By Prentice Mulford (1886).
Our unseen and unspoken thought is ever flowing from us an element and force, as real as the stream of water we can see, or the current of electricity we cannot see. It combines with the thought of others, and out of such combinations new qualities of thought are formed, as in the combination of chemicals new substances are formed.
If you send from you in thought the elements of worry, fret, hatred, or grief, you are putting in action forces injurious to your mind and body. The power to forget implies the power of driving away the unpleasant and hurtful thought or element, and bringing in its place the profitable element, to build up instead of tearing us down.
The character of thought we think or put out affects our business favorably or unfavorably. It influences others for or against us. It is an element felt pleasantly or unpleasantly by others, inspiring them with confidence or distrust.
The prevailing state of mind, or character of thought, shapes the body and features. It makes us ugly or pleasing, attractive or repulsive to others. Our thought shapes our gestures, our mannerism, our walk. The least movement of muscle has a mood of mind, a thought, behind it. A mind always determined has always a determined walk. A mind always weak, shifting, vacillating, and uncertain, makes a shuffling, shambling, uncertain gait. The spirit of determination braces every muscle. It is the thought‑element of determination filling every muscle.
Look at the discontented, gloomy, melancholy, and ill‑tempered men or women, and you see in their faces proofs of the action of this silent force of their unpleasant thought, cutting, carving, and shaping them to their present expression. Such people are never in good health, for that force acts on them as poison, and creates some form of disease.
A persistent thought of determination on a purpose, especially if such purpose be of benefit to others as well as ourselves, will fill every nerve with strength. It is a wise selfishness that works to benefit others along with ourselves. Because in spirit, and in actual element, we are all united. We are forces which act and re‑act on each other, for good or ill, through what ignorantly we call “empty space.”
There are unseen nerves extending from man to man, from being to being. Every form of life is in this sense connected together. We are all “members of one body.” An evil thought or act is a pulsation of pain thrilling through myriads of organizations. The kindly thought and act have for pleasure the same effect. It is, then, a law of nature and of science, that we cannot do a real good to another without doing one also to ourselves.