How to sort by previous date in database?

Question

What I want to ask is how to select from database record and my php code able to sort previous date by date,which is what i want to display in my interface:

Answer 1

Can't you simply use this?

SELECT `date` FROM staff WHERE `date` < NOW() ORDER BY `date`

or (if you need only different dates)

SELECT DISTINCT `date` FROM staff WHERE `date` < NOW() ORDER BY `date`