Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1874-04-10
Need One Hurry Z

ing some anticipation of the one that is
to come, as well as reminiscence of the
one that has just departed, there is never
theless feeling that turks very generally
in the human mind that the world is
coming to an end. 1t has lurked there,
certainly in all historic time, and the
fables which prehistoric times have told
had this moral; it has blazed out now
and then into fire of burning expecta-
tion and dread and in every generation
there are men and whole classes of socie-
ty TO whom the coming end is the stim.
ulus of action or the paralyzer of hon
est work
Now there is no great, comprehensive,
or penetrating impulse moving men and
generations, which has not its miniature
presentment in the petty ways of life;
and the strong hope which made the
horizon luminous to the Apostle, and
caught up his daily life into the sweep of
heroic action, is parodied in the flicker
of some phantom future which makes
ordinary mortals discontented with the
present, and turns their daily work into
an unseemly push and incontinent hurry.
Something is coming-be 1t Saturday, or
payday, or the annual balance.sheet, or
the visit of relation, or journey, a
marriage, birthday, an anniversary-the
end of the world in which we are dwell
ing for the time is at hand; then is to
begin something new; some changed cir
cumstances, fresh day, new week,
new account, different society, a new
start in life, settlement, a beginning
after the end.
1t is impossible for one to sit down to
think at all of what enters into the motive
of his life without seeing how very large
share new beginnings have in it; how
constantly he looks to the end with refer.
ence to the beginning that is to come
after. The point at issue is not how to
eradicate hope, small or great, from ones
life, but how to get rid of this perpetual
hurry and drive, this galloping to the end
of journey, only to mount fresh steed
and gallop on the next stage; the clatter
of the horses hoofs becoming an accom-
paniment to all ones thoughts. There is
certainly something ignominious in the
confession which people are constantly
making that they have no time TO do this
or that needful thing, and that they shall
breathe more freely if they can once clear
their desk, or finish this job, or wipe out
this obligation. One comes to feel that
Time has been borrowed from, and that
ones notes are perpetually maturing,
while one makes a vain effort to cancel
them by giving fresh notes. We turn
round in helpless sort of fashion, and
berate the age we live in, with its whiz
Zing locomotives and its clicking tele
graphs, as if the punctuality of railroad
trains and the instantaneousness of dis
patches were not the very friends and ser
wants of honest leisure.
1t would be idle to lay down set o.
rules by which one might hope to exor
else this evil demon of haste and unrest
but one would take much pains i
he could hope to persuade the unhappy
man of hurry that the fault was all hi
own, and lay in the very spirit will
which he set about his work; that, il
short, hurry was an evil spirit, to be exor
cised by whatever power is might,
enough to conrolit. 1t is among men o
business that it shows itself most clearly
while it is most offensive when displayed
in the life of men of thought Busines
and hurry, so far from being necessar,
partners, are opposed to each other by tn
most violent contrast. 1t may safely b
said that the most successful men of busi
ness are the least hurried, for hurry is al
open transgression of the law of order, ant
order is the foundation-stone of busines
house. And there we touch the secret o
IA leisurely life, one which has free play
without this incessant push from behind
He who orders his life, and refuse
to be carried along by the neares
current; who holds his purpose
as sacred and does not lightly allo,
himself to be turned from them
who has the will to refuse work, in spit
of that most intolerable complaint, tn
suspicion of being a shirk-it is he VIII
can hope bravely to live life of leisur,
Is it not pitiable to see one who, throug
his very anxiety to do everything whic
, circumstance seems to lay on his broa
back, comes to be the very thrall of eli
cumstance, and starts at every shado'
, which seems to whisper that he is nc
! faithful? He wears his life away 10
fretful existence in the vain attempt {
leave nothing undone, when it woul
have been nobler to leave much undon
which has been done ill. He disappoint
his masters by the excess of his endeavo
yet none is so disappointed as himself, fc
the solace of having tried to do what on
has not done is mockery. 1t is doin
which brings comfort.
, Along with the spirit of order whic
, leads one to arrange his work so that
shall not be always at his heels, and I'll
, courage which makes him refuse to d
: what he cannot do well, though he be su
/ pected of shirking-that most hatefl
! thing to his soul-there is also the ell
a ment, which indeed is but Il
a spirit of order and of coural
/ combined, of resolute reserve of leisur
Forster, in his account of Dickens, hi
|. touched upon the fundamental weakne
! of that sad life, the absence of any "ci
n of the mind to which he could flee f
v refuge from the incessant pressure of Il
y actual and real upon him. 1t is, we hol
n a necessity for every man of business
@ have and guard jealousy some period
!. each day which shall be consecrated
h leisure-the leisure of books, or of gent
|. society, or of nature, or of worship. I'll
q last is essential; the others are gratet
@ aids. In this shelter he has a chance
e set his watch by the heavenly bodies, ar
4 when he issues forth, into whatever thick
8 OF men or affairs he may plunge, he wi
q at any rate be himself and not the sla'
a of necessity. There is no need of hurr
v for hurry is at variance with freedom
and the need that men have is of freedOI
i So it comes to pass that in a hurryir
4 age the man of leisure is the man of hop
f and the end of the world to him Is Il
. opening OF fairer prospect for that whiC
even now lies in his grasp.-EUery SC
. urday.
4 THE Portland (Me) Press says tn
! five years ago gentleman in that Gil
! ! scratched his name on nickel cent an
sent it on its travels. Eighteen montl
after this cent came into the possessic
: of Lowell acquaintance, who markC
= his name upon it. Two years later
: turned up in Pennsylvania, and can
: into the hands of a former chum of u
Portlander. Recognizing the name, h
inscribed his also on the coin. One da
this week the man who started the Gel
! on its travels was making purchase
, a Lowell store, when the identical nick
y which left his pocket five years ago WI
handed to him in change.
4 of 1850 petitioners 10 the Govern'
7 of Kentucky for executive clemency, file
i since 1870, there were 3,106, or abo
+ three-fourths, of the petitioners wi
:. charge their troubles to the use of into
icating drinks.
Y