The opposite of this weakness is a feature in our own make-up.

The business man who is constantly asking advice is advertising the fact of his uncertainty of his own actions. Your great problems must be decided by yourself.

The one thing that separates the sheep from the goats, and success from failure, is the ability to a.n.a.lyze, study and weigh problems for yourself, and to make decisions for yourself.

The law of compensation comes in here again, for in proportion as you have self-reliance and good judgment your success will be measured.

You may rely upon it that if you go about seeking advice, you will get two kinds of advice--First: the advice that concurs with your own preference or decision; and, second, the kind that is in opposition to your views. You accept the first kind because it tickles your vanity, and you throw aside the second, saying the advice is prejudiced.

Don't ask advice. Size up and weigh the problem yourself and use your own best judgment.

Reading

The business man who goes along day by day without taking on any responsibilities or without tackling more difficult problems, finds he does not progress.

The man who gets into a rut and reads light, frothy literature all the time--the kind that is pleasing to the imagination, the kind that leaves no permanent impression--does not progress mentally.

Reading should be like eating, we should have the dessert as well as the substantials. It would be a great mistake to eat dessert alone, and it is certainly a mistake to read light, frothy reading matter alone.

One of the prime requisites to a successful career is concentration of thought. Few things will dissipate thought as much as over-reading of newspapers.

The newspaper starts in with the first page, and by the time you have finished the last column oh the last page you may have read a hundred articles, each one of these articles touching on a different line of thought. The daily newspaper contains climaxes of all kinds. Each article is a distinct change of thought. The daily newspaper gives us statistics, sorrow, laughter, crime, pa.s.sion, death, lies, humor, and so on all through the gamut of the scale of human experience.

The man who craves the newspaper soon finds his line of thought frequently interrupted, side-stepped, drawn, cut off and dispersed.

Abundant evidences are at hand where the book reader acquired the daily newspaper habit and reads the daily to such an extent that it is impossible for him to read books thereafter. He has broken his continuity of thought, and when this happens book reading is impossible.

Everyone should read two or three or more books at a time. One should be an interesting book, whether history, story or comedy, so long as it is well written and along lines that will hold one's interest. One should read one book after another of this sort as a dessert for his dinner, as it were, but along with it he should eat substantial food in the nature of substantial reading.

Do not read yourself to sleep at night over a light novel. Read your novel for an hour or so; then take up your old philosopher or scientist and read a page, or as much as necessary to find some thought clearly expressed so that it will be burned into your mind. That thought will remain and will be of service to you in years to come.

Read daily newspapers scantily. Read items concerning the business you are engaged in. Read the doings of Congress and the important events of the day. Go over the head-lines, if need be, and eliminate all those shocking stories of crime and sordid influence. Do not let yourself get into the habit of reading the details of horrible crimes and bad impulses and criminal acts. Skip over all the details of hangings and murders. They are weeds in the mind that choke up the beautiful flowers of thought.

Remember, everything you read depresses or elevates, and in proportion as you accustom yourself to read substantial matter so in proportion you will progress in this world, and have a flood of thoughts at your command when requirements come upon you calling for clean-cut expressions.

You will write better letters, you will converse better, you will enjoy social intercourse better if you read helpful reading matter from books and read newspapers very sparingly.

Argument

Not once in a thousand times will one man convince another in an argument, and the benefits you get if you do convince the other fellow will not compensate you for the waste of energy expended on the other nine hundred and ninety-nine times when your efforts failed.

You convince a man against his will and he is of the same opinion still.

There is a mighty lot of difference between argument and reason. You may accomplish more by dividing your case into one or two good reasons and telling your adversary that you will not argue the case, but you will let him look at these reasons, and when he takes it up logically you will have no fear of his conclusion, for truth must triumph.

While argument itself is a footless proposition, it is infinitely more so if your argument is with those of less mental calibre than your own, for by the law of compensation, in proportion as a man is ignorant, he makes up in perversity and lack of a.n.a.lytical ability.

Do not stoop to contend with those who have no standing, mentally, morally or physically. It is a waste of time.

If it is your purpose to change a man's opinion, do not try to do it by argument. Study the ground carefully. State your points with preciseness, make careful a.n.a.lysis of every phase of the situation, take up the matter point by point. Start with your adversary by getting on ground on which you both will agree. Take up the points on which there can be little chance for differences of opinion. You will find the other man will get in the habit of agreeing with your propositions and that his antagonism weakens. State facts that are right and truthful, and are so plain that the truth will be self-evident.

After you have made several propositions on which the other man agrees with you wholly, then make a proposition that is ninety per cent. his way and ten per cent. your way. Gradually increase that ten per cent.

until you swing him around so that he sees the truth. He then imagines that he has made the deduction himself.

Remember, you can swing the biggest ship around by a steady, slow, gentle pull. On the other hand a sudden strain on the hawser would produce no effect whatever on the ship.

The man who wishes to convert another to his way of thinking must be a diplomat if he is successful. Do not get excited, keep cool and collected, be sure of your ground, be positive in your a.s.sertions, make the whole matter clear, and use good judgment, sound reason and clear logic.

Speculation

You are playing against odds when you speculate.

The only man who has a sure thing on the Board of Trade or Stock Exchange or the race track is the man with the "Wienerwurst" privilege.

The successful business man some day wakes up to the fact that his bills are paid, and that he has surplus money. This surplus money should be used for investment purposes and not for speculation. Of course, it is hard to draw the line where investment leaves off and speculation begins.

When you speculate on margins you are like the fellow holding on a bear's tail as it runs around a tree--if you lose your hold the bear will get you.

The man who makes an investment, buying stocks or real estate and paying cash for them does not have to worry about the market. Prices may be up or down, but the man who has paid for what he has bought will sleep well.

You can't beat the speculation game. The only ones who make a success, and their success is ephemeral, are those who make speculation their whole occupation. The professional speculator is merely a high grade gambler, and he always winds up a loser.

Go to the Stock Exchange or the Board of Trade and you will see at either place a half a dozen old fellows hanging around. They are all men who have seen better days. A little inquiry and diplomacy on your part will bring forth the fact that these men were once prominent figures on 'Change.

When you have more money than you need in your business buy good farm lands out west, or good timber lands. No man ever bought good farm land or good timber land at the prevailing market price and lost money eventually. Of course, at different seasons of the year the price of land may go down a little temporarily, but the moment a good crop comes in, the price goes up again.

With good clear farm land you can always go to the nearest bank and borrow from sixty to seventy-five per cent. of its value.

Real estate is the true basis of wealth, and if you want to play a sure game, buy land that produces things.

When you buy vacant property in a large city, it is mere speculation.

The land does not bring in any remuneration, and you are simply betting that the prices will increase.

Every large city has abundant instances of vacant property that is not worth as much now as it was ten or twenty years ago. Real estate booms come in cycles. Prices go up and men get the fever and buy vacant property. The boom explodes, property goes down and you can't get your money back. The chances are you have bought the property on two or three years' time, and it certainly is paying for a white elephant when you are paying for land that is worth less than what it cost you. You cannot get out, however, because the original payment has already been made, and your only hope is to save something on your investment.

Notwithstanding the fact that certain business sections and certain residence sections in any city steadily increase in price, yet the average real estate in the city increases by very slow percentage. The same amount of money, put out in mortgages, with the interest added and compounded, will develop wealth greater than the average vacant property investment, for where one lot soars up to a high price there are a hundred that don't increase at all, and the picking out of the lot that is going to increase in value is as hard as picking out the horse that is going to win the race. It is because the vacant city property has only speculative value that the business man should not touch it.