CHAPTER ONE
THE GOD IN YOU

The Declaration of Independence starts with the preamble that all men are born free and equal.

But how many believe that? When one child is born in a Park Avenue home, with doctors and nurses and servants to attend to his slightest want, with tutors and colleges to educate him, with riches and influence to start him in his career, how can he be said to be born equal to the child of the Ghetto, who has difficulty getting enough air to breathe, to say nothing of food to eat, and whose waking hours are so taken up with the struggle for existence that he has no time to acquire much in the way of education!

Yet in that which counts most, these two are born equal, for they have equal access to the God in themselves, equal chance to give Him means of expression. More than that, the God in one is just as powerful as the God in the other, for both are part of that all-powerful God of the Universe who rules the world.

In effect, we are each of us individual cells in the great Mind of the universe—the God Mind. We can draw upon the Mind of the Universe in exactly the same way that any cell in our own body draws upon our brain for whatever it needs outside its immediate surroundings.

All men are born free and equal, just as all the cells in your body are equal. Some of these cells may seem to be more fortunately situated than others, being placed in fatty portions of the body where they are so surrounded with nourishment that they seem assured of everything they can need for their natural lives.

Others may be in hard-worked parts where they are continually having to draw upon the lymph around them, and through it upon the blood stream and the heart, and where it seems as though they cannot be sure of sustenance from one day to the next. Still others may be in little-used and apparently forgotten parts where they seem to have been left to dry up and starve, as in the scalp of the head when the hair falls out and the fatty tissue of the scalp dries, leaving the cells there to shrivel and die.

Yet despite their apparent differences in surroundings and opportunity, all these cells are equal, all can draw upon every element in the body for sustenance at need.

To see how it is done, let us take a single nerve cell in our own brain, and see how it works.

Look up the diagram of a typical nerve cell in any medical work, and what do you find? From one side of the cell, a long fibre extends which makes connection with some part of the skin, or some group of cells such as a muscle. This fibre is part of the nerve cell. It is the telephone line, carrying orders or stimuli from the cell to the muscle it controls, or from the sensory nerve in the skin to the cell in the brain. Thoughts, emotions, desires, all send impulses to the nerves controlling the muscles concerned, and provide the stimuli which set these muscles in action, thus transforming nervous energy into muscular energy.

So if you have a desire which requires the action of only a single muscle, what happens? Your desire takes the form of an impulse to the nerve cell controlling that muscle, the order travels along the cell-fibre to the musclc, which promptly acts in accord with the stimulus given it. And your desire is satisfied.

But suppose your desire requires the action of more than one muscle? Suppose it needs the united power of every muscle in the body? So far we have used only the long nerve fibre or telephone line connecting the nerve cell with the muscle it controls. But on the other side of each nerve cell are short fibres, apparently ending in space. And as long as the nerves are at rest, these fibres do lie in space.

But when you stir up the nerve cells, when you give them a job that is greater than the muscles at their command can manage, then these short fibres go into action. Then they bestir themselves to some purpose. They dig into the nerve cells near them. They wake these and stimulate them in turn to stir up those on the other sides of them until, if necessary, every cell in the brain is twitching, and every muscle in the body working to accomplish the job you demand.

That is what happens in your body if even a single cell in your brain desires something strongly enough, persistently enough, to hold to its purpose until it gets what it wants. And that is what happens in the God-body when you put the same persistence into your desires.

You see, you are a cell in the God-body of the Universe, just as every cell in you is a part of your body. When you work with your hands, your feet, your muscles, you are using only the muscles immediately connected with your brain cells. When you work with the money you have, the riches or friends or influence you control, you are using only the means immediately connected to your brain cell in the mind of God. And that is so infinitesimally small a part of the means and resources at the command of that Great God-mind.

It is just as though you tried to do all the work required of your body today by using only the tiniest muscle in your little finger, when by stirring up the surrounding nerve cells, you could just as well draw upon the power of the whole mind, or of the entire body if that were needed. It is as though one of your nerve cells undertook to do the work of the whole body, and tried, with the single muscle at its command, to do it!

You’d think that foolish, if one tiny nerve cell out of the billions in your brain, undertook any such gigantic job. You’d know it was hopeless . . . that no one cell, and no one muscle, could ever accomplish all that work. Yet you, as a single cell in the God-mind, have often attempted just as impossible jobs. When all you had to do to accomplish everything you desired was to stir into action the cells around you !

How can you do this? In the same way that any cell in your own brain does it. Pray! In other words, get an urgent, insistent desire. The first principle of success is DESIRE—knowing what you want. Desire is the planting of your seed. It needs cultivation, of course, but the first important step is the PLANTING. Desire stirs the nerve cells in your brain to use the muscles under their control to do the work required of them. Desire will set your nerve cell in the God-mind vibrating, using the muscle under its command and stirring into action all the nerve-celis around it until they, too, are working with you to bring about the thing you wish.

That is the reason it was said in the Vedas thousands of years ago that if any two people would unite their psychic forces, they could conquer the world! That is the reason Jesus told us—‘‘If two of you shall agree as touching anything they shall ask, it shall be done unto them. For when two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them, and I shall grant their request.”

When two or more nerve cells unite for a certain action, they get that action, even if to bring it about they have to draw upon every cell in the whole body for help I

This does not mean that anything is impossible to a single cell or a single person—merely that when two or more are united for a common purpose, the results are easier. But there is no good thing any man can ask, believing, that he cannot get.

In the first chapter of Genesis, it is written that God gave man dominion over the earth. And it is true. It is just as true as that any nerve cell in your whole body has dominion over your body. If you doubt it, let one nerve be sufficiently irritated, and see how quickly it puts every nerve in your body to work to remove that irritation.

One nerve cell in your body, with a strongly held purpose, can bring into action every cell in your body to accomplish that purpose. One nerve cell in the God-body (in other words, one man or woman) with a strongly held purpose, can bring into action every cell in the Universe, if these be necessary to the accomplishment of that purpose I

Does that mean anything to you? Does it mean anything to know that the words of prophets and seers are true, that the promises of the Scriptures can be depended upon, that there really is a Power in the Universe that responds to the urge of the lowliest man or woman just as readily as to the command of the highest?

The world is yours I It matters not whether you be prince or pauper, blue-blooded or red, white-skinned, black, yellow or brown. The God-body of the Universe makes no more distinction between cells than do you in responding to the impulses of the nerve-cells in your own body.

Rich or poor—it’s all one to you. Highly placed or low —one can cause you as much trouble, or give you as great satisfaction, as another. And the same is true of the God-body of the Universe. All men are created free and equal. All remain free and equal nerve cells in the God-mind of the Universe.

The only difference lies in our understanding of the power that is ours. How much understanding have you? And what are you doing to increase it? “Seek first understanding, and all things else shall be added unto you.” Easier to believe that now, isn’t it? With the right understanding, you could run the world. Can you think of anything more important than acquiring understanding?

What turned the complaining, discouraged, poverty-stricken and quite ordinary young Bonaparte into the greatest military genius of his age, “Man of Destiny” and master of most of Europe?

The Talisman of Napoleon, the Talisman of every great and successful man, the only Talisman that will stir the whole body of the Universe into action, is the same Talisman as that needed to put the entire physical body at the service of any one nerve cell—a purpose so strongly held that life or death or anything else seems of small consequence beside it! A purpose—and the persistent determination to hold to it until it is accomplished.

Love sometimes makes such a Talisman—the love that goes out to dare all and do all for the loved one. Greed oftentimes brings it into being—hence many of the great fortunes of today. The lust for power is a potent Talisman, that has animated men since time began. Greater still is the zeal of one who would convert the world. That Talisman has carried men through fire and flood, into every danger and over every obstacle. Look how Mohammed, a lowly camel driver, became the ruler of and prophet to millions.

Faith in charms, belief in luck, utter confidence in another’s leadership, all are Talismans of greater or lesser power.

But the greatest of all is belief in the God inside YOU! Belief in its power to draw to itself every element it needs for expression. Belief in a definite PURPOSE it came here to fulfill, and which can be fulfilled only through YOU!

Have you such a faith? If not, get it! For without such a faith, life is purposeless, meaningless. What is more, until you lay hold of that Talisman, life will never bring anything worth while to you 1

What was it won for Grant over his more brilliant opponents? The grim, dogged, persistent purpose to fight it out along those lines if it took all summer! What is it that has made England victor in so many of her wars, in spite of inept leadership and costly blunders? That same bull-dog determination, which holds on in spite of all reverses and discouragements, until its fight is won. What was it that wore out the unjust judge, in the parable that Jesus told?

If the nerve in a tooth keeps crying out that a cavity in that tooth needs attention, won’t you finally drop everything and seek out a dentist who can satisfy that nerve’s needs? And if any other nerve prays continuously for attention, won’t you do likewise with it?

Well, you are a nerve in the God-body. If you have an urgent need, and keep praying and insisting and demanding the remedy, don’t you suppose you will get it just as surely?

A definite purpose, held to in the face of every discouragement and failure, in spite of all obstacles and opposition, will win no matter what the odds. It is the one nerve cell working against the indifference, the inertia or even the active opposition of the entire group. If the cell is easily discouraged, it will fail. If it is willing to wait indefinitely, it will have to wait. But if it keeps stirring up the cells next to it, and stimulating them to stir those beyond, eventually the entire nerve system will go into action and bring about the result that single cell desires— even if it be only to rid itself of the constant irritation.1

You have seen young fellows determined to go to college. You have thought them foolish, in the face of the obstacles facing them. Yet when they persisted, you know how often those obstacles have one by one magically disappeared, until presently they found themselves with the fruition of their desires. A strongly held purpose, persisted in, believed in, is as sure to win in the end as the morrow’s sun is to rise. And earnest prayer is to the God-body what a throbbing nerve is to yours. Hold to it, insist upon it, and it is just as sure of a hearing. But remember:

“He that wavereth is like the wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed; let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord.”

All are born free and equal. All may not start with the same amount of wealth or opportunity immediately available to them, but all can go to the Source of these and get just as much of them as is necessary to satisfy their desires.

We are surrounded by riches. We have available unlimited wealth. But we have to learn how to draw it to us.

Years ago, at Kimberley in South Africa, a poor Boer farmer tried to glean a living out of the rocky soil. His boys oftentimes picked up pieces of dirty looking crystal and used them as pebbles to throw at some wandering sheep. After years of fruitless effort, the farmer abandoned his attempts to make a living out of this rocky soil, and moved to a more fertile spot. Today, the farm he tried so hard to cultivate is the site of the Kimberley Diamond Mines, one of the richest spots on the face of the globe. And the bits of dirty crystal that his boys threw at the sheep turned out to be diamonds in the rough!

Most of us are like that poor Boer farmer. We strive and struggle, and frequently give up, because of ignorance of our powers, ignorance of the good things around us. We remain in poverty until along comes someone and shows that we were standing on a diamond mine all the time.

Russell Conwell tells the story of a Pennsylvania farmer whose brother went to Canada and became an oil driller. Fired with the brother’s tales of sudden wealth, the farmer sold his land and went to Canada to make his fortune. The new owner, in looking over the farm, found that where the cattle came to drink from a little creek, a board had been put across the water to hold back a heavy scum which was washed down by the rains from the ground above.

He examined this scum, and thought it smelled like oil. So he had some experts come out and look the ground over. It proved to be one of the richest oil fields in the state of Pennsylvania.

What riches are you overlooking? What opportunities? “Opportunity,” says a famous writer, “is like oxygen. It is so plentiful that we fairly breathe it.” All that is necessary is a receptive mind, a willingness to try, and the persistence to see things through.

There is some one thing that YOU can do better than anyone else. There is some line of work in which you can excel—if you will just find that one thing and spend all your time and effort in learning to do it supremely well.

Don’t worry if it seems to be some humble thing that anyone ought to be able to do. In a magazine some time ago, there was the story of a Polish immigrant who could speak scarcely a word of English, who had no trade or training and had to take any sort of job that offered. He happened to get one in a nursery, digging up dirt for the flowers. He dug so well that soon he was attending to the planting of many of the commoner varieties of flowers.

Among these were the peonies. He loved those big peonies, gave them such careful attention that they thrived and grew more beautiful than ever. Soon his peonies began to attract attention, the demand for them grew, until he had to double and then quadruple the space devoted to them. Today he is half owner of that nursery.