They may seem to agree in some particulars, but press them hard, and you will see that the world of one is not the world of the other. Why all the others that we see about us are only parts of our world. You are entirely alone, if you did but know it. The subtle and illusive thing that makes you feel you are surrounded by others, is only the reaction you experience from contact with your own thoughts. And your own thoughts are the result of your own sensations, and your sensations certainly belong to you. You say that these sensations are produced by something outside of you. And you term that reality. On the contrary, it is unreality. The one thing that we are searching for all the time is reality, and that is the one thing that we never seem to achieve. AND, considering human beings just as they are (or as we think they are), they divide themselves into two groups, each one of which has some of the characteristic qualities of the other. The first group is materialistic: that is, it comprises the vast mass of human beings who regard everything they see and touch as being quite real, and who try to get as much out of it as they go along as they can. Some of them apparently succeed remarkably well. They break off great wads of money, and seem to have everything pretty much their own way. The only trouble with them is that they are never satisfied, because in each instance the thing they banked on as being real, they discovered when they got it, wasn't real at all. And then they begin all over again rolling their boulder up the hill like our old friend, Sisyphus. HALF the giant's strength You earn a thousand dollars, go to the bank and get the money, place it firmly in your hand and you say that is reality. You exchange it for clothes and food, and you then say that is reality. And the clothes and the food disappear and then where is your reality? It now lies somewhere in the heart of the next thousand dollars. And you go through the same thing over again. is in the conviction that he is a giant. The strength of a muscle is enhanced a hundredfold by the will-power. The same muscle, when removed from the giant's arm, when divorced from the force of the mighty will, can sustain but a fraction of the weight it did a moment before it was disconnected. So the thing that you want to deal with is always You. And a voice breaks in right here and says: "Dear me, I couldn't do that. It wouldn't be safe. If I should think about myself all the time, I should get introspective, and morbid and would be no use to anybody." And so the great majority of people never break through the barriers of You, because they are afraid. That is why one sees so many playing cards, and going to the movies and doing almost anything to get away from themselves because they are afraid of that YOU. Now, let us consider, for a brief moment, what the philosophers term the objective world. The objective world is the thing we are all of us up against. And we are up against it hard. If you haven't believed so far anything I have written, you will all agree to that. ("Hear, hear!" you say.) The other and much smaller group are the human beings who begin to suspect, quite early in the game, that things are not so real as they seem, and this leads them to question themselves. Pretty soon they are likely to discover that they get more satisfaction from giving up rather than from grabbing everything in sight. It is always a hard matter to give upat first-but after a while these people perceive that the very act of giving up brings in on them, from wholly unexpected sources, a lot of things that they never even asked for and didn't know they wanted them until they came. Thus we see an old man of this group who has apparently nothing; yet everybody comes to him for advice. And when he opens his mouth, everybody listens. The instinctive homage of the great mass of unthinking people is always given to the great moral leader. Think that over. You have tried to change them; but the harder you tried, the more impossible they seemed to get. Furthermore, you have a sneaking, humiliating feeling that you are being blamed for them. This only makes you feel worse. You have done your best to get rid of them, but they are working against you, are stronger than you are. At times you are able to forget them temporarily, by sheer exhaustion. Then the thought of them comes over you once more, you wriggle and squirm, and during these dark moments you feel like—well, making an end of it. The worst of it is that you can talk to nobody about it. You have tried, and have always failed. Your closest friend, during these shameful moments of confidence, goes back on you. You see he isn't interested. He dismisses your confession. with mock solemnity. Or he tells you that you are not well. You ought to go away. You don't exercise enough. You need rest. It's your liver. Then-if you have any sporting blood in you, as most of us have-you get mad. You may not show it outwardly, but your back is up against the wall, and you curse aloud, like Job. And then you feel better-for a time. N the meantime, there is that set of conditions, -SO You have braced up, and the relief was only temporary. What to do then? This: First, you must remember that it takes time to accomplish anything that is worth while. The man who endures to the end is the man who wins. Why did the Allies whip Germany? Do you remember that message of Joffre, in which he said that the Germans were getting into Paris? Do you recall that despairing utterance of Haig, when he said that they simply couldn't hold out any longer? Have you ever sent such a message back of your lines? Sure you have. The first rule then, is patience. The next rule is never to think of what is going to happen. Lincoln said he got through with the Civil War by taking only one thing at a time -as it came up. It takes practice to do this. And practice takes time, and time means patience. The third rule is, perhaps, the most important. Always face the condition as it presses upon you and face the details of it one by one, as they strike upon your consciousness. Don't think about them, don't dwell upon them. Just face them. Make no effort to overcome them. It is you that must change, and not they. And face them mentally. Look at them, steadily, and mentally. Don't move forward. Be passive. But hold on. You will be astonished at the power that will gradually come to you. If you are afraid of a thing, always look at it mentally. It will begin to recede of its own accord. That is because it isn't real. You are the only reality, and nothing can touch you if you look at it calmly and steadily. Beginning with the February Number a New and THE NEW SUCCESS "Who's Who in the World" Being a Monthly Record and Editorial Comment on the People Who Are Responsible for the Current Events that Are Making History, and Their Achievements. Keep in Touch with This Department Monthly and You Will Be in Touch with all that Is Important in the World. It Will Be Illustrated with Fine Photographs. Also in February: "Famous People I Have Tried to Interview for THE NEW SUCCESS," by John T. Drayton, European Correspondent. 1921 What Thought Force Has Done H AVE you, who are beating against the iron bars of poverty, ever stopped to think what marvelous things the Creator has everywhere provided for us, His children? Just imagine the entire universe, the great cosmic ocean of creative intelligence, packed with all the riches, all the glorious things, the magnificent possibilities the human mind can conceive, and then try to picture what it would mean to you and to all who are complaining of lack and want if by some magic they could call out of this universal supply of creative intelligence anything which would match their desires, their heart longings. Imagine this vast universe, this ocean of creative energy, packed with possibilities from which human beings could draw everything which the wildest imagination could conceive, everything they desire in life, everything they need for comfort and convenience, even luxuries—also cities, railroads, telegraphs and all sorts of wonderful inventions and discoveries. Every discovery, every invention, every improvement, every facility, every home, every building, every city, every railroad, every ship, everything that man has created for our use and benefit he has fashioned out of this vast invisible cosmic ocean of intelligence by thought force. Everything we use, everything we have, every achievement of man is preceded by a mental vision, a plan. Everything man has accomplished on this earth is a result of a desire, has been preceded by a mental picture of it. Everything he has produced on this plane of existence has been drawn out of this invisible ocean of divine intelligence by his thought force. His imagination first pictured the thing he wanted to do; he kept visualizing this mental conception, never stopped thinking, creating, until his efforts to match his visions with their realities drew to him the thing on which he had concentrated. AB WHY WORRY? BOUT 7,256 years ago a solemn-looking old gentleman named Menes K. Ptsch, High Priest of Astrological Astronomy of the temple of Ptah Ptut, Upper Egypt, stuck his head out of his window and said he had just observed a comet. Old Menes K. Ptsch had the general appearance of a beardless goat, but he stood high in the Astrological Astronomical circles of his day, and when he stuck his head out of his window and uttered words someone was always on hand to listen. "Behold and take notice!" he chanted. "I, Menes K. Ptsch, seventh son of a bald By ELLIS PARKER BUTLER Author of "Pigs Is Pigs" EDITORS' NOTE ACCORDING to the genial Mr. Butler, he has made worrying a life work, and, during the fifty years of his life, has encountered quite a number of one-hundred-per-cent worrying opportunities. In fact, he claims he has worried ever since he was a babe in the cradle. When you read this article and realize just what all this worrying did for Mr. Butler, pray stop and go over your own case. Then ask yourself if, in the long run, whatever worries you may have had were not, like Mr. Butler's, just soap bubbles that burst the moment the sunlight struck them. grandfather, do speak. And, behold, I have discovered a new comet in the skies, the said comet being large and juicy, like unto an overripe cantaloupe, of a circumference of ten million versts, with a density of approximately seventeen kilowatts. And, behold, it hath a tail seventy-five million Sabbath-day's journeys in longness. Whoop la!" When they heard this news, those who listened looked at the sky and they saw the comet. It seemed about the size of a pin head and about as brilliant as a dead lightning bug. "My gracious!" they exclaimed, but Professor Menes K. Ptsch was chanting again. "And, behold," he sang out, "the comet approaches the earth apace, or, I may even say, a couple of apaces. She is some comet, if I did discover her myself. She cometh onward with studding sails set, a tank chock full of gasoline and a clean hock action." His hearers gasped. "Behold," said Professor Menes K. Ptsch, "I calculate her speed to be seven billion numidian litres per hecktogram, or even more or less." This caused tremendous excitement. A vast wave of fear swept over his hearers. "And-and did you say she would hit the earth?" one asked tremulously. "Behold, I have not said," replied the wise old professor. Just then a reporter for the Upper Egypt Lily Pad and Papyrus Leaf pushed into the crowd with his pencil and notebook in his hand. He was a brisk young man and hungry for news. "Now, look here!" he said smartly. "Just cut out about half a dozen of those 'behold' things and come down to brass tacks. You have discovered a comet. It is pointed at the earth. Just what chance is there that the comet will hit the earth, break the earth into eight million pieces and, after setting the pieces afire, consume them utterly? That's what the Upper Egypt Lily Pad and Papyrus Leaf wants to know. What are the chances?" When he was asked this, Professor Menes K. Ptsch looked extremely solemn. 'Behold" he said, "if this is for publication be sure to get my name spelled correctly. You might also mention that it is pronounced like a sneeze, but more as a man sneezes in a draft than when he has the hay fever." "Never mind that, said the young reporter. "How about the chances of the comet hitting the earth and destroying it?" Thus pinned down to facts the professor thought deeply for several minutes. "Behold," he said then, "I have given thought to your question. The chance of the comet hitting the earth is clearly expressed by the following formula, namely, to wit: Seven times eight, less the square root of the length of the Nile, divided by the desultory circumnavigation of the primitive isosocles as compared with the in hoc signes of 8762, as last seen on Friday the thirteenth." When he had said this, Professor Menes K. Ptsch coughed gently and drew in his head. "The professor says," wrote the reporter in his note-book, "that the And that is the general outcome of most of the things we worry about. LAST April, I was on a lecture tour and I had to travel light, with only one pair of day trousers and one pair of dress trousers. I had to skip around like a flea on a hot griddle to keep my engagements and several days before my date at Grand Rapids, I began to worry about the knees of my trousers. I am a first-class worrier. Ever since I was a small boy, I have been one of the most noted worriers north of the Mason and Dixon line and able to worry about more things in a given length of time than any man I ever knew. I have also large, virile knee-joints, like a horse with spavin. I dreamed of standing before the elite of Grand comet will hit the earth As soon as this news was printed and spread broad cast, the people of Upper Egypt began to worry about the comet and the end that was coming to the earth on Friday the 13th. It was no mean worry either. None of the Egyptians, then alive, had ever died through a comet striking the earth, and they began some first-class worrying. Looking back across the long period of time their worrying seems rather silly to us, but it was just as important to them then as your worrying and my worrying are to us now. Life was precious to them and they knew that if the end of the world came and killed them they would be dead. So they worried. The records show that 74 worried to such an extent that they dropped dead of heart disease; 862 worried themselves insane and drowned themselves in the Nile; 408 fretted so over the prospect that they hung themselves. And then Friday the 13th, went by and nothing unusual happened. It was a beautiful calm day, with a gentle cool breeze and onions sold at six kopeks per cubit less than the day before. When I was down in Arkansas, early in March, I began to worry about the afternoon speaking date at Grand Rapids. Aman can't wear evening trousers in the afternoon, and, riding on a train is bad for trouser knees. It bags them as nothing else can. Again and again, I consulted my route list, hoping I could find some way of beating the trains so I could have time to get my day trousers pressed at Grand Rapids before I had to stand up before that audience of ladies, but I could not see how I could do it. I worried all through Arkansas, Tennessee, Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana and down into Ohio. Night after night, I dreamed of standing before the elite of Grand Rapids, in trousers that looked like the hind legs of an elephant, and I would awake in a cold sweat and groan. By the time I reached Akron, Ohio, I was almost a nervous wreck, and I feared the worst for Grand Rapids. There was one chance in a million that I could find time to have the bags taken out of my knees in Akron, and when I got there I found that chance gone. I did not have a minute to attend to pressing. There was a luncheon for me; and, although only men were present, I felt it best to wear my trousers, for I do not wish to be thought eccentric even in Akron. LEFT Akron at 11:30 P. M., in my dress suit, for Grand Rapids, my worry still sparking on all six cylinders, and got off the train at Orrville to change cars. This gave me plenty of time to worry about my baggy knees. I sat in the station there and waited and worried and did some of the most thorough and workmanlike worrying I had ever done, and about 2:10 A. M., when the train was due, I began to worry |