SLOTHFULNESS
And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.
—Romans 13:11
5790 The “Thresher”
The nuclear submarine Thresher disappeared on April 10, 1963, bearing 129 men to a watery grave. Poor workmanship and sloppy testing may have led to the loss. Probable cause of the sinking has been pinpointed as the failure of the saltwater-piping system that cooled the propulsion machinery. Such a failure would have flooded the submarine and knocked out all electrical power.
Before sinking in 8,000 feet of water, the Thresher had undergone extensive overhaul at the Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. But only five percent of the Thresher’s salt-water-piping system was inspected by the shipyard. Even in that small sampling one of seven inspections showed pipings or fittings “below standard.”
5791 No Reason To Fly Away
In February 1976, the Ontario government flew about three hundred fat Canada geese to Florida aboard a Twin Otter aircraft. The geese were considered too pampered to get there on their own. Ten years ago the government gave a gaggle of them a home on a plot of ground near Owen Sound. Commenting on the condition of the geese before their flight, one spokesman said: “The geese have got no reason to fly away. Right now their food is provided, and they’ve got it made.”
5792 Whole Day To Sign Name
Imperial etiquette required Emperor Baldwin II of Constantinople (1217–1273) to take a whole day to sign his name. One half of the name was signed one day, the other exactly twenty-four hours later.
—Selected
5793 Foxhole Photo
Army Secretary Frank Pace, Jr., went down to Fort Bragg to watch a big airlift maneuver. “After the drop,” he tells, “I saw a foxhole that had just been started, and as a very new Secretary of the Army I thought it would be a good idea if I saw what this grubbing business was like. So I got down and started digging.
“Just then a soldier stepped up and said, “Mr. Secretary, I would like to take your picture, with you digging a foxhole.” I thought that was as it should be, and I really set about it in earnest. I was digging and sweating and digging, and it seemed to me it was taking him an awful long time to snap that picture, so I finally looked up and said, “What’s the matter? Something wrong with your camera?”
“ “No, sir,” he said. “That’s my foxhole, and I want to take your picture when you’re through.””
—Saturday Evening Post
5794 Student’s Shortcut In Newspaper
In the Kansas City Star, an ad in the personnel’s column one day had eight words—reprehensible, idiosyncrasy, extrapolate, platitudinous, assiduous, plethora, euthanasia and desiderata. It was signed by a Ronnie Johnson.
The editor wondered what was going on, so he sent a young reporter to find Ronnie Johnson. Ronnie turned out to be a high-school sophomore whose English teacher had told the students that she would give an automatic A to anybody who found those eight words in the paper the first semester.
—Listen Magazine
5795 “Not Feeling Well?”
There is a legend at Harvard that the late Le Baron Russel Briggs, beloved dean of the College once asked a student why he had failed to complete an assignment.
“I wasn’t feeling very well, sir,” said the student. “Mr. Smith,” said the Dean, “I think that in time you may perhaps find that most of the work of the world is done by people who aren’t feeling very well.”
—Frederick Lewis Allen
5796 Mechanical Decision-Makers
“I am aghast at the Harwell Thinkometer, which by a system of buttons placed before each member of a group, permits group decisions without the embarrassment of discussion. You press a button, yes, no, or maybe; and the machine calculates the total reaction.
“I am aghast at the Dynamucator, which is alleged to be able to teach you through your pillow while you sleep. Without any intellectual effort, you may learn to be an aggressive salesman, or to speak Russian.
“I am even more terrified by the Dial-A-Prayer movement, by which a machine performs your devotions for you, and you do not have to make any personal exertion to get in touch with the Deity beyond giving Him a ring.”
—Robert M. Hutchins
5797 A Place Of Nothing To Do
A man complained that he could never get caught up. Every day for 20 years he looked at his desk piled high with unfinished matters, letters unanswered, bills to be paid, appointments accumulated, and problems that should have been settled two weeks ago. When he walked out of the house to get away from the clutter, there was the grass that needed to be cut, and hedges that should have been trimmed last spring. If he could only get caught up, just once, if only for 20 minutes!
Then he slept and had a dream. He was in a large room with a beautiful mahogany desk before him, clean, bright and shiny. On it there were no appointments—nothing. Through the window he could see the lawn and hedges neatly trimmed, everything in place. It was a great relief. He had caught up at last—thank the Lord!—and peace was his.
Or was it? All around the edges of his paradise there nibbled a little question: What do I do now? The postman down the street was whistling, and he hailed him. The postman had no letters for him; he was just out for a walk. “Please tell me,” the man said, “what place this is?”
“Why, don’t you know?” replied the postman cheerily. “This is Hell.”
—What About Tomorrow
5798 The Pot Of Gold
A merchant had a son who loved to sleep late. In spite of the father’s repeated lectures against indolence, the lazy son still would not get up until the sun was high in the sky. Finally, the merchant thought of applying the profit motive as an incentive to his son for early rising. “Don’t you want to make some money?” he said to his son. “You know the old saying, “Get up early in the morning, pick up a pot of lost gold!”” “In that case,” answered his son, “the one who lost the pot of gold must have got up even earlier.”
—Chinese Humor
5799 Eyelids Exercises
“I always do my exercise in the mornings, pa!” protested the lazy son:
“Immediately after waking I do this to myself: “Ready now. Up, down, up, down.” And after three strenuous minutes I tell myself, “OK boy, now, we’ll try the other eyelid.””
5800 Epigram On Slothfulness
• Idleness is the parent of all vice.
—English Proverb
• No mill, no meal. An idle brain is the Devil’s workshop.
—English Proverb
• He that would eat the kernel must crack the nut.
—Scotch Proverb
• Doing nothing is about the most tiresome work in the world because you cannot stop and rest.
• “What is life’s heaviest burden?” asked a youth to a sad and lonely old man.
He answered: “To have nothing to carry.”
• Sign at highway construction site: “Men working ahead—we hope.”
—Nashville Banner
• Some girls’ idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.
• There are always too many people who reach for the stool when there is a piano to be moved.
• The world is full of willing people; some willing to work, the rest willing to let them.
• The symptoms of laziness and fatigue are almost identical and only a few persons can tell the difference, for instance, coaches.
—Crow’s Nest
• It is far better to be industriously asleep than to be lazily awake.
—Spurgeon
• Man to friend: “My brother-in-law leaps out of bed as soon as the first ray of sun touches his window. Of course, his bedroom faces west.”
—Roger Allen
See also: Procrastination ; Time ; Eph. 5:14, 16.