The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1869-03-25

Agency, No. II Centre-street, Newly ork.
This certificate entities the holder to a
reduction ,of -one-third from the usual
hotel rates, in most of the leading hotels
of those States.
Do Laboring Men have Time to Study {?
.sAll work and no play makes Jack dull
boy" is a true saying if not model OF lit
erary excellence. Its meaning is, that
mind and heart as we'll as muscle need ex-
ercise. Man is complex being. Body,
mind, and soul need to be naturally and
tremendously developed, or the human
machinery becomes out of balance, and
speedily shakes itself to pieces. A dis
tinguished essayist, hailing from Boston,
the American Athens, has taken up the
pen to urge that the laboring classes play
too much and study so little, that the
nature of the case hardly admits of much
effort at mental improvement. So many
hours labor and such hearty meals to get
through it all are required, tlrat. any at
tempt at intellectual Improvement on the
part of the working classes is, in our Bos-
ton philosophers opinion, necessarily as the
gait of the OK, to that of a, ,trotting horse.
We have word to say upon this sub
iect, and we shall begin by agreeing with
our essayist, that workingmen, especially
young workingmcu, study too little, but
we dissent totally from the statement that
there is anything in the nature OF their
labor to prevent them as class from sue
ccssful study, if they could be induced to
undertake it Systematically. .
Let us see. 1t is asserted that they eat
too heartily, that they must eat too hearth
ly to be ieet.minded. We admit, because
our experience as well as physiological
science proves it, that hearty meal can
not be followed Immediately by vigorous
mental application. The attempt to do it
must inevitably work ill to body and mind
But We also know from theory and prac-
tice that the last meal of the day should
be, especially to the laboring man, light
one. This meal precedes the hours of
leisure generally possessed by laboring
men,-the hours which are too generally
spent in smoking, theatre going, billiard
playing, drinking in many sad cases, or,
what is scarcely better, season of men,
tai and physical inanity by the tireside,
slowly but surely degrading all faculties
Now, let it be distinctly understood
that we do not object to harmless amuse-
ments per Sc.
If workingmen will not study, they had
better play than smoke, drink, or sit by
the fire and NOPE. We believe i'll the
duty of recreation. But We also believe
that study itself is recreation to man
whose muscles have been in active play
for ten hours of the day, and the best kind
of recreation, too, when the last meal has
been, as it should be, light one. Then the
BODY rests while the mind IS fresh aud vig-
orous, and two or three hours OF profitable
and most interesting intellectual enjoy
ment can be had at far less expense than
the pipe, billiards, or theatre demands.
Let us now look for a moment at the
question of time. Suppose aborer to
work ten hours, and to devote two hours
per day to meals and going to and from
work. There remain twelve hours out OF
the twenty.four Allow nine hours Of this
for sleep-an hour more than necessary for
most persons-but say nine hours; three OF
leisure remains. But suppose one honr OF
the three be spent with the family, there
are still two hours of time for quiet study.
Now exclude Sundays from She calcua-
ton. and allow one secular evening for
amusement solely, there remain ten hours
per week for study-an amount OF time
that would, with ordinary intelligence, an
swer to master the rudiments ofthe French
or German language in a single year, thus
opening new and rich field Of amusement
and culture. Ten years of such course
would give man the mastery of the
French and German tongues, a fair knowl-
edge of mathematics pure and applied, an
outline of the physical sciences, and skill as
draughtsmau. The writer of this article,
still on the sunny side of forty, asserts that
the average Of all the time he has been able
to devote to study during his life has been
considerably less than two hours per day.
Let any mechanic at the age oftwenty con-
slider how much advantage the above ac-
quirements would be to him at the age Of
thirty, should he obtain them, and then go
to work and get them. The requisite books
can be obtained for less than many young
man spends for cigars during six months.
Twelve years since We were in a ma
chine shop in the centre of New-York
Stoto wbere wn were hayinr q model con-