Wallace Wattles - Science of Getting Rich
Introduction
- Practice the Golden Rule, that of gratitude, each day and your wealth will come to you.
Preface
- You want results and you are willing to take the conclusions of science as a basis for action, without going into all the processes by which those conclusions were reached.
Chapter 1: The Right To Be Rich
- The fact is that it is not possible to live a really complete or successful life unless one is rich.
- The object of all life is development, and everything that lives has an inalienable right to all the development it is capable of attaining.
- The purpose of nature is the advancement and unfoldment of life, and everyone should have all that can contribute to the power, elegance, beauty, and richness of life. To be content with less is sinful.
- There is nothing wrong in wanting to get rich. It is perfectly right that you should desire to be rich.
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The 3 motives for which we live:
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Body
A person cannot live fully in body without good food, comfortable clothing, and warm shelter, and without freedom from excessive toil. Rest and recreation are also necessary to his physical life. -
Mind
To live fully in mind a person must have intellectual recreations, and must surround himself with all the objects of art and beauty he is capable of using and appreciating. -
Soul
To live fully in soul, a person must have love, and love is denied fullest expression by poverty.
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Body
Chapter 2: There Is A Science Of Getting Rich
- There are certain laws which govern the process of acquiring riches, and once these laws are learned and obeyed by anyone, that person will get rich with mathematical certainty.
- Getting rich is not a matter of environment. Getting rich is not the result of saving, or thrift. Nor is getting rich due to doing things which others fail to do. Conclusion: it is the result of doing things in a certain way.
- "No one is prevented from getting rich by lack of capital."
- You must begin to live in harmony with the laws governing the universe.
Chapter 3: Is Opportunity Monopolized?
- No one is kept poor because other people have monopolized the wealth and have put a fence around it.
- There is abundance of opportunity for the person who will go with the tide, instead of trying to swim against it.
- No one is kept in poverty by a shortness in the supply of riches - there is more than enough for all.
- "Everything you see on earth is made from one original substance, out of which all things proceed."
- Nature is an inexhaustible storehouse of riches - the supply will never run short.
- The formless stuff is intelligent - it is stuff which thinks. It is alive and is always impelled toward more life.
- Nature is formed for the advancement of life, and its impelling motive is the increase of life.
Chapter 4: The First Principle In The Science Of Getting Rich
- Thought is the only power which can produce tangible riches from the formless substance.
- Every thought of form, held in thinking substance, causes the creation of the form, but always, or at least generally, along lines of growth and action already established.
- "No thought of form can be impressed upon original substance without causing the creation of the form."
- You cannot shape a thing until you have thought that thing.
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3 fundamental propositions:
- There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which, in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces of the universe.
- A thought in this substance produces the thing that is imaged by the thought.
- A person can form things in his thought, and, by impressing his thought upon formless substance, can cause the thing he thinks about to be created.
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The first step toward getting rich:
To do things in the way you want to do them, you will have to acquire the ability to think the way you want to think. To think what you want to think is to think TRUTH, regardless of appearances.
Chapter 5: Increasing Life
- Get rid of the last vestige of the old idea that there is a Deity whose will it is that you should be poor or whose purposes may be served by keeping you in poverty. Get rid of the idea that God wants you to sacrifice yourself for others and that you can secure his favor by doing so.
- The intelligent substance which is all, and in all, and which lives in all and lives in you, is a consciously living substance.
- Intelligence is a necessity for continuous increase.
- The universe desires you to have everything you want to have. Nature is friendly to your plans. Everything is naturally for you.
- You must want real life, not mere pleasure or sensual gratification.
- You can make the most of yourself only by getting rich, so it is right and praiseworthy that you should give your first and best thought to the work of acquiring wealth.
- Intelligent substance will make things for you, but it will not take things away from someone else and give them to you.
- If you are to become rich in a scientific and certain way, you must rise entirely out of competitive thought. You must never think for a moment that the supply is limited.
- Never look at the visible supply. Look always at the limitless riches in formless substance, and know that they are coming to you as fast as you can receive and use them.
Chapter 6: How Riches Come To You
- You do not have to get something for nothing, but can give to every person more use value than you take cash value from him.
- Do not forget for a moment that the thinking substance is through all, in all, communicating with all, and can influence all.
- If you fix upon your consciousness the fact that your desire for the possession of riches is one with the desire of the supreme power for more complete expression, your faith becomes invincible.
Chapter 7: Gratitude
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The whole process of mental adjustment and atunement can be summed up in one word: Gratitude.
- You believe that there is one intelligent substance, from which all things proceed.
- Then you believe that this substance gives you everything you desire.
- Finally you relate yourself to it by a feeling of deep and profound gratitude.
- The law of gratitude is the natural principle that action and reaction are always equal and in opposite directions.
- The grateful mind is constantly fixed upon the best. Therefore it tends to become the best. It takes the form or character of the best, and will receive the best.
Chapter 8: Thinking In The Certain Way
- You must form a clear and definite mental picture of what you want. Know what you want and be specific and definite. You cannot transmit an idea unless you have it yourself.
- Spend as much of your leisure time as you can in contemplating your picture. Behind your clear vision must be the purpose to realize it, to bring it out in tangible expression. And behind this purpose must be an invincible and unwavering FAITH that the thing is already yours, that it is "at hand" and you have only to take possession of it.
- Hold the vision with unshakable purpose to attain it and with steadfast faith that you do attain it. Once you have clearly formed your vision, the whole matter turns on receiving.
- The answer to prayer is not according to your faith while you are talking, but according to your faith while you are working.
- Hold steadily to your vision, with the purpose to cause its creation into solid form, and the faith that you are doing so.
Chapter 9: How To Use The Will
- To set about getting rich in a scientific way, you do not try to apply your will power to anything outside of yourself.
- To get rich, you need only to use your will power upon yourself. Use your will to keep yourself thinking and acting in the certain way.
- The picture of your desires, held with faith and purpose, is taken up by the formless, and permeates it to great distances - throughout the universe, for all we know.
- "If you want to become rich, you must not make a study of poverty."
- The poor do not need charity - they need inspiration. Prove it by getting rich yourself.
- People must be taught to become rich by creation, not by competition.
- Use your will power to keep your mind off the subject of poverty and to keep it fixed with faith and purpose on the vision of what you want and are creating.
Chapter 10: Further Use Of The Will
- You cannot retain a true and clear vision of wealth if you are constantly turning your attention to opposing pictures, whether they be external or imaginary.
- You should interest yourself in the world's becoming rich. Give your attention wholly to riches.
- "The very best thing you can do for the whole world is to make the most of yourself."
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4th fundamental proposition:
- In order to do this, a person must pass from the competitive to the creative mind - he must form a clear mental picture of the things he wants, and hold this picture in his thoughts with the fixed purpose to get what he wants, and the unwavering faith that he does get what he wants, closing his mind against all that may tend to shake his purpose, dim his vision, or quench his faith.
Chapter 11: Acting In The Certain Way
- Thought is the creative power or the impelling force which causes the creative power to act.
- The scientific use of thought consists in forming a clear and distinct mental image of what you want, in holding fast to your purpose to get what you want, and in realizing with grateful faith that you do get what you want.
- Your faith and purpose positively impress your vision upon formless substance, which has the same desire for more life that you have, and this vision, received from you, sets all the creative forces at work in and through their regular channels of action, but directed toward you. But you must act in a certain way, so that you can appropriate what is yours when it comes to you and so that you can meet the things you have in your picture and put them in their proper places as they arrive.
- By thought, the thing you want is brought to you. By action, you receive it. And it is evident that you must act now.
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5th fundamental proposition:
- So that he may receive what he wants when it comes, a person must act now upon the people and things in his present environment.
Chapter 12: Efficient Action
- "The world is advanced only by those who more than fill their present places."
- Do, every day, all that you can do that day, and do each act in an efficient manner.
- It is really not the number of things you do, but the efficiency of each separate action that counts.
- You will see that it is a self-evident proposition that if you do not do any inefficient acts and if you do a sufficient number of efficient acts, you will become rich. Power is at your service, and to make each act efficient you have only to put power into it.
- Every act can be made strong and efficient by holding your vision while you are doing it and putting the whole power of your faith and purpose into it.
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New combined 4th and 5th fundamental proposition:
- In order to do this, a person must pass from the competitive to the creative mind. He must form a clear mental picture of the things he wants, and must do - with faith and purpose - all that can be done each day, doing each separate thing in an efficient manner.
Chapter 13: Getting Into The Right Business
- You can get rich in any business, for if you have not the right talent, you can develop that talent. Of course, it will be easier for you to succeed in a vocation for which you already have the talents in a well-developed state.
- You will get rich most easily in terms of effort, if you do that for which you are best fitted, but you will get rich most satisfactorily if you do that which you want to do.
- "Desire is a manifestation of power."
- There is never any hurry on the creative plane, and there is no lack of opportunity.
- There is a mind which knows all there is to know, and you can come into close unity with this mind by faith and the purpose to advance in life, if you have deep gratitude.
Chapter 14: The Impression Of Increase
- The key thought of all your efforts must be to convey to other people's minds the impression of increase.
- You are a creative center from which increase is given off to all.
- Convey the impression of advancement with everything you do, so that all people shall receive the impression that you are an "advancing personality", and that you advance all who deal with you.
- Beware of the insidious temptation to seek for power over other people. Beware of the competitive mind!
Chapter 15: The Advancing Personality
- The law of the increase of life is as mathematically certain in its operation as the law of gravity.
- The person who is certain to advance is the one who is too big for his place, who has a clear concept of what he wants to be, who knows that he can become what he wants to be, and who is determined to be what he wants to be.
- There is a power which never fails to present opportunity to the advancing personality who is moving in obedience to law.
- Do not wait for an opportunity to be all that you want to be. When an opportunity to be more than you are now is presented and you feel impelled toward it, take it. It will be the first step toward a greater opportunity.
Chapter 16: Some Cautions And Concluding Observations
- If the people have the advancing mind, have the faith that they can become rich, and move forward with the fixed purpose to become rich, nothing can possibly keep them in poverty.
- You are concerned with doing today's work in a perfectly successful manner and not with emergencies which may arise tomorrow.
- Guard your speech. Never speak of yourself, your affairs, or of anything else in a discouraged or discouraging way.
- When others are having hard times and poor business, you will find your greatest opportunities.
- Go on in the certain way, and if you do not receive that thing, you will receive something so much better that you will see that the seeming failure was really a great success.
Chapter 17: A Summary Of The Science Of Getting Rich
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The Summary:
- There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which, in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces of the universe.
- A thought in this substance produces the thing that is imaged by the thought.
- A person can form things in his thought, and by impressing his thought upon formless substance can cause the thing he thinks about to be created.
- In order to do this, a person must pass from the competitive to the creative mind. Otherwise he cannot be in harmony with formless intelligence, which is always creative and never competitive in spirit.
- A person may come into full harmony with the formless substance by entertaining a lively and sincere gratitude for the blessings it bestows upon him. Gratitude unifies the mind of man with the intelligence of substance, so that man's thoughts are received by the formless. A person can remain upon the creative plane only by uniting himself with the formless intelligence through a deep and continuous feeling of gratitude.
- A person must form a clear and definite mental image of the things he wishes to have, to do, or to become, and he must hold this mental image in his thoughts, while being deeply grateful to the supreme that all his desires are granted to him. The person who wishes to get rich must spend his leisure hours in contemplating his vision, and in earnest thanksgiving that the reality is being given to him. Too much stress cannot be laid on the importance of frequent contemplation of the mental image, coupled with unwavering faith and devout gratitude. This is the process by which the impression is given to the formless and the creative forces set in motion.
- The creative energy works through the established channels of natural growth, and of the industrial and social order. All that is included in his mental image will surely be brought to the person who follows the instructions given above, and whose faith does not waver. What he wants will come to him through the ways of established trade and commerce.
- In order to receive his own when it is ready to come to him, a person must be in action in a way that causes him to more than fill his present place. He must keep in mind the purpose to get rich through realization of his mental image. And he must do, every day, all that can be done that day, taking care to do each act in a successful manner. He must give to every person a use value in excess of the cash value he receives, so that each transaction makes for more life, and he must hold the advancing thought so that the impression of increase will be communicated to all with whom he comes into contact.
- The men and women who practice the foregoing instructions will certainly get rich, and the riches they receive will be in exact proportion to the definiteness of their vision, the fixity of their purpose, the steadiness of their faith, and the depth of their gratitude.
Posted on 3rd September 2007 by Quintus Hegie
