Good Advice | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Mar 2, 1882

Good Advice.

MANY good people are much troubled by the multiplicity of duties. They see so much to be done, that they are ever in a worry and a hurry, and thus are in danger of doing nothing well, and also leaving many things undone. In their eagerness to do great things of their calling, they are apt to overlook what seem to be the smaller concerns, which perhaps lie just at hand. They are looking ahead and aloft, and pass over what really ought to be attended to, and which, if attended to and thus put out of the way, would lead on naturally and quietly to greater works. These little things may be indispensable to the accomplishment of the greater. They may be the little stones which together make up the building. They may be the first rounds of the ladder, leading up to the loftier heights of achievement.

Now let such persons consider what the great German poet, Goethe, said—and hardly uttered a wiser one—“Do the thing that lies next you.” Be it little, do it. It may be great in its necessary relation to something else. Neglect not the present, the immediate thing. The person who adopts this rule will do a world of work—a world of good. He will begin at home, in his little circle, and so branch out as each day gives new and, perhaps, wider opportunities.