“Here is a job lot of combs, coarse combs, fine combs, horse combs, honey combs and the comb of a roof; we’ll take this fine tooth comb first.
“Here it is, gentlemen, already for business, white as the driven snow, and with two rows of teeth as sharp as the edge of a fine razor. I will guarantee it to catch ‘em every time, dead or alive. It’s a sure winner, a double-geared, switch-back combination, that will work either forward or backward, without a single kick. It is hand-turned, double-soled, and made from genuine ivory, worth four hundred dollars a pound, and a good day for elephants at that. How much do I hear to start it? Will you give me a quarter? No? Will you give me a dime? No? Do I hear any one whisper the ridiculous small sum of a nickel? What! Don’t shake your heads sideways; always shake them up and down.
“Hurry up your bids, gentlemen. Tempus Fugit, as the astronomer says. Time flies. Yes, time flies; and so do the little vermin this comb is warranted to lay low. Will no one give me a bid? I never saw a lousy man buy a comb in my life. You needn’t be ashamed. You won’t find a sale on record, from the time Noah made a clearing sale on closing business at the ark, where the purchaser needed the article for his own use. Slip it in the package the next time you want to send some books to a starving cripple who has just lost his spectacles, and when you are nosing around for something to put in the contribution box for the poor, benighted heathen, think how handy it would be to have it in the house. Does nobody say five cents? Third and last call at—thank you. You’ll take it. Sold at five cents. You’re a clear-headed man for sure, and I hope there is more in the crowd.”
There was a laugh at this, and I began to feel more confident than ever. I kept on at the combs until I had sold the entire assortment. By and by I opened a watch.
The crowd was willing, but slow to start. Each man wanted to take time to consider the outside figure he was willing to pay for the article, provided he had the least thought of purchasing. I was satisfied to let the customer have plenty of time, because he might make a bid, even if it was within the figure he placed as the top notch. If he once began bidding, such a limit would cut no ice at all. After some preliminary remarks I shouted at the top of my voice:
“Under or over the top of God’s green earth I never saw the like before. You stand perpetually blind to your own interests, and wait for the other fellow to get the bargain. When I offer you a fifty dollar watch I can’t even get a four dollar bid on it, and still you wonder why you are poor.
“Now, gentlemen, remember that this is a fact, a tried, tested and practical fact. Everywhere in this generation, the human mind is busier than ever in extending its prerogatives. If you don’t believe me turn to the ninth chapter of Isaiah and read the twenty-fourth verse where it says, ‘It is easier for an elephant to walk through the eye of a needle than a poor man to enter into the kingdom of heaven,’
“The physical necessity of mental activity in every practical sense confers upon the mind the power of determining the actual strength of longevity. So, prepare yourselves, gentlemen, for one of the most startling revelations yet to come. We are living in times when people know what goods are. To keep abreast with them we must organize and increase our capacity to thirty million times its natural strength and power.
“To illustrate, look back along the ages and see that poor man there, bending over the stone mortar, pulverizing the fluidy grains into a more minute form. Watch him. See. He stops and gazes at yonder precipitous torrent thundering down a rocky channel in its course. There, a thought has struck him. He begins to whistle, and then to whittle, for he learned to whistle soon after he learned to breathe.
“His hands are clumsy, but brains furnish skill, and practice makes perfect. He gears together a dozen wooden wheels, some horizontal, some perpendicular, and makes a mortar, such as he had never seen before that moment of inspiration. He turns on the water. The wheel revolves. The mortar grinds, and out rolls the meal in a golden stream, while he claps his hands in triumph, and thinks what the machine would do if it were a thousand times stronger.