Think and Grow Rich! | Page 9

find the answer until years later, when he told me the story.
Strangely, the story of this unusual experience was told to the author in
the old mill, on the very spot where the uncle took his whipping.

Strangely, too, I had devoted nearly a quarter of a century to the study
of the power which enabled an ignorant, illiterate colored child to
conquer an intelligent man.
As we stood there in that musty old mill, Mr. Darby repeated the story
of the unusual conquest, and finished by asking, "What can you make
of it? What strange power did that child use, that so completely
whipped my uncle?"
The answer to his question will be found in the principles described in
this book. The answer is full and complete. It contains details and
instructions sufficient to enable anyone to understand, and apply the
same force which the little child accidentally stumbled upon.
Keep your mind alert, and you will observe exactly what strange power
came to the rescue of the child, you will catch a glimpse of this power
in the next chapter. Somewhere in the book you will find an idea that
will quicken your receptive powers, and place at your command, for
your own benefit, this same irresistible power. The awareness of this
power may come to you in the first chapter, or it may flash into your
mind in some subsequent chapter. It may come in the form of a single
idea. Or, it may come in the nature of a plan, or a purpose. Again, it
may cause you to go back into your past experiences of failure or defeat,
and bring to the surface some lesson by which you can regain all that
you lost through defeat.
After I had described to Mr. Darby the power unwittingly used by the
little colored child, he quickly retraced his thirty years of experience as
a life insurance salesman, and frankly acknowledged that his success in
that field was due, in no small degree, to the lesson he had learned from
the child.
Mr. Darby pointed out: "every time a prospect tried to bow me out,
without buying, I saw that child standing there in the old mill, her big
eyes glaring in defiance, and I said to myself, 'I've gotta make this sale.
' The better portion of all sales I have made, were made after people
had said 'NO'."

He recalled, too, his mistake in having stopped only three feet from
gold, "but," he said, "that experience was a blessing in disguise. It
taught me to keep on keeping on, no matter how hard the going may be,
a lesson I needed to learn before I could succeed in anything."
This story of Mr. Darby and his uncle, the colored child and the gold
mine, doubtless will be read by hundreds of men who make their living
by selling life insurance, and to all of these, the author wishes to offer
the suggestion that Darby owes to these two experiences his ability to
sell more than a million dollars of life insurance every year.
Life is strange, and often imponderable! Both the successes and the
failures have their roots in simple experiences. Mr. Darby's experiences
were commonplace and simple enough, yet they held the answer to his
destiny in life, therefore they were as important (to him) as life itself.
He profited by these two dramatic experiences, because he analyzed
them, and found the lesson they taught. But what of the man who has
neither the time, nor the inclination to study failure in search of
knowledge that may lead to success? Where, and how is he to learn the
art of converting defeat into stepping stones to opportunity?
In answer to these questions, this book was written.
The answer called for a description of thirteen principles, but remember,
as you read, the answer you may be seeking, to the questions which
have caused you to ponder over the strangeness of life, may be found in
your own mind, through some idea, plan, or purpose which may spring
into your mind as you read.
One sound idea is all that one needs to achieve success. The principles
described in this book, contain the best, and the most practical of all
that is known, concerning ways and means of creating useful ideas.
Before we go any further in our approach to the description of these
principles, we believe you are entitled to receive this important
suggestion... WHEN RICHES BEGIN TO COME THEY COME SO
QUICKLY, IN SUCH GREAT ABUNDANCE, THAT ONE
WONDERS WHERE THEY HAVE BEEN HIDING DURING ALL

THOSE LEAN YEARS. This is an astounding statement, and all the
more so, when we take into consideration the popular belief, that riches
come only to those who work hard and