“He was diligently watchful over the use of time, but more careful to do each thing well rather than to perform large quantities of work . . . Whatever he did and whatever business he undertook, always received his whole attention, as though he had nothing else to think of, or that it were the last act he had to perform in this world . . . Amidst the incessant duties and claims of so busy a life, the secret of his great power and of his unruffled calmness and sweetness, was that he never allowed himself to be hurried . . . There was no lack of energy and eagerness of life and verve, such as we are prone to make the excuse for hurry and bustle. ‘He took up the matters of business which came before him, one by one,’ says one of his biographers, ‘as though there had been nothing before it, and nothing more were to be done after it; accepting all contradictions with perfect serenity.”
From Life of St. Francis de Sales
“We ought never voluntarily so to extend our sphere of labour, that our activity becomes an unharmonious disorderly struggle, in which we constantly lose that power of calm reflection and clear mastery over our life, on which so much of our own best happiness and usefulness to others depends. In the golden rule of moderation lies undoubtedly the essential condition of all stable human happiness.”
A. SIEVERING
