Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-12-15
THE MASTER VICE.
As Such Is Procrastination Described
by a Confessed Victim.

From the New York Sun.
1.-THE bane Of my existence" said the pro-
crastinating man, has been my habit of
putting things off. I never do today what
can put off till tomorrow.
1.-THE result Is that 1 am always putting
things off and never doing any more than is
necessary for my current daily hand-to-
mouth support. and SO, as the saying is,
never have anything. I am not indie
pendent, but always dependent upon some
body else for the work that will enable me
to live, and SO I can never say my soul is
my own. I must do the work am set to do
by some stronger man, whether like it or
not, and so I plod along, just getting
through, while the man who collars things
gets on.
"Of late years, as I have come to realize
its evil effects and the enormous difficulty
of overcoming 1t, have come to think that
And coming to- think thus has disturbed me
a little, because have to give up orig
inally preconceived and long-cherished no.
ton.
II had long held that the most nearly in
eradicable of personal vices was gambling,
but now I thought the most difficult of all
vices to cure oneself of was that of procras-
tination. Was 1 wrong then? And could it
| be that was wrong now?
This, as I say, disturbed me little; but
now on this point rest quite easy. For 1
nave discovered, contradictory as THIS, at
| first thought, might seem, have discovered
that L was right then and that 1 am right
now.
For now discover that the vice of gam
| bling is but another phase of, or at least
| the outcrop of, that Of representation. The
great majority of those given over to gam
| bling hope to get something for nothing
| they hope to get money without effort
| They put off from day to day the hard, I'M
| fiinching work that would give them a sure
thing, without chances, on the race of life
and make just enough to indulge their vice
and their vain hopes.
$50 gambling is really buA a form, or out
| come, of the vice of representation. And
| by the same line of reasoning I suppose we
| might say the same of drunkenness, which
| Is essentially procrastinating vice; we put
things off today, today we will drink: we
| will drink; we will work tomorrow.
| And l don't know but what we should
procrastination; and SO this, which Nigh,
| seem but a form Of laziness,> is really the
master vice; and am one of it's most close
| ly bound victims. don't drink, and don't
| putting things off.
Inertia, dullness, lack of power from
| want of exercise, come from 1.-THE procras-
| tinating man is always at the same dead
low level. He is always going to do some.
| thing, never doing it; just pulling through
with the work he has to do, and gaining
correspondingly small rewards. He never
| knows the joy Of doing things gathers
| in its profits, but habit bound, he settles
| down in lifelong slavery.
| "And I am one of those victims Occa-
| sionally do rouse up and do something out
| of my set routine, and in the accomplishing
| of some rugged task that thus take up
| find great new Joy and pride; and am
i going to keep this up; but next day sink
! to the old level again, and stay there; 1t is
so much easier to put things OF than to dc
/ things, and this, the trunk bad habit OF
which all others are but branches, is sc
i deep-rooted.
1 But I am not without hope. have
and I am prying, prying. around the roots
! of the trunk"