Precept & Practice – JANUARY 23 – Habit

It is very important that teachers should realise the importance of habit, and psychology helps us greatly at this point.   We speak, it is true, of good habits and of bad habits;  but, when people use the word ‘habit,’ in the majority of instances it is a bad habit which they have in mind.   They talk of the smoking-habit and the swearing-habit and the drinking-habit, but not of the abstention-habit or the moderation-habit or the courage-habit.   But the fact is that our virtues are habits as much as our vices.   All our life, so far as it has definite form, is intellectual – systematically organised for our weal or woe, and bearing us irresistibly toward our destiny, whatever the latter may be.

Professor James

Obedience grew into a habit and became to him a second nature;  so that when the temptation came, it cost him little effort to overcome it.   If you would conquer like him (Daniel) you must discipline your wills like him.   In spiritual as in physical warfare previous preparation is the only sure condition of victory.

Canon MacColl (Life Here and Here-after)

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From the Introduction to Precept and Practice

The kindly welcome given to my other little books, ‘Being and Doing’ and ‘Character and Conduct,’ must be my excuse for adding another collection of extracts to the number now in circulation.

The quotations are gathered from the books of many earnest thinkers, and deal with Life in all its length and breadth, with ourselves, our characters, our plain unvarnished faults and weaknesses, our often untoward circumstances, and with all that drags us down;-  with our purposes, our religion, our love and friendships, and with all that uplifts us;-  with our relation to others, our influence and responsibilities, and finally with those stages of our journey which bring us to the Road’s Last Turn and to the Silent Land.

CONSTANCE  M. WHISHAW