p. 238 | Keep it to Yourself

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · May 27, 1880

Keep it to Yourself

You have trouble—your feelings are injured, your husband is unkind, your wife frets, your home is not pleasant, your friends do not treat you fairly, and things in general move unpleasantly. Well, what of it? Keep it to yourself. A smouldering fire can be found and extinguished; but when the coals are scattered, who can pick them up? Bury your sorrow. The place for sad and disgusting things is under the ground. A cut finger is not benefited by pulling off the plaster and exposing it to somebody's eye. Things thus covered are cured without a scar; but once published and confided to meddling friends, there is no end to the trouble they may cause. Keep it to yourself. Troubles are transient, and when a sorrow is healed and passed, what a comfort it is to say: “No one ever knew it until it was all over.”—Sel.