THOUGH Russell H. Conwell’s Acres of Diamonds have been spread all over the United States, time and care have made them more valuable, and now that they have been reset in black and white by their discoverer, they are to be laid in the hands of a multitude for their enrichment. In the same case with these gems there is a fascinating story of the Master Jeweler’s life-work which splendidly illustrates the ultimate unit of power by showing what one man can do in one day and what one life is worth

Friends .—This lecture has been delivered under these circumstances: I visit a town or city, and try to arrive there early enough to see the postmaster, the barber, the keeper of the hotel, the principal of the schools, and the ministers of some of the churches, and then go into some of the factories and stores, and talk with the people, and get into sympathy with the local conditions of that town or city and see what has been their history, what opportunities they had, and what they had failed

1 WHEN going down the Tigris and Euphrates rivers many years ago with a party of English travelers I found myself under the direction of an old Arab guide whom we hired up at Bagdad, and I have often thought how that guide resembled our barbers in certain mental characteristics. He thought that it was not only his duty to guide us down those rivers, and do what he was paid for doing, but also to entertain us with stories curious and weird, ancient and modern, strange and familiar. Many of them I

2 I SHALL write of a remarkable man, an interesting man, a man of power, of initiative, of will, of persistence; a man who plans vastly and who realizes his plans; a man who not only does things himself, but who, even more important than that, is the constant inspiration of others. I shall write of Russell H. Conwell. As a farmer’s boy he was the leader of the boys of the rocky region that was his home; as a school-teacher he won devotion; as a newspaper correspondent he gained fame; as a soldie

IT is not because he is a minister that Russell Conwell is such a force in the world. He went into the ministry because he was sincerely and profoundly a Christian, and because he felt that as a minister he could do more good in the world than in any other capacity. But being a minister is but an incident, so to speak. The important thing is not that he is a minister, but that he is himself! Recently I heard a New-Yorker, the head of a great corporation, say: “I believe that Russell Conwell is d

AT every point in Conwell’s life one sees that he wins through his wonderful personal influence on old and young. Every step forward, every triumph achieved, comes not alone from his own enthusiasm, but because of his putting that enthusiasm into others. And when I learned how it came about that the present church buildings were begun, it was another of those marvelous tales of fact that are stranger than any imagination could make them. And yet the tale was so simple and sweet and sad and unpre

EVEN as a young man Conwell won local fame as an orator. At the outbreak of the Civil War he began making patriotic speeches that gained enlistments. After going to the front he was sent back home for a time, on furlough, to make more speeches to draw more recruits, for his speeches were so persuasive, so powerful, so full of homely and patriotic feeling, that the men who heard them thronged into the ranks. And as a preacher he uses persuasion, power, simple and homely eloquence, to draw men to

THE constant earnestness of Conwell, his desire to let no chance slip by of helping a fellowman, puts often into his voice, when he preaches, a note of eagerness, of anxiety. But when he prays, when he turns to God, his manner undergoes a subtle and unconscious change. A load has slipped off his shoulders and has been assumed by a higher power. Into his bearing, dignified though it was, there comes an unconscious increase of the dignity. Into his voice, firm as it was before, there comes a deepe

THAT Conwell is not primarily a minister—that he is a minister because he is a sincere Christian, but that he is first of all an Abou Ben Adhem, a man who loves his fellow-men, becomes more and more apparent as the scope of his life-work is recognized. One almost comes to think that his pastorate of a great church is even a minor matter beside the combined importance of his educational work, his lecture work, his hospital work, his work in general as a helper to those who need help. For my own p

THE story of the foundation and rise of Temple University is an extraordinary story; it is not only extraordinary, but inspiring; it is not only inspiring, but full of romance. For the university came out of nothing!—nothing but the need of a young man and the fact that he told the need to one who, throughout his life, has felt the impulse to help any one in need and has always obeyed the impulse. I asked Dr. Conwell, up at his home in the Berkshires, to tell me himself just how the university b

CONWELL has a few strong and efficient executive helpers who have long been associated with him; men and women who know his ideas and ideals, who are devoted to him, and who do their utmost to relieve him; and of course there is very much that is thus done for him; but even as it is, he is so overshadowing a man (there is really no other word) that all who work with him look to him for advice and guidance the professors and the students, the doctors and the nurses, the church officers, the Sunda

CONSIDERING everything, the most remarkable thing in Russell Conwell’s remarkable life is his lecture, “Acres of Diamonds.” That is, the lecture itself, the number of times he has delivered it, what a source of inspiration it has been to myriads, the money that he has made and is making, and, still more, the purpose to which he directs the money. In the circumstances surrounding “Acres of Diamonds,” in its tremendous success, in the attitude of mind revealed by the lecture itself and by what Dr.

AN Autobiography! What an absurd request! If all the conditions were favorable, the story of my public Life could not be made interesting. It does not seem possible that any will care to read so plain and uneventful a tale. I see nothing in it for boasting, nor much that could be helpful. Then I never saved a scrap of paper intentionally concerning my work to which I could refer, not a book, not a sermon, not a lecture, not a newspaper notice or account, not a magazine article, not one of the ki