This arch traitor of mankind is so closely related to fear that it is almost impossible to draw a dividing line between the two. They are twins. Wherever doubt can get a foothold it introduces its brother fear, and fear brings with it all of its relatives, worry, anxiety, discouragement—the whole failure family. A single day of doubts, of fears, of unbeliefs, of the crime of self-depreciation, will drive away from a man all that he has attracted to himself in many months.

There are multitudes of people to-day suffering from the fatal disease of self-depreciation, the seeds of which were implanted in them by doubt. All the victims of discouragement, those who are suffering from despondency, those who are going through life disheartened, hopeless, despairing, are the authors of their own misery. They persist in killing the very thing they are pursuing, in queering their own quest by the poison of doubt.

The doubting Thomases never get anywhere, because they have no vision, and "without a vision the people perish." The man who would do anything worth while in this[Pg 51] world must have a vision, and he must have courage to match it. Courage is the great leader in the mental realm. Whatever paralyzes it strangles the initiative, kills the ability to do things. Doubt is its greatest enemy. It suggests caution at the very moment when everything depends on boldness. If a general were to be over-cautious, to wait for absolute certainty in regard to results before putting his plan of campaign into action, he would never win a battle.

Caution is an admirable trait, but wh