The Law of Success - Napoleon Hill.

The Law of Success is a 1925 book – actually in the form of a set of 15 separate booklets – by Napoleon Hill. It was released as a limited edition of 118 copies and was given to many of Americas most successful individuals, all of whom had contributed to the book's content. One of those copies was used by Orne Publishing to reprint it in 2010.

The Law of Success in 16 Lessons is an edited version of Napoleon Hill’s first manuscripts which was reworked under advisement of some the contributors and first published in 1928. This version was initially published as a multi-volume correspondence course. Later editions gathered the material into a single hardcover book. The most current version available is through Wilder Publishing.

The work was originally commissioned at the request of Andrew Carnegie at the conclusion of a multi-day interview with Hill, and was based upon interviews of over 100 American millionaires across nearly 20 years, including such self-made industrial giants as Henry Ford, J. P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, Alexander Graham Bell, and Thomas Edison. The Law of Success was first presented as a lecture, and was delivered by its author in practically every major city and in many smaller localities throughout the United States over a period of more than seven years.

The following outline is from the original 1925 edition.

Lesson 1 A Definite Purpose will teach you how to save the wasted effort which the majority of people expend in trying to find their life-work. This lesson will show you how to do away forever with aimlessness and fix your heart and hand upon some definite, well-conceived purpose as a life-work.

Lesson 2 Self-Confidence will help you master the six basic fears with which every person is cursed: the fear of Poverty, the fear of Ill Health, the fear of Old Age, the fear of Criticism, the fear of Loss of Love of Someone, and the fear of Death. It will teach you the difference between egotism and real self-confidence which is based upon definite, usable knowledge.

Lesson 4 IMAGINATION will stimulate your mind so that you will conceive new ideas and develop new plans which will help you in attaining the object of your Definite Chief Aim. This lesson will teach you how to "build new homes out of old stones", so to speak. It will show you how to create new ideas out of old, well known concepts, and how to put old ideas to new uses. This one lesson, alone, is the equivalent of a very practical course in salesmanship, and it is sure to prove a veritable gold mine of knowledge to the person who is in earnest.

Lesson 5 Action - As a matter of facts imaginations and purposes cannot yield anything unless action is taken to realize the purpose. Actions prove the practicability of our imaginations. When powered with clear purpose and strong leadership it yields desired results [requires further contribution and reference]