Self-confidence is not egotism. It is knowledge, and it comes from the consciousness of possessing the ability requisite for what one undertakes. Civilization to-day rests upon self-confidence.
A firm self-faith helps a man to project himself with a force that is almost irresistible. A balancer, a doubter, has no projectile power. If he starts at all, he moves with uncertainty. There is no vigor in his initiative, no positiveness in his energy.
There is a great difference between a man who thinks that "perhaps" he can do, or who "will try" to do a thing, and a man who "knows" he can do it, who is "bound" to do it; who feels within himself a pulsating power, an irresistible force, equal to any emergency.
This difference between uncertainty and certainty, between vacillation and decision, between the man who wavers and the man who decides things, between "I hope to" and "I can," between "I'll try" and "I will"—this little difference measures the distance between weakness and power, between mediocrity and excellence, between commonness and superiority.
The man who does things must be able to project himself with a mighty force, to fling the whole weight of his being into his work, ever gathering momentum against the obstacles which confront him; every issue must be met wholly, unhesitatingly. He can not do this with a wavering, doubting, unstable mind.
The fact that a man believes implicitly that he can do what may seem impossible or very difficult to others, shows that there is something within him that makes him equal to the work he has undertaken.
Faith unites man with the Infinite, and no one can accomplish great things in life unless he works in oneness with the Infinite. When a man lives so near to the Supreme that the divine Presence is felt all the time, then he is in a position to express power.
There is nothing which will multiply one's ability like self-faith. It can make a one-talent man a success, while a ten-talent man without it would fail.
Faith walks on the mountain tops, hence its superior vision. It sees what is invisible to those who follow in the valleys.
It was the sustaining power of a mighty self-faith that enabled Columbus to bear the jeers and imputations of the Spanish cabinet; that sustained him when his sailors were in mutiny and he was at their mercy in a little vessel on an unknown sea; that enabled him to hold steadily to his purpose, entering in his diary day after day—"This day we sailed west, which was our course."