Laziness

Laziness BY HEBER Q. HALE, PRESIDENT OF THE BOISE STAKE OF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS "Thou shalt not be idle; for he that is idle shall not eat the bread nor wear the garments of the laborer." — (Doc. and Cov. 42:42.) Our text, taken from the Doctrine and Covenants, the same being a compilation of the revelations given to the Prophet Joseph Smith, suggests two characters — the idler and the laborer; and it further suggests the social relationship between the two characters, namely : the idler shall not live from the fruits of the toil of the laborer. Idleness, in the sense the term is used in our text, suggests laziness. Now, to my mind there are three kinds of laziness : First, there are the physically lazy. Second, there are the mentally lazy. Third, there are the spiritually lazy. Laziness is a disease and you will seldom find a person who is not afflicted with it more or less, in at least one of the three forms mentioned. Pity the man, however, who shows symptoms in any two forms of the disease, and he is altogether lost if he has all three! The disease of laziness is somewhat like the smallpox. Both diseases start on a weak backbone and manifest themselves very visibly on the person ; but if they go in on you, they are ofttimes fatal. There is one encouraging feature about these diseases — both can be vaccinated against. There is a little difference, however, in the formula of the vaccine used. For smallpox you inject into the blood a vaccine-lymph made from cowpox. For laziness you inject a compound of equal parts of backbone, sand, and gunpowder. If any of you doubt that laziness is a disease, let me cite you to a dictionary or an encyclopedia for a definition of the word. I asked a doctor, the other day, the question: "What is disease?" He replied : "Incapacity to react under the stimulus of environment." I said to myself: "That is just what laziness is" I next went to Foster's Medical Dictionary and got this definition : *An address delivered by President Heber Q. Hale, September 28, 1913, before the newly organized Y. M. and Y. L. Mutual Improvement Associations. The address was given prior to the recent organization of the stake, at the time when President Hale was the presiding elder of the Boise Branch. — Editors.

524 IMPROVEMENT ERA "Disease is any departure from, failure in, or perversion of, normal physiological action in the material constitution or functional integrity of the living organism." Here again I found the best kind of a definition for laziness. Reduced to simple terms, this definition means quitting work, — and that is the surest sign of laziness. When the heart or the liver or the stomach refuses to do its work, you say the particular organ is diseased. Now, when man refuses to do his work, I say he is diseased. There is a universal law in operation in this world from which we read that inactivity breeds inertia — disuse brings ultimate loss of power to act. Failure to use finger, function or faculty, will result in a speedy decay and uselessness. Idleness not only leads to utter uselessness, but too often to positive evil and crime. During a period of recent years an eastern organization for the prevention of crime, collected data regarding the final destiny of 20,000 boys, ranging in age from 12 to 18 years, all of whom suffered from that common disease, laziness, which I have just described. Hear the results : 2,000 eventually saw the error of their downward course and turned right-about-face, and became useful and respected citizens; 1,000 were committed to insane asylums; 7,000 were sent to reformatories ; 9,700 were classified as derelicts and paupers. In considering these startling statistics it should be remembered that the 20,000 boys were not chosen from the slums, but from respectable homes. It is further stated that over $20,- 000,000 are annually expended in the United States for the maintenance of reformatories, industrial institutions, and prisons in which only lazy boys are kept. Dr. Albert von Bergman, of Berlin, the noted German scientist, who has made a special study of the lazy boy, has this to say : "No one is born naturally lazy. One born indolent and inactive is already diseased by some other cause than laziness. The chronically lazy boy is at the start as healthy as the average child, but, as he continues to refuse to do his work in school, his duties at home, his labor in shop and field, a great physical change takes place in him. He physically becomes so that he cannot help being lazy except under powerful curative treatment. "The motor muscles and joints of his feet soften, as do those of the legs and hands. The powers of perception of the brain are dull, and thought becomes sluggish and non-creative. The eye is dulled and performs only about half the functions it should. The ear misses many sounds and thus weakens the strength of its possessor. Although slower in its development, there is as much disintegration in a lazy boy's body as in the frame of one attacked with a malignant disease. "Gradually this physical change passes into the soul, and the beautiful inspirations given by God to all new-born beings change under human influence to criminal instincts. Society receives them, the boy beggar, the boy thief, the boy sloth. Nothing is left to do with him but to lock him up or drive him from town to town until death releases him from his uselessness."

LAZINESS 525 It is obviously apparent that laziness is a physical disability, a disease, and should be considered and treated as such. Children so afflicted should be skilfully handled, and that at once. "The idler shall not eat the bread nor xvcar the garments of the laborer." The common acceptation of this phrase is best expressed in the language of Capt. John Smith, the early Virginia colonist, who declared : "He who will not work shall not eat." But I see in these words also a higher interpretation. The laggard (or physically lazy) knows nothing of the exhilaration which comes to the man who arises at the break of day, when the dew is yet upon the grass and the breath of morning wafts cooly upon his cheek. He has never felt the joy which dwells in the heart of the man who works, the man who thinks, the man who hears and sees and feels and acts — of the man who can look back upon Work successfully done. He has never had the satisfaction of arriving on time, or of feeling the pride which comes to the man who can say : "I have accomplished something." With his soft muscles and sluggish blood, he does not even experience the lesser joy and blessing of physical excellence. Of this bread he shall not eat. Inspiration comes not to the inactive, the inert, the sluggard (the mentally lazy), but to the plodder. To the sluggard is attributed no invention, no discovery, no painting, no poem. From the stagnant pool of his mind come only stale and lifeless utterances upon his putrid breath. To him the field and the forest have no voice — the flowers do not speak to him — his heart is not touched by sweet music — books have no voice which he can hear — the great fields of science, art and literature reveal no footprints of his. He has never asked — he has never knocked ; he has, therefore, received nothing, and nothing has been opened up to him. Nature's wonderful book remains closed before his unwilling eyes and his famished brain shrivels to decay. Of this bread he shall not eat. The spiritually lazy knows no God. His untrained ear cannot catch the whisper of the "still small voice" — his benumbed soul has never felt the thrill of inspiration. He may look up — he may fall down and worship, but what does he really know? What meaning has life to him? What relationship does he bear toward his fellowmen? How does he stand as against the world beyond? Of his own three-fold self he is ignorant. He has found his stomach and perhaps his heart, but his soul he has never discovered. He never opened the door to the hand of Omnipotence. The divine spark in him has never flamed. His degenerate self has never been regenerated- Of the true bread of life he has not partaken. Of this bread he shall not eat. Hand to him the ten commandments and he will only see :

526 IMPROVEMENT ERA "But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work." Give him the Lord's prayer and he will only pray : "Give us this day our daily bread." The commandment thundered down from Sinai begins : "Six days shalt thou labor." Alas, too many of us look to the day of rest and think by observing it we have fully lived up to the commandment. We lose sight of the fact that we are required to precede that day of rest with six days of labor. We pray : "Give us this day our daily bread." My friends, if it be loaves we pray for, we pray in vain, as you yourselves can testify. We do not pray simply: "Forgive us our debts," but add : "as we forgive our debtors." In the latter case we expect to receive only in the measure that we give. Does not the same rule apply also in the former case? Daily bread and all other necessities and joys of life come to us in the measure of our own activities and application of the opportunities and resources at hand. To whom much is given, much is expected. If we improve our talents, they shall be added to ; but if we fail to improve them, they shall be taken away. Disuse is as much an abuse as misuse. Inactivity brings loss of power. It is positive virtue in a man that counts — and virtues become positive only as they have been tempered in the crucible of temptation. The rough sea makes the sailor — labor makes muscle — thoughts build the brain — man grows in service. The greatest men of all ages have been the world's greatest servants- The world needs leaders in every line of activitv. We have too many followers. The earth is elastic under the feet of the worker ; but it groans under the feet of the sluggard. No one has respect for an idler — no one loves him. "One monster there is in the world," said Thomas Carlyle : "the idle man. Looking up, looking down, around, behind or before," he continued, "discernest thou * * * any idle hero, saint, god, or even devil? Not a vestige of one. In the heavens, in the earth, in the waters under the earth, is none like unto thee. Thou art an original figure in this creation." The gospel of Christ, as understood by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, contemplates work. In it there is no place for drones. "The idler shall have no place in the Church," says one of our scriptures. "Six days shalt thou labor" appeals to us just as strongly as "one day shalt thou rest." The trail across the desert into these western mountains, the transformation of a barren wilderness into fruitful fields and happy homes, speak in a language more eloquent and convincing than tongue can utter in support of the industrious life of the Church. Joseph Smith, its founder under God, said : "Man cannot be saved in ignorance." Man is saved from the ills of the flesh, from the superstitions and errors of the mind to the extent of his knowledge