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RUSSELL H. CONWELL
FOREWORD
People
are thinking, but they can think much more. The housewife is thinking
about the chemical changes caused by heat in meats, vegetables, and
liquids. The sailor thinks about the gold in sea-water, the soldier
thinks of smokeless powder and muffled guns; the puddler meditates on
iron squeezers and electric furnaces; the farmer admires Luther
Burbank's magical combinations in plant life; the school-girl
examines the composition of her pencil and analyses the
writing-paper; the teacher studies psychology at first hand; the
preacher understands more of the life that now is; the merchant and
manufacturer give more attention to the demand. Yes, we are all
thinking. But we are still thinking too far away; even the prism
through which we see the stars is near the eyes. The dentist is
thinking too much about other people's teeth.This
book is sent out to induce people to look at their own eyes, to pick
up the gold in their laps, to study anatomy under the tutorship of
their own hearts. One could accumulate great wisdom and secure
fortunes by studying his own finger-nails. This lesson seems the very
easiest to learn, and for that reason is the most difficult.The
lecture, "The Silver Crown," which the author has been
giving in various forms for fifty years, is herein printed from a
stenographic report of one address on this general subject. It will
not be found all together, as a lecture, for this book is an attempt
to give further suggestion on the many different ways in which the
subject has been treated, just as the lecture has varied in its
illustrations from time to time. The lecture was addressed to the
ear. This truth, which amplifies the lecture, is addressed to the
eye.I
have been greatly assisted, and sometimes superseded, in the
preparation of these pages by Prof. James F. Willis, of Philadelphia.
Bless him!My
hope is by this means to reach a larger audience even than that which
has heard some of the things herein so many times in the last
forty-five years. We do not hope to give or sell anything to the
reader. He has enough already. But many starve with bread in their
mouths. They spit it out and weep for food. Humans are a strange
collection. But they can be induced to think much more accurately and
far more efficiently. This book is sent out as an aid to closer
observation and more efficient living.