Not a True Saying

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Sep 17, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 36.

Not a True Saying.

It is a favorite saying of the poets, that only the good is beautiful; but what if the saying only were true! If we could but know that everything which is beautiful is also good; if the evil were always repulsive to us, and only the good attractive; if Satan never came to tempt men, except with horns and hoof; then, indeed, it would be easy always to do right, and it would be incomprehensible that any one should do wrong. But there are good things which are not beautiful, and beautiful things which are not good. You may fall over a precipice without much endeavor; but it will take hard climbing to bring you to the top again. Would it not be well, before you decide upon looking for an easy place, to find out how many of the successful workers in the various spheres of labor with which you are acquainted, are men who sacrificed all for an easy place to rest in? And then—if you can—find out the men who did seek, and did obtain, "easy" places. This double search will result in giving you two classes,—men who did not seek easy places, but who are prominent and successful workers in the world to-day; and men who found easy places, and therefore have accomplished nothing. When you have the two classes before your eyes, you can judge for yourself, from what you see of them, to which class you would prefer to belong.—Sel.