Napoleon Hill

This man is the editor of a national magazine and I advise every one of you to subscribe for that magazine, because such a man as this must have much that each of you will need when you go into the field and offer your services."

By the middle of that week I had received more than $6,000.00 for subscriptions to the magazine of which I was editor, and during the following two years these same two thousand students and their friends sent in more than $50,000.00 for subscriptions. Tell me, if you can, how or where I could have invested $100.00 as profitably as this, by refusing to accept my $100.00 fee and thereby setting the Law of Increasing Returns to work in my behalf?

We go through two important periods in this life; one is that period during which we are gathering, classifying and organizing knowledge, and the other is that period during which we are struggling for recognition.

We must first learn something, which requires more effort than most of us are willing to put into the job; but, after we have learned much that can be of useful service to others, we are still confronted with the problem of convincing them that we can serve them.

One of the most important reasons why we should always be not only ready but willing to render service, is the fact that every time we do so, we gain thereby another opportunity to prove to someone that we have ability; we go just one more step toward gaining the necessary recognition that we must all have.

Instead of saying to the world, "Show me the color of your money and I will show you what I can do," reverse the rule and say, "Let me show you the color of my service so that I may take a look at the color of your money if you like my service."

In 1917 a certain woman who was then nearing the fifty-year milepost of life, was working as a stenographer, at fifteen dollars a week. Judging by the salary she must have been none too competent in that work.

Now note this change:

Last year, this same woman cleared a little over $100,000.00 on the lecture platform. What bridged that mighty chasm between these two earning capacities? you ask, and I answer: The habit of performing more service and better service than that for which she was paid, thereby taking advantage of the Law of Increasing Returns.

This woman is well known throughout the country, as she is now a prominent lecturer on the subject of Applied Psychology. Let me show you how she harnessed the Law of Increasing Returns. First, she goes into a city and delivers a series of fifteen free lectures. All may attend who will, without money and without price.