Page 13 - Napoleon Hill Think and Grow Rich Full Book | Success Learned

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NAPOLEON HILL THINK AND GROW RICH

Before success comes in any man's life, he is sure to meet with much temporary
defeat, and, perhaps, some failure. When defeat overtakes a man, the easiest and
most logical thing to do is to QUIT. That is exactly what the majority of men do.

More than five hundred of the most successful men this country has ever known,
told the author their greatest success came just one step beyond the point at which
defeat had overtaken them. Failure is a trickster with a keen sense of irony and
cunning.

It takes great delight in tripping one when success is almost within reach.

A FIFTY-CENT LESSON IN PERSISTENCE

Shortly after Mr. Darby received his degree from the "University of Hard Knocks, "
and had decided to profit by his experience in the gold mining business, he had
the good fortune to be present on an occasion that proved to him that "No"
does not necessarily mean no.

One afternoon he was helping his uncle grind wheat in an old fashioned mill.
The uncle operated a large farm on which a number of colored sharecrop farmers
lived. Quietly, the door was opened, and a small colored child, the daughter of a
tenant, walked in and took her place near the door.

The uncle looked up, saw the child, and barked at her roughly, "what do you
want?" Meekly, the child replied, "My mammy say send her fifty cents." "I'll not
do it," the uncle retorted, "Now you run on home." "Yas sah," the child replied.
But she did not move. The uncle went ahead with his work, so busily engaged that
he did not pay enough attention to the child to observe that she did not leave.
When he looked up and saw her still standing there, he yelled at her, "I told you
to go on home! Now go, or I'll take a switch to you." The little girl said "yas sah,"
but she did not budge an inch. The uncle dropped a sack of grain he was about to
pour into the mill hopper, picked up a barrel stave, and started toward the child
with an expression on his face that indicated trouble.

Darby held his breath. He was certain he was about to witness a murder. He knew
his uncle had a fierce temper. He knew that colored children were not supposed
to defy white people in that part of the country.

When the uncle reached the spot where the child was standing, she quickly