The Soldiers' journal. (Rendezvous of Distribution, Va.) 1864-1865, 1864-03-23
Eor The Soldiers Journal.
Be Employed.


Would YOU avoid the dscontentment and home
sickness that are to be felt by the lstless
and inactive, who spend their time, hour after
hour, in Longing about from place to place,
which totally units them for usefulness to them
selves and others; and in many cases lays the
foundation for diseases that may render them
useless for life, be employed for this will rem
der you thousand fold more contented, and
WILL in great measure, prevent the recurrence
of those thoughts that only tend to unfit you
for your duties man and as a soldier
Would you guard against the temptations to
drinking gambling, and all their kindred vices,
be usefully employed, and when the Tempter
comes he will not tarry long, for he prefers the
vantage ground that he is sure to find where he
finds men unemployed.
Would you have the proud consciousness that
you are becoming daily more like what you
should be; that you are carrying out instead of
thwarting the plan of your Creator in giving you
an existence here that you are doing your duty
and making the world better by living in it, in
stead of lending your influence to disseminating
vice and increase misery in the world, be employ
ed for thus, and thus only, can you live life
that shall be noble and manly.
Would you go home prepared to enter again
the walks of civil life, and not find that you are
totally untitled to become useful member ofso-
ciety, a man that shall be dreaded for the pesti-
lential influence that he exerts in the communi-
", be employed; for these habits of idleness that
you have formed since you entered the army,
will cling to you with increasing tenacity, the
longer you delay TO break away from them they
already making sad inroads upon the choi-
oest years of your existence; and your aversion
to anything that requires an effort either ofmind
or body, is becoming stronger and stronger from
day to day. You need not imagine that you can
lay aside your useless and pernicious habits as
easily as you can your suit of blue, on the day
that signalizes your release from the army; for
habits things of lifetime, not of campaign.
But how shall soldier be employed? What
can he find to do that will tend to make him
better man, or better citizen? Much, very
much, if he will. Even at the front he is noten-
tirely destitute of the means of self cultivation
for the friends at home have reached even that
place, with food for the mind as we'll as for the
body.
But even if you have no direct means of men
tai improvement; though you cannot cultivate
your powers of thought in one particular way, it
does not therefore follow that you are to to
grow mentally, or that you are to grow lower
and lower in the scale of intellect. Trees, Clouds
rivers, mountains, all nature is yours, and no
man can take it from you. Your own SELF your
own mind and character, thoughts and feelings,
are before you always; not a very pleasing, per-
haps, but certainly very profitable subject of
study.
Then there multitude of ways, in which
you may spend The moments that now hang so
heavily upon your hands. IF you cannot find a
book, find an intelligent companion; if you cam
not do this, find out all Won can about the nar-