Law of Success (21st Century Edition)

THE GOLDEN RULE 947

of Psychology, advanced the functionalism movement and launched psy-

chologyas a separate field. It was perhaps the focus in James' work on

the mind and on thought, habit, memory, imagination, hypnotism, and free

will that most appealed to Napoleon Hill. First published in 1890, this book

is still available in paperback. (William James is the older brother of novelist

Henry James.)

It was at the urging of William James that idealist German psychol-

ogist and philosopher Hugo Milnsterberg came to the U. S. as a professor

of psychology at Harvard. Combining his career and outside interests,

Milnsterberg wrote several books on such varied subjects as social issues,

film, the criminal justice system, and Asian art, and many of these books

are also still available.

DO UNTO OTHERS ...

For more than four thousand years, people have been preaching the
Golden Rule as a suitable rule of conduct toward others. But while
we have accepted the philosophy of it as a sound rule of ethical con-
duct, we have failed to understand the spirit of it or the law upon
which it is based.
The Golden Rule essentially means to do unto others as you
would wish them to do unto you if your positions were reversed.
There is an eternal law through the operation of which we reap
what we sow. When you select the rule of conduct by which you
guide yourself in your transactions with others, you will very likely
be fair and just if you know that by your selection you are setting
into motion a power that will run its course in the lives of others,
returning finally to help or to hinder you, according to its nature.
If you fully understood the principles described in Lesson Eleven
on Accurate Thinking-that one's thoughts are transformed into
reality corresponding exactly to the nature of the thoughts-it will
be quite easy for you to understand the law upon which the Golden
Rule is based. You cannot divert or change the course of this law,