girl. Her eyes shone like stars as she held it up for her mother’s inspection. “Mother, isn’t it lovely? You won’t have to make me one now. It’s just my size. You see, Mother has been ill. She was lying down when you came and had just said that she couldn’t get me a dress for graduation; and I was feeling sorry for myself. Now you can imagine how happy this has made me!”
“God does answer prayers, surely,” the mother answered, half to herself, and I saw her hastily wipe a tear from the corner of her eye.
When I reached home 1 remembered why I had taken her the dress. I needed bread. But it really didn’t seem so important any more. I looked to see if I had enough ingredients in the house to make some. I didn’t. I began to search drawers and pockets for stray pennies, and at last I found just enough to buy one loaf of bread. I called my little girl to go to the store. She was just starting out the door when the doorbell rang. There stood one of my neighbors, holding in his hand a pan covered with a towel.
He smiled and said, “My wife was baking, and thought perhaps you might like some warm rolls for your supper.”
For a moment I couldn’t speak. Then I thanked him in a startled, awe-struck manner. I carried the pan to the kitchen and unwrapped it. As I gazed upon the lovely golden brownness of those dozen homemade rolls, I could only humbly, chokingly exclaim, “Father, forgive me! I should have known you would give me bread even at the last minute!”
There was the time I needed a new tablecloth for my breakfast table. I knew the size, color, and price I wished to pay. But though
I had been looking for several weeks I could not seem to find a suitable one. The last time I looked I came home rather chagrined. Nevertheless I still persisted in believing that the right cloth was there for me at the right price. I now resolved not to look for a while but to wait and not be anxious. The telephone rang. It was a friend on the other side of the city asking me to pray for a friend who was ill. “Will you meet me downtown tomorrow?” she asked. “I have something I have wanted to give you.” I met her and she immediately handed me a package. “May I look?” I asked. “Of course, if you wish,” she replied. I drew from the package the tablecloth that I had been seeking, or at least its exact counterpart! “Where in the world did you get this?” I exclaimed in amazement. “I bought it a week ago at a little store close to my home.” No wonder I could not find one. The Father knows our need and supplies it as we supply that of our fellow man.
My sister stated she wished a certain position in the city where I live. She lived in a nearby town but was willing to sell her furniture and come to the city if she could secure the kind of work she wished. I knew her desire was right and sincere, since it was really an urge to express her talent in a larger field. I meditated over it with her. One day I noticed an ad in the paper for just the kind of position she wanted. There was no time to send her the paper or communicate with her and have her answer, so I answered the ad for her. I knew it was really the Father writing the letter through me. She received the position.
In the meantime my husband had had an accident at work. He was off without pay foe almost two weeks. This placed us in debt. We even thought of moving to cheaper quarters. Finally we knew that if we could secure a loan of a certain amount of money it would relieve the strain and we could remain where we were.
The next evening my sister came for dinner. We carelessly mentioned our circumstances but did not mention that we needed any money. She was so happy about her new position that I had to leave the room for a minute to realize that we had a right to the same abundance. Almost immediately she followed me. “I feel you need a loan,” she said. “You helped me when I needed it, according to your ability, and now you must let me help you.” And again the Father, through her, placed in my hand the money I needed, and just the right amount!
There was the time when we were invited to a cottage for the week end. As my little girl collected the bathing suits she held hers up in dismay. It was entirely too small. I told her the way to supply a need in her life was to look around and see what she could give to someone else. I told her the story of my “lights.” She started immediately to help her brother wash and polish the car, a task that she ordinarily disliked. When she had almost finished, the girl next door came to the fence. She held up for inspection a lovely wool bathing suit, the color of which—yellow—was particularly suited to my little girl. “Can you use this?” she said. “When mother washed it the water was too hot, and now I can’t get into it. It is practically new.” My little girl held it up. It was just her size. She looked at me with speechless wonder in her eyes. “It worked, Mother,” she cried; and the rest of the family wondered what we were talking about.
Sometimes a person gets back just the material thing he gives another but from a different source. For instance, a friend visiting at my house ruined her hose through a mishap. She declared it was her only pair, and I gave her the last good pair I had in the house.
The next day a woman that I knew only slightly called for spiritual assistance. The following day she brought me a lovely pair of hose, much better than the one I had given away, saying it was “in appreciation of the peace I had helped her find.”
Then there was the time I needed potatoes. I was on my way to the country to visit a little boy who was ill. I told the children to remind me to buy potatoes on our way back, as we had none in the house. After my visit when I went to get in the car there was a bushel of lovely, fresh-dug potatoes. “Oh,” I exclaimed in amazement. The boy’s father humbly answered, “I don’t have much cash just now, but I did want to give you something.” When I told him they were just what I needed we were both “made glad.”
I remember the time I wanted some fresh candy, my favorite kind, which was displayed in a downtown store. I could not decide to buy it, so followed my motto “When you are in doubt, don’t; there is no doubt in God.” I decided to divert my appetite into another channel by buying Truth literature for a friend.
That evening my nephew, who worked in that downtown store, came home and handed me a box.
“I had an urge to buy this for you today,” he said. I opened it, and there was the candy I had so much wanted; not a pound, the amount I should have bought, but a pound and a half. Surely God does supply all our needs abundantly when we consciously become a supply channel through which He is enabled to fill the needs of another.
These are only a few of the many instances in which I have proved Paul’s statement. Do you need something just now? Then tune in to the Father, the gives of all good gifts, and find out what and where you can “give.” Give according to your capacity and ability and you will surely start the pendulum of giving and receiving swinging regularly in your life.
Would you know life abundant,
Love doubled for all you give?
There is a means no surer
Than helping someone to live.”
ELLEN H. JONES
Paste This On Your Mirror—
”I CAN HAVE WHAT I WANT, IF I PLANT IT”
“The Magnificent Obsession”, from which quotations have been freely made in The Lost Word of Power, is published by Willett, Clark & Colby, 440 South Dearborn St., Chicago, III, at a price of $2.50. This book was for many months a “best seller”. It has been dramatized and put in the movies. It is a story that anyone can read with both entertainment and profit.
“The Green Light”, by the same author, is quoted in the seven Lessons of “The God in You”. It can be obtained from Houghton, Mifflin Co., Boston, Mass.
Spread the Good Word!
One of the principles advocated in “The Magnificent Obsession” is to extend your personality through helping others. In doing this, you sow a crop whose harvest comes back to you increased manifold.
It is an outward flow of power that completes its cycle and returns laden with energy. For our every unselfish act, there is a response, a return of the pendulum that we have started swinging. It is Emerson’s “Law of Compensation.”
[1] am not trying to tell you any such thing. You may give everything you have to the poor, and get no good from it, just as you may put all your money into wildcat stocks, and never get a cent picking sound stocks or bonds.
The End