In a world where ridiculously hyped tomes promising instant financial euphoria for ordinary citizens now vie with counsel on health and sex in every bookstore, old-fashioned common sense still takes the prize. Most of the would-be gurus, not to mention their customers, would hare been better off to read this one first." -From the foreword by Louis Rukeyser Timeless, common sense investment advice from an uncommonly sensible market observer "The small investor frequently inquires whether a particular stock represents a safe speculation. His is a fantastic quest, something like a search for dry water, or still motion." "The success magazines are seemingly developed on the theory that, if everyone works diligently enough, 110 million bank presidencies will open up." ".unless their judgment is extraordinarily discriminating, those who 'get in on the ground floor' are more than likely to end up in the basement." "To succeed fully, an individual must gain control of himself and regulate potential wayward tendencies which exist more or less in all individuals and which, if uncontrolled, lead him astray financially. Before he can obtain economic independence through his own efforts, he must first be master of his own soul.