Therefore I offer as the most valuable study in the use of time under modern conditions the men and women in our large cities who are so far evolved that they are not tempted to commit common crimes, are well educated, earnest and pleasing, and are keenly desirous to effect in their daily lives that happy compromise between self-interest and altruism to which I have referred as the goal of success in the use of time. Let us consider them from the point of every day in the week and of the four seasons. In every man’s life his occupation, the calling or profession by which he earns his bread, must necessarily be the chief consumer of his time. We Americans have never been an idle race, and it is rare that the father of a family exposes himself to the charge of sloth. His work may be unintelligent or bungling, but he almost invariably spends rather too much than too little time over it. If you ask him why, he says he cannot help it; that in order to get on he must toil early and late. If he is successful, he tells you that otherwise he cannot attend to all he has to do. There is plausibility in this. Competition is undoubtedly so fierce that only those who devote themselves heart and soul to any calling are likely to succeed. Moreover, the consciousness of success is so engrossing and inspiriting that one may easily be tempted to sacrifice everything else to the game.
But can it be doubted, on the other hand, that the man who refuses to become the complete slave either of endeavor or success is a better citizen than he who does? The chief sinners in this respect in our modern life are the successful men, those who are in the thick of life doing reasonably well. The man who has not arrived, or who is beginning, must necessarily have leisure for other things for the reason that his time is not fully employed, but the really busy worker must make an effort or he is lost. If he does not put his foot down and determine what else he will do beside pursuing his vocation every day in the year except Sunday, and often on Sunday to boot, he may be robust enough to escape a premature grave, but he will certainly not make the best use of his life.
The difficulty for such men, of course, is to select what they will do. There are so many things, that it is easy to understand why the mind which abhors superficiality should be tempted to shut its ears out of sheer desperation to every other interest but business or profession. If every one were to do that what would be the result? Our leading men would simply be a horde of self-seekers, in spite of the fact that their individual work in their several callings was conscientious and unsparing of self. Deplorable as a too great multiplicity of interests is apt to be to the welfare and advancement of an ambitious man, the motive which prompts him to endeavor to do many things is in reality a more noble one, and one more beneficial to society than absorption to excess in a vocation. The cardinal principle in the wise use of time is to discover what one can do without and to select accordingly. Man’s duty to his spiritual nature, to his æsthetic nature, to his family, to public affairs, and to his social nature, are no less imperative than his duty to his daily calling. Unless each of these is in some measure catered to, man falls short in his true obligations. Not one of them can be neglected. Some men think they can lighten the load to advantage by disregarding their religious side. Others congratulate themselves that they never read novels or poetry, and speak disrespectfully of the works of new schools of art as daubs. A still larger number shirks attention to political and social problems, and declares bluffly that if a man votes twice a year and goes to a caucus, when he is sent for in a carriage by the committee, it is all that can be expected of a busy man. Another large contingent swathes itself in graceless virtue, and professes to thank God that it keeps aloof from society people and their doings. Then we are all familiar with the man who has no time to know his own family, though, fortunately, he is less common than he used to be.