wait for opportunity, but that the secret of true life and best achievement lies in doing
well;he thing the heavenly Father gives us to do. He who throws himself resolutely and
with perseverance into a course of worthy action will at last hear the discords of human
existence die away into harmonies; for if the voice within whispers that all is well, it
is fair weather, however the clouds may lower or the lightning play. What we habitually
love and live by, will, in due season, bud, blossom, and bear fruit.
Whatever opportunity is favorable to genuine life, to its joy, purity, beauty, and power,
is good; whatever occasion is hurtful to such life is evil. In each one's path through the
world there are a thousand pitfalls, into anyone of which he may step unawares. Let us
take heed therefore and choose our way.
Let a man have a purpose, let him resolve and labor to make of himself a good mechanic, or
merchant, or farmer, or lawyer, or doctor, or teacher, or priest; but first of all let him
have the will and the courage to make of himself a true man, for else there shall be no
worth in him. On the miser, the drunkard, the liar, the lecher, the thief, no blessings
can fall. Our value is measured by that of the things we believe, know, love, and
strenuously strive to accomplish. Make no plans, entertain no schemes.
Think and do day by day the best thou art able to think and do. This is the open secret,
which all might learn and which only a few know. But to them it reveals the way to the
highest and the holiest.
Busy thyself not with what should be corrected or abolished; but give thyself wholly to
learning, loving, and diffusing what is good and fair. The spirit of the creator is more
joyful and more potent than that of the critic or reformer. Budding life pushes away the
things that are dead; and if thou art a wellspring of vital force, thou shouldst not be a
grave-digger. The test of a man's strength and worth is not so much what he accomplishes
as what he overcomes. When circumstances favor, the lesser man may do the greater work, as
cowards who are armed conquer heroes who are weaponless. He who has made his own the
spiritual wealth of all the ages, knows more and can do more than the mighty men of the
past, who excelled him in natural endowment and in virtue.