Precept & Practice – APRIL 28 – Answering Letters

You should answer letters just as you answer men – promptly, courteously, and decisively.   Of course you don’t ever want to go off half-cocked and bring down a cow instead of the back you’re aiming at;  but always remember that game is shy, and that you can’t shoot too quick after you’ve once got it covered.   When I go into a fellow’s office and see his desk buried in letters with the dust on them, I know that there are cobwebs in his head.   Foresight is the quality that makes a great merchant, but a man who has his desk littered with yesterday’s business has no time to plan for tomorrow’s.

The only letters that can wait are those which provoke a hot answer.   A good hot letter is always foolish, and you should never write a foolish thing if you can say it to the man instead, and never say it if you can forget it.   The wisest man may make an ass of himself to-day, over to-day’s provocation, but he won’t to-morrow.   Before being used, warm words should be run into the cooling-room until the animal heat is out of them.   Of course, there’s no use in a fool’s waiting, because there’s no room in a small head in which to lose a grievance.

G. H. Lorimer (Old Gorgon Graham’s Letters to his Son)

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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