slander, dirty, vicious, will-weakening, health-destroying,
poverty-breeding, soul-killing influences radiate from one or all of
these four. You must cut at their roots and utterly destroy them. In your
efforts follow assiduously the following four rules. They alone can give
you absolute thought-control. They are infallible:

(1) You can break up old thought-habits and build up new ones
by sheer force of Will.

(2) You can easily become great by associating with some strong-willed,
holy, wisdom-steeped soul. This is absolutely necessary and
means the finding of your Guru.

(3) By auto-suggestion, _i.e._, by impressing upon your passive
mind the particular change you would have it work out.

(4) By thought-absorption, _i.e._, by constant meditation on that
one line of thinking.

Now let me give you a few valuable hints on the above four in detail:

(1) & (3). _Character Building_.

You can accomplish this result by tensing the will and by strengthening
the active function of your mind and thus enabling it to "step in"
and simply 'command' the passive function to drop the old thought-habit
and take up the new one. This is a magnificent feat and in it only the
strongest succeed. You can obtain good results by combining this with
auto-suggestion. Silently concentrate upon your passive mind and impress
upon it your order. Say to it earnestly, confidently, and masterfully: