Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-08-04

the rush and hurry and restless competi-
ton are such that even when the average
business man or toiler ceases the struggle
for time the momentum of activity is
carried on into the recreation, and like
chain, links leisure and toll.
Like the drive-wheels of their engines they
keep up action after the fore that sets them in
motion is withdrawn. Excitement becomes TO
them final necessity, their recreation being
but change in the manner of the excitement.
OF vital force, his most valuable possession, the
American business man is perpetual spend
thrift. Like his horse, he is trained more for
speed than for endurance. He sacrifices the
staying powers of his ancestors for immediate
results. He has lost that noble repose, both of
mind and of manner, which gave dignity to life
in the earlier days of the republic He suffers
from whole train of nervous and functional
disoTders-the natural protest of his oyertaxed
powers His life suddenly gives way or becomes
kind of prolonged disease, the only cure for
which. when not too late. is change of occupa-
ton or absolute rest.
And he adds what we all know to be
true, that the bulk of those employed by
him must enter into their work with the
same spirit. If the employing man would
but calculate the investment and the re-
suit, he will uniformly find that by ac-
cording his employees frequent holidays
and breathing spells" he will largely
augment the sum of his gains, by reason of
the greater energy and its better direction
that will be projected into the work of his
wage-earners. Mr.. Peters breaches the
gospel of truth when he declares that,
while it is true that the American work.
man receives higher wages than any other
workman in the world, it is also true that it
is because he earns them, for he turns out
more of product than any other within a
given space of time. But to win this high
wage he sacrifices the best part of the
workman's reward, the impress of his char
acter upon his work. 1t is unfortunately
too true that the average American en-
ployer cares more for speed and quantity
than he does for the individualism of the
workmen in the product
We are told, and not without truth of
some degree-by the Trades Unions-that
the reason for the steady influx of highly
skilled foreign workmen to the exclusion
of our own wage-earners, is because the
employers do not permit the American
apprentice to thoroughly acquire his trade,
while in the Old World thoroughness is
exacted. Here, when smattering is ac-
quired, the worker is taken out of the
initiative stage and placed at tasks that
pay him wage and give the employer a
product that answers his purpose when
supplemented by the skill of the accom-
plished journeymen. And this complete
ljourneymau is oftenest the man who
learned mis- trade thoroughly in the Old
World, where, by the way, there is
not that nervous output of energy, nor
| that fierce competition to which we are
witnesses, and where there are more
rest-days and oftener leaving of the tread
mill for restful paths. The connection be-
tween the sacrifice of leisure and this in
completeness of American workmen is
closer than at first glance may appear.
force, neither learning the arts slowly and
| well nor giving the opportunity for rest
and recuperation that nature demands. it
is not difficult to understand that we are
prodigal of ability to degree that must
bring us, in time, harvest of regrets.
But if the workmen and the business
men are so hard pushed by their vacations
that they have no leisure what shall be
said of the literary workers Mr.. Peters
declares as the result of his observation
that the public, towards these workers, is
the hardest of taskmasters as well as
towards the professional classes generally /:
In truth, il begins % look as if the indenand-
ent scholar aud thinker must soon determine
TO what degree the finer and coarser empIoy-
Inents may be performed by the same person; in
what proportion one can clean stables and
study Plato in the same forenoon, The so-caiIad
learned professions have in such measure de-
generated from their original idea of disinter.
es'ed service; that professional life has come
10 diher but little from business lie he work-
ing OF a muck rake would less unfit man to be
thinker than much OF the professional life of
our Tune. Men generally fail to
to pay the price. The present Industrial svstem
would force them to pay it whether they are
Wiling or not Just here, more than in in
equality OF condition, is the cause of many n
fortuneiess mans quarrel with the world (jnlv
that labor can find employment that will con-
centrate and expend itself TO the utmost =
Is the intense and prolonged application
required IN every Department OF associated in
dustIy that makes men of reflective tempera.
ments morose and pessimistic The treadmill
round Oh industrial civilization takes all the in
spiration out OF them.
There is flavor of intense bitterness in
all this, but the charge of the essayist IS
substantially true. Too much of the labor
of the day that involves not only physical
output of energy, but the exercise of the
intellectual, mental and nervous powers,
demands the complete sacrifice of the
worker, be he business man, toilcr at the
forge, or the tireless worker in intellectual
fields. 1t is the perpetual grind" that
wears out the human as we'll as the iusen-
safe machine. That the demand for this
grind is increasing, no intelligent man
will deny. The ultimatum of the push
ing age is grind, or stand aside for one
who will" 1t is the ''grind" that eats up
the leisure that, if wisely granted and enl-
ployed, would make the worker better IN
labor, whatever its class and kind, and
produce better and better paying results.
As our essayist puts it, Everywhere men
are seeking their ends less by order and
system than by hard work. Nor can we
expect anything better so long as all occu-
patton looks only for the coin reward.
There will be no change SO long as we buy
substance and wealth by slavery TO toll
and sacrifice OF leisure.
We may not now follow the argument
of the essayist into the consideration of
the civilization of the future when we
shall have conquered all, occupied all our
lands, constructed all our railways, tapped
all our mines and built all our ships. But
in the meantime we may all do something
to mitigate the punishment of the grind
the age enforces upon men by preaching
the doctrine Of the gainfulness of rest, and
holiday, and change-the paying invest
ment that every business man and every
worker will find IL To be to sacrifice Soma