Page 14 - Napoleon Hill Think and Grow Rich Full Book | Success Learned

stepped forward one step, looked up into his eyes, and screamed at the top of her
shrill voice, "MY MAMMY'S GOTTA HAVE THAT FIFTY CENTS!"

13

NAPOLEON HILL THINK AND GROW RICH

The uncle stopped, looked at her for a minute, then slowly laid the barrel stave on
the floor, put his hand in his pocket, took out half a dollar, and gave it to her. The
child took the money and slowly backed toward the door, never taking her eyes
off the man whom she had just conquered.

After she had gone, the uncle sat down on a box and looked out the window into
space for more than ten minutes. He was pondering, with awe, over the whipping
he had just taken. Mr. Darby, too, was doing some thinking. That was the first
time in all his experience that he had seen a colored child deliberately master an
adult white person. How did she do it? What happened to his uncle that caused
him to lose his fierceness and become as docile as a lamb? What strange power
did this child use that made her master over her superior? These and other simi-
lar questions flashed into Darby's mind, but he did not 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 unu-
sual 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 ac-
cidentally 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.