The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1866-11-03
SMisrellatteotls.
The Use of Time and Uselessness of

Hurry.
Time was given to man TO use and not waste.
1t is for rational use and not foolish abuse. And
at times it appears to the rejecting mind that we
are mistaken in our endeavors to crowd into half
an hour what should fill half day. We do not
refer to our habits of hurried eating so frequent
ly the subject of critics and lecturers, but to the
general hurry and haste that characterize every
movement of our people,. In travelling we give
preference to the fastest this being the grand re-
commentator of one competing line over an
other. The humiliation of space and time is a
modern boast as though the feat was really mer-
itorious.
1t is to be questioned whether this idea is a
correct one. Human life is more valuable than
few hours or days, yet we risk lie and limb In
patronizing those conveyances which run the
longest possible distance in the shortest possible
time. The employees of railroad and steamboat
companies have received the title of baggage
smashers, - for no reason except that the rules OF
the companies and the exacting demands of the
public will not allow them to handle baggage, as
Tom Hood advised the management of the body
Of the despairing suicide
stTake her up tenderly,
Handel with care"
It's a public demand that every thing shall be
done in the shortest possible time, but it is a
wasteful and often s.:cidal demand. We do not
Give out half our days. If we exist the allot-
ted space of mans life we do not live. We are
driven by this spirit to hurry as relentlessly as
the poor souls in Dante's Inferno by the torment
ing devils of Hades.
But laying aside all considerations affecting
the general welfare of the race, the element of
hurry-not judicious employment of time-in the
building Of engineering works and machinery, is
really injurious. Men and concerns are intrust-
ed with the building and completion of work
of magnitude, which is to remain for the use OF
future generations and as monument of our
skill and workmanship-and instead of priding
themselves on job well done, they boast rath-
err, of one quickly performed. We have bridges
that break down, ships that founder, engines that
fall boilers that explode-not TO speak of theo-
ries thatw not stand the test of practical use
simply because we conceive time to be OF more
value than any thing else. 1t is all wrong
The engineer had better take twelve months to
test and perfect his plans, and then plenty of
time to build his structure, than TO make it an
experiment, the offspring of crude ideas. The
mechanic would do better to study the parts OF
| his machine and at last embody them in a per-
feet and practical whole than to be satisfied with
hurried completion of work that may ruin
his reputation.
IF !'large. bodies move slowly" works of use
| and for endurance should be carefully and slow
| " constructed crude idea may be worthless,
and it may contain the germ OF valuable I'M
provemenl, but neither of these facts can often be
ascertained without patient Investigations and
repeated experiments Hurry is the curse of our
mechanics. 1t prevents them often from success
fully competing with the studious German, the
patient SWISS the persistent Frenchman, and the
obstinate Engishman. Wejump at conclusions,
and insist that even if 'Rome was not built in a
day." we can erect greater than Rome in an
| hour.
We need to use care, patience, time, if we ever
intend to succeed as mechanicians. Time en-
ployed in the calculation of an idea, the demon
stration Of theory, the test of an improvement,
or the reliability of an invention is never wasted.
The fruit may be long ripening, but, when ready
to pluck, it will not prove MISUNDERSTANDING
| Anleric1R