Temperance in Labor
[
Christian Temperance and Bible Hygiene, 64-66
(1890).]
Intemperance in eating and drinking, intemperance in labor, in-
temperance in almost everything, exists on every hand. Those who
make great exertions to accomplish just so much work in a given time,
and continue to labor when their judgment tells them they should rest,
are never gainers. They are living on borrowed capital. They are
expending the vital force which they will need at a future time. And
when the energy they have so recklessly used is demanded, they fail
for want of it. The physical strength is gone, the mental powers fail.
They realize that they have met with a loss, but do not know what
it is. Their time of need has come, but their physical resources are
exhausted. Everyone who violates the laws of health must sometime
be a sufferer to a greater or less degree. God has provided us with
constitutional force, which will be needed at different periods of our
life. If we recklessly exhaust this force by continual overtaxation, we
shall sometime be losers. Our usefulness will be lessened, if not our
life itself destroyed.
As a rule, the labor of the day should not be prolonged into the
evening. If all the hours of the day are well improved, the work
extended into the evening is so much extra, and the overtaxed system
will suffer from the burden imposed upon it. I have been shown that
those who do this often lose much more than they gain, for their
energies are exhausted and they labor on nervous excitement. They
may not realize any immediate injury, but they are surely undermining
their constitution.
[100]
Let parents devote the evenings to their families. Lay off care and
perplexity with the labors of the day. The husband and father would
gain much if he would make it a rule not to mar the happiness of his
family by bringing his business troubles home to fret and worry over.
He may need the counsel of his wife in difficult matters, and they may
both obtain relief in their perplexities by unitedly seeking wisdom of
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