From a study of the bodily machine, we shall advance to a consideration of the mental processes themselves, not after the usual manner of works on psychology, but solely from the standpoint of practical utility and for the establishment of a scientific concept of the mind capable of everyday use.

[Sidenote:  Fundamental Laws and Practical Methods]

The elucidation of every principle of mental operation will be accompanied by illustrative material pointing out just how that particular law may be employed for the attainment of specific practical ends.  There will be numerous illustrative instances and methods that can be at once made use of by the merchant, the musician, the salesman, the advertiser, the employer of labor, the business executive.

[Sidenote:  Special Business Topics]

In this way this Basic Course of Reading will lay a firm and broad foundation, first, for an understanding of the methods and devices whereby any man may acquire full control and direction of his mental energies and may develop his resources to the last degree; second, for an understanding of the psychological methods for success in any specific professional pursuit in which he may be particularly interested; and third, for an understanding of the methods of applying psychological knowledge to the industrial problems of office, store and factory.

The first of these—­that is to say, instruction in methods for the attainment of any goal consistent with native ability—­will follow right along as part of this Basic Course of Reading. The second and third—­that is to say, the study of special commercial and industrial topics—­are made the subject of special courses supplemental to this Basic Course and for which it can serve only as an introduction.

[Sidenote:  A Step Beyond Collegiate Psychology]

In this Basic Course of Reading we shall show you how you may acquire perfect individual efficiency.  And, most remarkable of all, we shall show you how you may acquire it without that effort to obtain it, that straining of the will, that struggling with wasteful inclinations and desires, that is itself the essence of inefficiency.

The facts and principles set forth in this Basic Course are new and wonderful and inspiring.  They have been established and attested by world-wide and exhaustive scientific research and experiment.

[Sidenote:  The Eternal Laws of Individual Achievement]

You may be a college graduate.  You may have had the advantage of a college course in psychology.  But you have probably had no instruction in the practical application of your knowledge of mental operations.  So far as we are aware, there are few universities in the world that embrace in their curricula a course in “applied” psychology.  For the average college man this Basic Course of Reading will be, therefore, in the nature of a post-graduate course, teaching him how to make practical use of the psychology he learned at college, and in addition giving him facts about the mind unknown to the college psychology of a few years ago.