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the affairs of the community. Certainly they might employ their time to better purpose They can learn nothing from such conversation For it is scarsely any thing but cheasing old lies and coining new ones. How much better citizens would they make if they would only spend that time which they now throw away (and many worse than throw away) in the improvement of their minds. But how shall we occupy our time most advantageously? Or how shall we save time? In the first place, that, which will be most conducive to the saving of time, is order. Order is the first requisite in well-spent-time. Go to the man, who does the most, and has the most time to do, and you will find that he has his time the most regularly distributed. He has it so allotted that every duty comes in its proper season and is then attended to. He does not let one duty crowd another out of its place It is impossible for a man to do much, who has no regularity in his time. A man ought to know as soon as he rises in the morning what he has to do that day and persevere till all is finished Who has not experienced the inconvenience of not having his time properly arranged? and of being driven from day to day and week to week, by duties that have previously been neglected? What do we hear much of this than "O I am so pushed that I do not know how to get along I do not know what to do first." But look into the allotment those men make of their time. It is no wonder they are hurried. They have nothing like regularity about them They scarcely ever think an hour beforehand what is to be done next Their business comes a good deal like the winds in Illinois, just as it hapens. How can much be expected from such a course?
from Rodgers family letters [10], 1830-1890 →
Transcribed by sanderson · 11 / 14 / 2026
the affairs of the community. Certainly they might employ their time to better purpose They can learn nothing from such conversation For it is scarsely any thing but cheasing old lies and coining new ones. How much better citizens would they make if they would only spend that time which they now throw away (and many worse than throw away) in the improvement of their minds. But how shall we occupy our time most advantageously? Or how shall we save time? In the first place, that, which will be most conducive to the saving of time, is order. Order is the first requisite in well-spent-time. Go to the man, who does the most, and has the most time to do, and you will find that he has his time the most regularly distributed. He has it so allotted that every duty comes in its proper season and is then attended to. He does not let one duty crowd another out of its place It is impossible for a man to do much, who has no regularity in his time. A man ought to know as soon as he rises in the morning what he has to do that day and persevere till all is finished Who has not experienced the inconvenience of not having his time properly arranged? and of being driven from day to day and week to week, by duties that have previously been neglected? What do we hear much of this than "O I am so pushed that I do not know how to get along I do not know what to do first." But look into the allotment those men make of their time. It is no wonder they are hurried. They have nothing like regularity about them They scarcely ever think an hour beforehand what is to be done next Their business comes a good deal like the winds in Illinois, just as it hapens. How can much be expected from such a course?
from Rodgers family letters [10], 1830-1890 →
Transcribed by sanderson · 11 / 14 / 2026
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