Page 125 - Napoleon Hill Think and Grow Rich Full Book | Success Learned

Well, nothing happens until large numbers of men join forces for the avowed pur-
pose of ignoring the law, and taking what they want by force.

THEN COMES THE DICTATOR, WITH WELL ORGANIZED FIRING SQUADS
AND MACHINE GUNS!

We have not yet reached that stage in America! But we have heard all we want to
know about how the system works. Perhaps we hah be fortunate enough not to
demand personal knowledge of so gruesome a reality. Doubtless we shall prefer
to continue with our

FREEDOM OF SPEECH, FREEDOM OF DEED, and FREEDOM TO RENDER
USEFUL SERVICE IN RETURN FOR RICHES.

The practice, by Government officials of extending to men and women the privi-
lege of raiding the public treasury in return for votes, sometimes results in elec-
tion, but as night follows day, the final payoff comes; when every penny wrong-
fully used, must be repaid with compound interest on compound interest. If those
who make the grab are not forced to repay, the burden falls on their children, and
their children's children, "even unto the third and fourth generations." There is no
way to avoid the debt. Men can, and sometimes do, form themselves into groups
for the purpose of crowding wages up, and working hours down. There is a point
beyond which they cannot go. It is the point at which the LAW OF ECONOMICS
steps in, and the sheriff gets both the employer and the employees.

For six years, from 1929, to 1935, the people of America, both rich and poor,
barely missed seeing the Old Man Economics hand over to the sheriff all the busi-
nesses, and industries and banks. It was not a pretty sight! It did not increase our
respect for mob psychology through which men cast reason to the winds and start
trying to GET without GIVING.

We who went through those six discouraging years, when FEAR WAS IN THE
SADDLE, AND FAITH WAS ON THE GROUND, cannot forget how ruthlessly the
LAW OF ECONOMICS exacted its toll from both rich and poor, weak and strong,
old and young. We shall not wish to go through another such experience.

126

NAPOLEON HILL THINK AND GROW RICH

These observations are not founded upon short-time experience. They are the
result of twenty-five years of careful analysis of the methods of both the most suc-
cessful and the most unsuccessful men America has known.