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Proper Regulation

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International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · May 1, 1884

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 10, No. 17.

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Proper Regulation.

MORE attention to system and to rules of conduct is needed in some directions than in others, in every man's nature. There are things which one man will attend to, and which another man will leave undone, without special care or prompting. One man really needs to school himself to eating, or to recreation, at proper times; while another man needs to be on the watch in order to stop eating, or to go to work, at a proper time. It is common to say, that every man is by nature lazy; but it has been wittily said of some men of tireless activity that they "are too lazy to stop working;" that they lack the watchful attention to times and seasons which would make them ready to rest when only resting is in order. Similarly is it true that one man is too ready to give away money, while another is too ready to refuse a fitting call on him for help. Each man needs to know wherein restraint or pressure on himself is important to his well-doing, and wherein he can safely trust to his natural impulses or his ordinary habits of conduct. Lord Bacon said: "In Studies, whatsoever a Man commandeth upon himself, let him set Houres for it: But whatsoever is agreeable to his Nature, let him take no Care for any set Times: For his Thoughts will flie to it of Themselves; So as the Spaces of other Business, or Studies, will suffice. A Man's Nature runnes either to Herbes, or Weeds; Therefore let him seasonably Water the One, and Destroy the Other." The average boy, for example, needs no parental reminder to be always ready to heed the first tap of the school bell which announces recess or dismissal; but he does need such a prompting to be equally prompt in heeding the home bell for rising in the morning, or for coming in from play at meal-time. And the average business man can safely trust his instincts to start him out to his money-making in the morning; whereas he needs some will-pressure on him to secure family prayers at any inconvenience before he goes to his business. In fact, it is in little things as in larger that the intelligent and persistent prayer to God of every disciple of Christ should be, as that of his Master: "Not my will, but thine be done."—Sel.