The Law of Attraction
There is in Nature a great Law the Law of Attraction by the
operations of which all things from atoms to men are attracted
toward each other in the degree of the common affinity of common use.
The reverse of this law which is merely another manifestation of its
power is what is called Repulsion, which is but the other pole of
Attraction, and by the operations of which things tend to repel each
other in the degree that they are unlike, opposing, and of no use to
each other. The Law of Attraction is Universal, on all the planes of
life, from the physical to the spiritual. Its operations are uniform
and constant, and we may take the phenomena of one plane and thereby
study the phenomena of another plane, for the same rule applies in
each case the same Law is in operation in the same way.
Beginning with the tiny corpuscles, electrons, or ions, of which
the atoms are formed, we find manifested the Law of Attraction
certain electrons attract each other, and repel others still, thereby
causing to spring into existing groups, combinations and colonies of
electrons which being in agreement and harmony manifest and constitute
what are called atoms, which until recently were supposed to be the
primal form of matter. Passing on the atoms themselves, we find many
degrees of affinity and attraction existing between them which cause
them to combine and form into molecules of which all masses of matter
consists. For instance, every drop of water is composed of countless
molecules of water. And each molecule is composed of two atoms of
Hydrogen and one atom of Oxygen the combination always being the
same in every molecule of water. Now, why these atoms combine in just
this way the same invariable grouping and proportion? Not by chance,
surely, for there is no such thing in Nature there is a natural law
back of every phenomenon. And in this case it is the Law of Attraction
manifesting in the case of these atoms. And it is so in all chemical
combinations it is called Chemical Affinity. Sometimes an attached
atom will come in contact with, or in proximity to, another atom, and
then bang goes the explosion of the molecule as the atom flies away
from its partners and into the arms of the other atom for which it has
a greater affinity. There are marriages and divorces in the world of
atoms, you will notice. And in the cases of the molecules, it is found
that certain molecules are attracted to others of the same kind, under
what is called Cohesion, and thus masses of matter are composed. A
piece of gold, silver, tin, glass, or other form of matter is composed
of countless molecules held together tightly by Cohesion and this
Cohesion is merely another form of the Law of Attraction the same
that draws all things together. And, underlying the Law of Attraction
is to be found our old Principle of Desire and Will. You may shrug
your shoulders at this mention of desire and Will in connection with
electrons, atoms, molecules all forms of matter, but just wait a bit
and see what the leading scientific authorities have to say on the
subject.
Prof. Hakel, one of the worlds greatest scientists a materialist
who would sneer at the teachings of Mental Science even this man,
naturally prejudiced against mentalist theories, finds himself
compelled to say:"The idea of chemical affinity consists in the fact
that the various chemical elements perceive the qualitative
differences in other elements experience pleasure of revulsion at
contact with them, and execute specific movements on this ground. "He
also positively and distinctly states that in the atoms there must be
something corresponding to Desire for contact and association with
other atoms, and Will to enable the atom to respond to the Desire Law
is constant throughout Nature, from atom to man physical, mental and
spiritual.
But what has all this to do with the Secret of Success you may ask?
Simply, that the Law of Attraction is an important part in the Secret
of Success, inasmuch as it tends to bring to us the things, persons
and circumstances in accordance with our earnest Desire, Demand, and
Will, just as it brings together the atoms and other particles of
matter. Make yourself an atom of Living Desire and you will attract to
yourself the person, things and circumstances fitting in with the
accomplishment of your Desire. You will also get into rapport with
those who are working along the same lines of thought, and will be
attracted them and they to you, and you will be brought into relations
with persons, things and environments likely to work out the problem
of your Desires you will get "next to" the right persons and things
- all by the operation of this great natural Law of Attraction. No
Necromancy or Magic about it at all nothing supernatural or
mysterious just the operations of a great Natural Law.
You can do little by yourself in Life, be you ever so strong and
able. Life is a complex thing, and individuals are interdependent upon
each other for the doings of things. One Individual, segregated from
all the other Individuals, could accomplish little or nothing along
the lines of outer activity. He must form combinations, arrangements,
harmonies and agreements with others, and in accordance with
environments and things, that is, he must create and use the proper
environments and things, and draw to himself others with whom he must
form combinations, in order to do things. And these persons, things
and environments come to him and he to them by reason of this
great Law of Attraction. And the way he sets into operation this great
Law of Attraction is by the operation of his Desire, and along the
lines of Mental Imagery. Do you see the connection now? So be careful
to form, cultivate and manifest the right Desires hold to them
firmly, strongly and constantly, and you will set into operation this
great Law, which forms an important part of the Secret of Success.
Desire-Force is the motive power leading the activities of Life. It
is the basic vital power, which animates the minds of living things
and urges them forth to action. Without strong Desire no one
accomplishes anything worthy of the name and the greater the desire
the greater will be the amount of energy generated and manifested,
everything else being equal. That is to say, that given a dozen men of
equal intellect, physical health and mental activity equal in
everything else except Desire, in short, the ones in whom the greatest
Desire resides and is manifested will outstrip the others in
attainment and of these winners the one in who Desire burns like an
unquenchable flame will be the one who will Master the others by the
force of his primitive elementary power.
Not only does Desire give to the man that inward motive which leads
to the enfoldment of the power within himself, but it does more than
this; it causes to radiate from him the finer and more subtle mental
and vital forces of his nature, which, flowing forth in all directions
like the magnetic waves from the magnet, or the electric waves from
the dynamo, influencing all who come within the field of force.
Desire-Force is a real, active, effective force of Nature, and serves
to attract, draw and bring to a center that which is in line with the
nature of the Desire. The much talked of Law of Attraction, of which
so much is heard in Mental Science and the New Thought, depends
largely upon the force and power of Desire. Desire-Force is at the
center of the Law of Attraction. There is a tendency in Nature to
attract and draw to the center of a Desire the things, which are
needed to fulfill that Desire. Ones "own will come to him" by reason
of his natural force, which lies behind and underneath the entire
phenomena of Mental Influence. This being so, does it not become at
once apparent why one who wishes to accomplish anything should be sure
to create a strong Desire for it, and at the same time be sure to
acquire the art of Visualization so as to form a clear Mental Picture
of the thing Desired a clear mold in which the materialized reality
may manifest?
Have you ever come in contact with any of the great men of modern
business life? If you have seen these people in action, you will have
become conscious of a subtle, mysterious something about them a
something that you could actually feel a something that seemed to
draw you to fit in to their schemes, planes, and desires almost by an
irresistible force. These people are all people of the strongest kind
of Desire their DesireForce manifests strongly and affects those
with whom they come in contact. Not only this, but their Desire-Force
flows from them in great waves, which occultists inform us soon
manifests a circular, or whirlpool-like motion, swing around and
around the center of the Desire these men become actual cyclones of
Desire into which nearly everything that comes within its sweep is
affected and swept into the vortex. Have we not evidences of this in
the cases of all the great leaders of men can we not see the
operation of that mighty law of attraction which brings to them their
own? We are apt to call this Will Power, and so it is in a way, back
and under the Will in such cases is to be found the ardent, burning
Desire that is the motive force of the attractive power.
This Desire-Force is a primitive, elemental thing. It is found in
the animal kingdom, and among the lower races of men, perhaps more
clearly than among the higher types of men, but only because in such
instances it is seen stripped of the covering, sheaths, disguises and
masks that surround the more civilized forms and planes of life. But
remember this well, the same principle is manifested under and beneath
the polished veneer of civilized life the Desire-Force of the
cultured leader of men is as elemental as that animating the fierce
and shaggy caveman or the wild Berserker who, naked and half-mad,
rushed upon overwhelming hordes of his enemy, brushing them aside like
flies that is, if you will but look beneath the polished surface. In
the old wild days Desire manifested its force on the physical plane
now it manifests on the Mental Plane that is the only difference,
the Force is the same in both cases.
While we write, there has just been produced on stage a new play
that illustrates this principle. The heroine, the daughter of an old
New York family of high social standing and wealth, has a dream of her
life in a former incarnation, in which she sees herself torn from the
arms of her cave-dweller father by the mighty arms of a fierce savage
chief, whose desire is manifested through the physical. She awakens
from her dream, and to her horror soon discovers the face of her
dream-captor on a man who comes into her fathers life in New York.
This man comes from the West, forceful, resourceful and desirous,
beating down all before him in the game of finance. As of old, he
places his foot not on the neck of his enemies but on the
mental-plane, this time, instead of the physical. The same old Desire
for power is strong within him the same old masterfulness manifests
itself. This man says:"I have never quit; I have never been afraid.
"The same old Desire then flamed up in the savage now manifests in the
Master of Wall Street, and between the force of its Attraction and the
coupled and allied force of his Will, he repeats the performances of
his previous incarnation but on the plane of mental forces and
achievement this time mind, not muscle, being the instrument through
which the Desire manifests.
We give the above example merely as an illustration of the fact
that Desire is the motivating force that moves the Will into action,
and which cause the varied activity of life, men and things.
Desire-Force is a real power in life, and influences not only tracts,
influences and compels other persons and things to swing in toward the
center of the Desire sending forth the currents. In the Secret of
Success, Desire plays a prominent part. Without a Desire for Success,
there is no Success, none. The Law of Attraction is set into motion by
Desire. The majority of the principles advanced in this book have been
in the nature of Positive injunctions that is, you have been urged
to do certain things rather than to not do the opposite or contrary.
But here we come to a place in which the advice must be given along
the negative lines we must urge you not to do a certain thing. We
allude to that great poison of the mind and Will known as Fear. We do
not allude to physical fear important though physical courage may
be, and as regrettable as physical cowardice may be considered, still
it is not a part of the purpose of this book to preach against the
latter and advise a cultivation of the former quality you will find
much of that elsewhere. Our purpose here is to combat that subtle,
insidious enemy of true Self-Expression which appears in the shape and
guise of mental fear, forebodings which may be considered as Negative
Thought just as the other principles mentioned in this work may be
considered as Positive Thought.
Fear thoughts is that condition of the mind in which everything is
seen through blue glasses in which everything seems to bring a sense
of the futility of endeavor the "I Cant" principle of mentality, as
contrasted with the "I Can and I Will" mental attitude. It is the
noxious weed in the mental garden, which tends to kill the valuable
plants to be found therein. It is the fly in the ointment the spider
in the cup of the Wine of Life. So far as we know the first person to
use the word "Fear-Thought" which has now passed into common use
was Horace Fletcher, the well-known writer, who coined it to supplant
the use of the word "Worry" in a certain sense. He had pointed out
that Anger and Worry were the two great hindrances to a well-balanced,
advanced and progressive mentality, but many misunderstood him and
urged that to abolish Worry meant to cease taking any consideration of
the morrow a lack of common prudence and forethought. And so
Fletcher coined the word "Fear-Thought" to express a phase of his idea
of "Forethought without Worry," and he entitled his second book on the
subject, "Happiness, as found in Forethought minus Fear-Thought," a
very happy expression of a very happy idea. Fletcher also was the
first to advance the idea that Fear was not a thing-in-itself, but
merely an expression of Fear-Thought a manifestation of the state of
mind known as Fear-Thought. He and others who have written on the
subject, have taught that Fear might be abolished by the practice of
abolishing Fear-Thought from the mind by driving it out of the
mental chamber and the best teachers have taught that the best way
to drive out Fear (or any other undesirable mental state) was by
cultivating the thought of the opposite quality of mind by compelling
the mind to dwell upon the mental picture of the desirable quality,
and by the appropriate auto-suggestions. The illustration has often
been stated that the way to drive darkness from a room is not to
shovel it out, but to throw open the shutters and let the sunlight
stream in, and that is the best way to neutralize Fear-Thought.
The mental process has aptly been spoken of as "vibrations," a
figure that has a full warrant in modern science. Then, by raising the
vibration to the Positive pitch, the negative vibrations may be
counteracted. By cultivating the qualities recommended in the other
lessons of this book. Fear-Thought may be neutralized. The poison of
Fear-Thought is insidious and subtle, but it slowly creeps through the
veins until it paralyzes all useful efforts and action, until the
heart and brain are affected and find it difficult to throw it off.
Fear-Thought is at the bottom of the majority of failures and "going
down" in life. As long as a man keeps his nerve and confidence in
himself, he is able to rise to his feet after each stumble, and face
the enemy resolutely but let him feel the effects of Fear-Thought to
such an extent that he cannot throw it off and he will fail to rise
and will perish miserable. "There is nothing to fear except Fear," has
well been said.
We have spoken elsewhere about the Law of Attraction, which
operates in the direction of attracting to us, that which we Desire.
But there is a reverse side to this it is a poor rule that will not
work both ways. Fear will set into motion the Law of Attraction just
as well as Desire. Just as Desire draws to one the things he pictures
in his mind as the Desired Thing, so will Fear draw to him the thing
pictured in his mind as the Thing Feared. "The thing that I feared
hath befallen me. "And the reason is very simple, and the apparent
contradiction vanishes when we examine the matter. What is the pattern
upon which the Law of Attraction builds under the force of Desire? The
Mental Image, of course. And so it is in the case of Fear the person
carries about the Mental Image or haunting picture of the Feared
Thing, and the Law of Attraction brings it to him just as it brings
the Desired Thing. Did you ever stop to thing that Fear was the
negative pole of Desire? The same laws work in both cases.
So avoid Fear-Thought as you would the poisonous draught that you
know would cause your blood to become black and thick, and your
breathing labored and difficult. It is a vile thing, and you should
not rest content until you have expelled it from your mental system.
You can get rid of it by Desire and Will, coupled with the holding of
the Mental Image of Fearlessness. Drive it up by cultivating its
opposite. Change your polarity. Raise your mental vibrations. Someone
has said, "There is no Devil but Fear" then send that Devil back to
the place where he properly belongs, for if you entertain him
hospitably he will make your heaven a hell in order that he may feel
at home. Use the mental Big Stick on him.
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