ALL FACULTIES have enemies. The faculty of song has many enemies that are constantly at work destroying its best quality. All the gifts and accomplishments of life are beset with in­fluences that tend to weaken their effective powers; and the man or woman alone is great who can watch over them with jealous care. Gladstone maintained his public position many years longer than he otherwise would by reason of the fact that his wife studied his habits and criticized his methods with unceasing zeal. We cannot see ourselves as we are, nor as others see us; and it is an advantage to have the guidance of one who is sincerely interested in our success.

DEFINITIONS

Owing to the fact that we will make use of terms from time to time that have special application in this study, we present herewith a list of definitions for the guidance of our readers:

1. Cultivation of Personal Magnetism. A series of Exercises and Regulations whereby the nerves are made subject to the will, and are then super-charged with magnetic power.

2. Negative Exercises. That portion of the exercises set apart for the special purpose of removing nervous defects and tendencies.

3. Positive Exercises. That portion of the exercises Bet apart for the special purpose of super-charging the nervous system with magnetism.

4. Regime. The daily conduct of the pupil.

5. Internal Energy. A certain power within, which is able to direct the magnetic forces outward.

6. External Energy. The mere muscular action of the body, which, when not acting in unison with Internal Energy, wastes the nerve-force.

7. Nerve-Force. An electro-magnetic influence of a vibrating character, generated by the principle of life, and usually wasted at the surface of the body, but capable of traveling great distances and controlling any form of life which can hear, see or feel; and more especially the human race. When so used it is popularly called Personal Mag­netism.

8. Nervousness. The action of the vital-force moving without command from the will, or contrary to the will.

9. Nervous Prostration. The exhaustion of the vital-force, or an inability to generate a sufficient amount to supply the waste. It is well to distinguish between this malady and nervousness. The former is, of course, the outgrowth of the latter. While the nerve-force is in good supply, but erratic in its action, it is called nervousness. In persons suffering from prostration there is generally no erratic action, as the vitality is too weak.

This exhaustion robs the blood circulation of its tone or health.

It weakens the bones by making them like the bones of dead people.

It weakens the stomach.

It destroys the tone of the cuticle and skin by the deaden­ing of weak fibres.

It weakens the hearing by causing part of the sounds to be obscured.

It weakens the sight and causes films or small specs to move in front of the eyes.

It weakens the mind and often leads to insanity by the exhaustionof the nerve-force.

Nervous prostration and the tendency to it may be cured by the exercises of this book.

Medicine never yet. cured or prevented a case of nervous prostration.

Persons who do not care to cultivate magnetism may simply devote themselves to the "Negative Exercises" in the lessons to follow, and they will thereby obtain benefits to the nervous system that can be procured in no other way.

10. Voluntary Muscles. Those that may be moved in obedience to the will.

11. Involuntary Muscles. Those over which the will has little or no control, moving in obedience to the laws of life. Their action being directed by nature no loss of nerve-force occurs.

12. Straight Lines. Imaginary lines in the air through which the extremes of the body pass in making movements.

13. Extremes. Any part of the body from which, by shaking, water could be thrown, as the fingers, elbows, head, feet, knees and others.

14. Angles. Sharp turns made in any movement

15. Circles. Imaginary rings made in any movement.

16. Curves. Parts of circles.

17. Leakage. The out-flow of nerve-force from any one or more of the extremes of the body. This outflow is caused by constant small motions which are unperceived by the person making them, but which in a few hours will throw off great quantities of vitality into the air, which, if retained, would have been converted into magnetism. Leakage always occurs without Internal Energy. The latter power is capable of being developed so as to supply an unlimited quantity of nerve-force.

18. Leaker. A person whose waste vitality has not been checked by training. Everybody who does not pass through the Negative Exercises of this book is a leaker.

FOUNDATION LAW All men and women possess personal magnetism.

This foundation law must be kept in mind all through these lessons.

We will endeavor to explain it. Life is due to mag­netism, and there can be no life where there is no magnetism. Like heat it may pass to such a degree of weakness as to be regarded as a negative condition; but, like heat, it exists even in its apparent absence. We think of the day as warm when the thermometer reaches the eighties, and as hot when it rises to ninety or a hundred. We regard it as cold when the temperature is fifty, or forty, and as freezing cold at thirty-two or under. Yet the freezing point is hot and even burning to a kind of life that thrives at zero. As cold is only dimin­ished heat, it must be true that fifty below zero is hot in comparison to a condition that is one hundred below zero. Science has never yet found the state of total absence of heat.

Magnetism is the first manifestation of life in a plant of animal organism. It is magnetism that brings one cell to another cell and frames the form of the future body. It is magnetism that allows all things that belong to the earth to remain in close affinity with the earth, Were there no gravity, all the people and all the objects on the globe would wander off aimlessly in space. Gravity cannot be satisfactorily explained except on the principle of magnetism. If it were not for this force of attraction, all the planets would rush into a state of chaos under the mere impulse of gravity, or would drift away into the cold realms of space in its absence. We see two kinds of magnetism at work in the solar system; one that chains the orbs to the sun's influence, and one that whips them away from each other while leashed within that influence. The star systems of the sky seem to be independent of our own corner of the universe; but it is safe to say that they all obey one and the same governing power, and their march through the limitless fields of ether is controlled by a central magnetic force.

When the sun shines on plastic life, it begins at once to exert a magnetic influence on all it touches. Only the other day a neighbor who had planted a row of flowering-peas, complained that they did not cling to the wire netting that stretched along in front of them. We brought him into our garden and showed him a row more than a hundred feet in length where the peas were clinging to a similar mesh of wire, and their tendrils were closely entwined in the wires, thus holding up the abundance of many-hued flowers. He could not understand it. But we had placed the wire netting on the south side of the row of vines, and he had placed his on the north side. The sun is always on the south, and never crosses to the north except when it is low in the east or the west. Its intense influence is always from a southerly direction. Its influence draws all growth towards it, and therefore the vines would reach their tendrils to the south rather than to the north. In one case they would reach towards the wire, and in the other case they would reach away from the wire.

The principle is true in all plant growth that is to hold itself up by its own climbing. If the location permits of no sun except in the morning, the wire netting should be on the east side of the vines; if the only sun is in the late afternoon, the netting should be on the west. If these simple rules are kept in mind, the results will be far more satisfactory.

This is a simple illustration, but it shows two things: first, that there is an influence at work in life; second, that it costs no more effort to take advantage of power than it does to allow it to run to waste.

All men and women possess personal magnetism; but some magnetism repels and some attracts. Magnetism is largely relative; what will repel one person may attract another. The woman who is so ugly that she causes a stampede when she enters a room, may be an angel to some man as ugly as herself. She may even inspire poetry on her angelic attributes.

As the absence of heat may be termed cold, so the diminished degree of personal magnetism may pass for none at all; and the idea may go forth that some persons are totally-devoid of the power. This is not true. For the purpose of presenting the First Grand Principle we will speak of such persons as non-magnetic, just as we speak of a reduced degree of heat as cold.

FIRST GRAND PRINCIPLE,

The least magnetic of the so-called non-magnetic people lose each day more vital electricity than is neces­sary to produce the highest degree of personal magnetism.

The proposition is put into simple language and is made as clear as words can present it. To give it a more exact study, let us imagine some man or woman who says that personal magnetism is a gift, that it is the heritage of a chosen few, that others are barred from its power, and must follow instead of move along in advanced lines in life.

It is supposed that the ability to hypnotize is a born gift, possessed by a certain few, and developed once in a while from a dormant condition. This may be true in a limited class of cases; but the hypnotic power has a number of uses, one of which is to produce sleep, and another of which is to induce obedience through suggestion. The sleep part of it can be induced by the act of the subject without the aid of the living hypnotizer. The latter at his best sets up substitute beliefs in the subject, always after the sleep state has been entered into. The use of personal magnetism em­ploys suggestion effectively without putting the subject in the sleep state. The wide awake individual acts upon the ideas suggested.

As the magnetic power is universal, and differs only in degree, it cannot be regarded as a born gift. In every instance it is the result either of accidental development or acquired attainment.

The First Grand Principle states that the least of the so-called magnetic people lose each day more vital electricity than is necessary to produce the highest degree of personal magnetism. This involves the consideration of what is meant by vital electricity and its relation to personal magnetism. The laws that govern the development of these powers are best stated in the form of propositions.

SECOND GRAND PRINCIPLE

Vital electricity is the basis of all personal magnetism, but is in no way related to hypnotism.

Many persons are afraid to study these subjects, believing that they stand for something that is terrible, some weird power that may be associated with witchcraft. Hypnotism was undoubtedly the basis of the oldtime witchery, for it has always existed in the world, and been misjudged in every age.

Once it was called the possession of devils, owing to the fact that one person might exercise an uncanny influence over another. Today, under the guise of trickery and in the hands of a charlatan, hypnotism might easily reproduce all the effects that were seen in the ages when superstition clothed it with every ill that befell unfortunate people. But personal magnetism has never been in bad company. It has had no unsavory reputation; but, on the other hand, its work has been of the nobler stamp, and its influence has always tended to make the mind sound, the body whole and the nerves steady. Of all the thousands of pupils in personal magnetism whom we have met, there has never been one who retained the least bit of superstition, nor one who had any fear of ghosts or a belief in them. The brain gets a clear and perfect view of life free from the muddy hues that tinge the meaner nature.

Its very basis is vitality. Life and power grow with the increase of personal magnetism. It helps to uplift the weak, wheather that individual be the student of the power or the one who is brought under its influence. One magnetic man or woman can wield a vast and inspiring sway over hundreds and thousands of others at one and the same time. Those who are thus dominated are given some of the magnetism of the master power, and the more they are under such sway the stronger they become in mind and purpose. Just the oppo­site is true of the uses of hypnotism.

THIRD GRAND PRINCIPLE

The natural gift of personal magnetism arises from accidental habits that prevent the constant loss of vital electricity.

This is a negative proposition, as are all those that relate to the enemies of this power. Nature is always generating vital electricity in every man and woman. When she ceases to do this, death ensues. The so-called non-magnetic people are constantly allowing the power to run away of its own accord. There is no accumulation. The funds placed in the bank each day are spent with each day's activities, and the in­dividual is as poor at night as in the morning. When we see some one who is undoubtedly magnetic, we find a person who saves each day some of the excess of energy which is generated in the process of living.

Every intelligent reader knows what is meant by the power of personal magnetism, and there are few who cannot at once detect the man or woman who possesses this power. The mere entering of the room, the first steps toward an audience, the first tones of the speaking or singing voice, the touch of the hand, the glance of the eye, or the impress of the fingers on the piano, as in the case of the famous Polish player: these tell in a few seconds the fact that the individual is magnetic. If the gift be natural, then it has come from accidental habits that prevent the constant loss of vital elec­tricity. You will see a self-controlled, easy, but at the same time energetic personality that will attract your attention be­cause of the presentation of these two conditions in one life.

Later on, as we come to study the positive side of the power, we will learn that composure, or ease of action and quietude of method, when there is great energy behind them, are always evidences of personal magnetism. In fact, whenever you find this combination you will always be sure of finding the quality known as personal magnetism. It may be a combination that attends a person who is not credited with much book learning; but the absence of such learning is not by any means proof of ignorance. Wisdom may develop and grow into a giant, while its possessor may know very little of the kind of things that usually belong to education. This sort of ignorance is found with some of the most successful men of the world. At the same time, it is true that, in proportion as a man or woman lacks education, its place must be taken by personal power, or failure in life is the certain consequence.

The greatest men and women in history are those who couple education with magnetism. Education without this power makes a person an employe forever; the tool of some one else. This power without education always pushes the individual to the front. So, if the choice is to be had between the two, magnetism is the better equipment, as it brings leadership. The reason is that behind the personality is energy; and, with the energy, is ease of manner and self-composure.

Such a combination is found only when there is magnetism.

It would seem at a glance as if the whole matter could be summed up and disposed of under this double-proposition; but the sources of the power and the uses of the faculties make an elaborate and complicated study.

These remarks are made at this time in order to encourage those who think they are handicapped by lack of previous education. They must remember that magnetism draws wisdom in proportion as it is properly driven, just as a fine steed may be harnessed and made to do many kinds of valuable work. The more magnetism you have the more you will absorb of the practical knowledge of the world if you are master of this power.

That you may become its master, it is first necessary to know that certain habits are its enemies and are daily robbing you of its aid. These we will discuss in the next chapter.