I hope in this volume to introduce to each other various kinds of persons who, in various ways, have successfully learned the great art of converting passion into power.
If, or in so far as, any of the world's favoured ones should at some future day read, and in any manner profit by, the following pages, what they receive will be a gift from the poor to the rich, from the sick to the healthy, from those who have lacked the advantages of education to those who have enjoyed them, from patients in lunacy wards to commissioners in lunacy, from overworked and struggling illegitimate children to their sheltered and well-cared-for legitimate cousins, from Asia to Europe, from Celts to Anglo-Saxons, from despised and oppressed races to their conquerors, from the hooligan class to the respectable, from Jews to Christendom, from benighted and superstitious orthodox Jews to their liberal and enlightened co-religionists, from everything that is despised and rejected to whosoever is honoured by the world.
But for the present we, the less favoured ones, are going to have a little talk together.
Of those who have assisted in accumulating the information contained in this work, such as are still in the flesh can claim their share of credit (or discredit?) if they like to do so. There is a word or two that must be said about some who have passed into the Silent Land.
Nicolas Antoine Boulanger.—Left school a hopeless dunce, who could not learn algebra. Died in his fortieth year, a good mathematician, and a famous engineer. Was one of the Enyclopædists. Left behind him writ-
