The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1924-02-27
Mankind Not Ready
For the FOur-HOur Day
From the Saturday Evening
Post.

From the Saturday Evening
Post.
In the course of recent interview
famous scientist predicted that the
development Of electrical power would
ultimately lead to four-hour work
day.
He did not seem to feel however,
that this era of leisure ahead Of the
human race would be an unmixed
blessing.
Too much leisure, he intimated
would perhaps have bad effect, par
ticularly on the young.
He has presented the adverse side
too mildly.
If the time ever comes when four
hour day is the common lot, living
conditions will be little short of de-
plorable.
In the first place, the human mind
and body need the stimulus of labor
and it is impossible to keep the one
keen and the other fit on a daily
shift of four hours.
1t is not so much that four hours
devoted to work would in themselves
fail to keep the mind sharp and the
The difficulty would consist in the
inability of the average person to
make proper use of the twelve hour S
of leisure thus provided.
Twelve hours of loafing or mis-
directed energy would steal from mind
and body an benefits that might ac-
crue from shortening the hours of
work to four.
Man has never been a good loafer
With nothing to do he either lets
his powers atrophy Or turns to per-
nicious activities.
The society waster, the bored diet
tante, the tramp, the beggar and the
beachcomber are the common types
created by idleness.
Even the Woodworking and sue
cessful man who finds it possible to
retire soon shows the effects Of an
unwonted inactivity. He becomes
heavy and lethargic in body and tho
roughly miserable in mind and spirit;
often, too, he fails to live out his al
lotted span and succumbs to some dis
ease which might never have laid its
grip upon him had he stayed in the
harness.
Any man worth his salt comes back
from vacation completely stated with
idleness and with renewed zest for his
work.
Work is the salvation of the hui
man race.
1t was a blessing, not curse, that
was laid on Adam and Eve when they
were elected from the Garden of Eden
All work and no play may MAKE
Jack dull boy, but all play and no
work makes him the worst possible
kind of citizen.
The four-hour day would make man
a twelve-hour loafer, and it would not
be long before he should need twenty
fOur-hour theaters, amusement parks,
traffic cops and jails.
Roads would be black with flying
FLYERS at all hours of the day and
night. Places of amusement would
be continuously jammed, and all forms
of vice would flourish
An equally unsatisfactory feature
would be the impossibility of making
che short day general in any sense.
Electrical power may some day
partly replace Drawn and give such
diu 20 ohiii tIl1t q Sifoi Va |
day will become possible for the man
who works with his hands.
Electricity, however, will never take
the place Of thought.
II civilization is to keep on function
ing and advancing the brain worker !
will never have it any easier than he
does today.
Responsibility can never be put or
a four-hour basis.
Leadership and supervision have al
ways been twenty -four-hour PROPOSE
lions, and always will be, no matter
how advanced our mechanical devices
may become.
We do not dare clip any shorter the
hours of education unless illteracy is
to accompany leisure. Nor will 1t
ever be possible for the housewife and
mother to condense her labor and re-
sponsihilities into such a short daily
schedule.
What will the twe.ve-hour wife do