Napoleon Hill’s Critique of Education in
Outwitting the Devil: Teaching Students How to Think
Napoleon Hill’s Outwitting the Devil presents one of his strongest criticisms of conventional education. Written in 1938 but withheld from publication for decades, the book takes the form of an imaginary interrogation between Hill and the “Devil.” Hill uses the Devil not simply as a religious figure, but as a literary device representing fear, conformity, procrastination, lack of purpose, negative thinking, and other forces that prevent people from taking control of their lives. Central to this discussion is Hill’s belief that education often gives students information without adequately teaching them how to think, develop a definite purpose, or apply knowledge to the practical problems of life.
Hill’s fundamental argument is that education should teach people how to think rather than merely what to think.
This distinction is at the heart of Outwitting the Devil.
Education Should Develop Independent Thinkers
Hill believed that one of the greatest dangers facing an individual is what he called “drifting.” A drifter is a person who moves through life without a definite purpose, allowing circumstances, fear, social pressure, institutions, or other people to determine his direction.
For Hill, drifting is not simply laziness. It represents the surrender of independent thought.
This is where his criticism of education becomes particularly important. If students spend their formative years primarily memorizing information, following instructions, passing examinations, and accepting ideas without questioning them, Hill believed they may develop the habit of allowing others to do their thinking for them.
A truly educated person, according to Hill’s philosophy, should be capable of examining information, questioning assumptions, making decisions, developing plans, and taking responsibility for the consequences.
Therefore, education should not merely produce graduates.
It should produce thinkers.
Knowledge Is Not the Same as Education
Another important idea running through Hill’s philosophy is that possessing information is not necessarily the same thing as being educated.
A person could memorize thousands of facts and still be unable to solve practical problems.
Hill placed enormous importance on the organization and application of knowledge. This same principle appears throughout his better-known book, Think and Grow Rich. Knowledge becomes powerful when it is organized and directed toward a definite objective.
Consider two students who understand percentages.
One student memorizes the formula, completes the examination, receives an A, and eventually forgets much of what was learned.
Another student uses percentages to calculate interest, investment returns, profit margins, taxes, discounts, and the cost of borrowing money.
Both students learned percentages.
But the second student has learned how to apply mathematics to life.
Hill would likely consider that distinction extremely important.
Education should therefore connect knowledge with purpose.
Definiteness of Purpose
Perhaps the most important educational concept in Outwitting the Devil is Hill’s emphasis on definiteness of purpose.
Hill believed that people who know what they want are much more difficult to control through fear or social pressure. They can organize their knowledge, relationships, time, and resources around achieving a particular objective.
Yet many students can spend twelve years in elementary and secondary education without being seriously asked:
What do you want to accomplish?
What are your natural abilities?
What problems do you want to solve?
What kind of life do you want to build?
How can your education help you accomplish it?
Instead, success can become defined primarily through grades, attendance, examinations, graduation, and eventually employment.
Hill would challenge that definition.
A student should not simply be prepared to get a job. Education should help that student discover how he or she can create value in society.
That could mean becoming an engineer, electrician, physician, teacher, scientist, entrepreneur, carpenter, programmer, farmer, artist, or business owner. The occupation itself is less important than having a definite purpose and deliberately developing the knowledge necessary to pursue it.
Hill’s Education Would Include Entrepreneurship
Hill’s educational philosophy also has strong implications for entrepreneurship.
Traditional education can teach students how to become employees without spending nearly as much time teaching them how businesses actually work. Hill believed practical economic knowledge was important because economic independence gives individuals greater control over their lives.
Imagine students learning mathematics by operating a small business.
They would have to calculate revenue, expenses, wages, inventory, profit margins, interest, taxes, and return on investment.
Writing would suddenly have a practical purpose because students would need to create advertisements, proposals, business plans, emails, and presentations.
Technology could be used to create websites, analyze data, develop products, and communicate with customers.
Economics would no longer be an abstract textbook subject. Students would experience supply, demand, competition, pricing, and consumer behavior firsthand.
That kind of education represents Hill’s concept of applied knowledge.
Failure Should Become Part of Education
Hill also viewed adversity differently from conventional thinking.
Schools understandably reward correct answers. Students receive higher grades for getting things right and lower grades for getting things wrong.
But life often works differently.
Entrepreneurs, inventors, scientists, investors, and leaders frequently learn through unsuccessful attempts.
Hill believed adversity could contain what he described throughout his philosophy as the seed of an equivalent advantage. The important question is not merely whether someone failed, but what that person learned from the failure.
Education based on Hill’s philosophy would therefore teach students how to analyze mistakes.
Why did the business fail?
Why didn’t the experiment work?
Why did the investment lose money?
Why didn’t the plan produce the expected result?
What information did we overlook?
What should we change before trying again?
Failure becomes feedback rather than a permanent judgment of someone’s ability.
That develops persistence—another major principle of Hill’s philosophy.
Self-Discipline Is Part of Education
Hill also believed genuine education involves developing control over oneself.
Intelligence without discipline can accomplish very little.
A person might have tremendous talent but constantly procrastinate. Another might possess great ideas but abandon projects whenever difficulties arise.
Education should therefore help develop habits involving time management, decision-making, persistence, emotional control, responsibility, and delayed gratification.
These qualities are difficult to measure on a standardized examination, but they can determine whether someone actually uses what he or she has learned.
The Danger of Conformity
Perhaps Hill’s most controversial educational argument concerns conformity.
Every society needs rules and institutions. Schools could not function without structure. But Hill believed there is a difference between teaching discipline and teaching unquestioning obedience.
Students should be capable of respectfully asking:
Why?
Why do we believe this?
What evidence supports it?
Is there another explanation?
Could this system work differently?
Can I develop a better solution?
Those questions are the foundation of innovation.
Nearly every major technological or economic advancement began because someone questioned the existing way of doing something.
Education as Freedom
Ultimately, Hill’s educational philosophy is about intellectual independence.
He believed the greatest defense against “drifting” is a person who possesses a definite purpose, thinks independently, exercises self-discipline, acquires useful knowledge, and takes deliberate action.
It is important to recognize that Outwitting the Devil is a philosophical and motivational work rather than scientific research on education. Hill’s criticisms should therefore be examined rather than accepted automatically.
Nevertheless, his central question remains powerful nearly ninety years after he wrote the manuscript:
What is education supposed to produce?
If the answer is simply graduates who can memorize information and pass examinations, Hill would consider the system incomplete.
If the goal is to produce people capable of thinking independently, solving problems, creating businesses, understanding money, adapting to technological change, learning from failure, and directing their own lives, education becomes something much greater.
Hill’s message can ultimately be summarized in one principle:
The purpose of education should not simply be to put knowledge into a student’s mind. It should teach the student how to organize knowledge, think independently, establish a definite purpose, and convert ideas into action.
A nation that teaches children what to think can produce followers.
A nation that teaches children how to think can produce innovators, entrepreneurs, scientists, inventors, and leaders.
That is the educational challenge at the heart of Napoleon Hill’s Outwitting the Devil.