Dear Friends,
This past week Nancy and I were up in Massachusetts cleaning out things from her childhood home when I came across a pristine copy of “The Business Man’s Calendar” published in 1915. (Nancy’s mom was an avid collector of antiques!) Each page covers an entire week, and on each page is a quote from well-known people. It's beautifully decorated and I wish you could see it, though each time I have attached photos they haven’t gone through.
At any rate, I’ve always taken Genesis 12:2 to teach that when I’m blessed, I’m supposed to “be a blessing” (or share the blessing I’ve received with others – Genesis 12:2). Therefore, I share 15 of my favorites from the 52 in the calendar. And to keep it all in perspective, consider as you read that this calendar was published during the height of the Great War (WWI). On the last page it says, “Bound paper copies can be attained at 35 cents postpaid; full leather-bound copies $1.50 postpaid.” Enjoy.
“To rejoice in the success of another is to partake of it.”
William Austin
“It is not the spurt at the start, but the continued, unresting, unhasting advance that wins the day.”
Anonymous
“Do not dare to live without some clear intention toward which your living shall be bent. Determine to be something with all your might.” Rev. Phillips Brooks
“To lose money ill (ie: wrongly) is often a crime; but to get it ill is a worse one, and to spend it ill is the worst of all.” Ruskin
“Don’t be content with doing only your duty. Do more than your duty. It’s the horse who finishes a neck ahead who wins the race.” Andrew Carnagie
“From strength to strength go on;
Wrestle, and fight, and pray’
Tread all the powers of darkness down,
and win the well-fought day.”
Charles Wesley
“This for thy comfort thou must know,
Times of ill won’t still be so;
Clouds won’t forever pour down rain;
A sullen day will clear again.”
Herrick
“However vexed you may be at night, things will often look different in the morning. If you have written a clever and conclusive, yet scathing letter, keep it back till the next day and it will very often never be sent.”
Lord Avery
“God divided man into man and woman so that they might help each other.”
Seneca
“So long as there is work to do there will be interruptions or breaks in its progress. And it is part of one’s character growth to bear these timely or untimely interruptions without any break in good temper or courtesy.”
Anonymous
“As it is with narrow-necked bottles, so it is with narrow-souled people – the less they have in them the more noise they make when it comes out.”
Alexander Pope
“Every day in this world has its work, and every day as it arises out of eternity keeps putting to each of us this question afresh: ‘What will you do before the day has sunk into eternity and nothingness again?’”
Frederick William Robertson
“It is not doing the thing we like to do, but liking the thing we have to do, that makes life blessed.”
Goethe
“Frugality is good if liberality be joined with it. Frugality is leaving off superfluous expenses; liberality is giving them away to the benefit of those in need. Frugality without liberality begets covetousness, liberality without frugality begets prodigality.”
William Penn
“Pessimists are always in the rear, and never in the van in the march of progress. Successful men and women are never chronic grumblers.”
Bishop Samuel Fellows
I have found that the wisdom of former generations can often help us navigate the difficult issues we face today. Old does not necessarily mean outdated. It can also mean forgotten. And all of these quotes (none more recent than 1914 when this calendar was copyrighted) still offer guidance to us today. Does Jeremiah 6:16 not tell us: “Thus saith the Lord: ‘Stand by the roads and look, and ask about the ancient paths, where the good way is. Then walk in it and find rest for your souls.”
In His Grace, Pastor Jeff
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