PUNCTUALITY.
Evil of being one minute too late. Examples to illustrate the
importance of punctuality. Case of a mother at Lowell. Her adventure.
General habits which led to such a disaster. Condition of a family
trained to despise punctuality.
No system can be carried on without both order and punctuality. I have
already said something, incidentally, on both of these topics; but
their importance entitles them to a separate consideration.
The importance of strict punctuality could be shown by appealing to
hundreds of authorities; but I prefer an appeal to the good sense of my
readers.
How painful it is, in a thousand instances of life, to be but one
minute too late; and how much evil it may, indeed, often does occasion,
both to ourselves and others!
"Think of the difference," says a spirited writer, "between arriving
with a letter one minute before the post-office is closed, and arriving
one minute after; between being at the stage-office a quarter of an
hour too soon, and reaching there a quarter of an hour too late;
between shaking a friend heartily by the hand as he steps on board his
vessel bound to the Indies, and arriving at the pier when the vessel is
under weigh, and stretching her wide canvass to the winds! Think of
this, and a thousand such instances, and be determined, through life,
to be in time."
Allow me to illustrate the important subject of which I am now
treating, by the case of a young mother. She wishes to go from Boston
to Lowell. She leaves Boston in the cars which go at eleven, and reach
Lowell soon after twelve. She goes to spend the afternoon with a sick
friend there, resolving to return at five--the hour when the last cars
leave Lowell for Boston. Her infant is left, for the time, in the hands
of a maiden sister--the husband being engaged in his shop, and hardly
knowing of her departure.
She spends the afternoon with her friend, and her services are very
acceptable. But ere she is aware, the bell at the railroad depot rings
for passengers to Boston. A few moments are spent in getting ready and
in exchanging the parting salutation with those friends who, though
aware of the danger of her being left, have not the honest plainness to
urge her to make speed. She is, at length, under way; but on arriving
at the depot, lo! the cars have started, and are twenty or thirty rods
distant.
What can she do? "Time and tide," and railroad cars, "wait for none."
It is in vain that she waves her handkerchief; the swift-footed
vehicles move on, and are soon out of sight! She returns, much
distressed, to the house of her sick friend, unfit to render her any
further service-to say nothing of the mischief she is likely to do by
exciting her painful sympathies.
But how and when is she to get home? There are no public means of
conveyance back to the city till to-morrow morning, and the expense of
a private conveyance seems to her quite beyond her means.
How could I be so late? she says to herself. How could I run the risk
of being thus left? Why was I not in season? What will my husband
think--especially as I came off without saying any thing to him about
coming? But this, though much to distress her, is not all, nor the
most. Her poor bade! what will become of that? Her friends endeavor to
soothe her by diverting her mind--but to no purpose, or nearly none:
she is half distracted, and can do nothing but mourn over her folly in
being so late.
But the weather is mild, and all is propitious without, except that it
is likely to be rather dark; and by means of the efforts of thoughtful
friends, a coach is fitted out with a careful driver, to carry her home
this very evening. It will take five hours in all; and as it is now
six, she will reach home at about eleven. The infant will not greatly
suffer before that time.
Finding herself fairly on the road, her feelings are somewhat composed,
and she just now begins to think what her husband will do, when he
comes from the shop at seven, and finds she has not arrived. She is
afraid he will be at the extra pains and expense to come after her; and
perhaps in the darkness pass by her, and go on to Lowell.
And her fears are partly realized. After much anxiety and some
complaining--which, however, I will not undertake to justify--the
husband is on the road with a vehicle, going to Lowell to assist her in
getting home. They meet about half way from place to place, and the
drivers recognize each other--though rather more than, in the darkness,
could have been expected. The coach from Lowell returns, and that from
Boston, taking in both passengers, wheels them back in haste to their
home. In their joy to find matters no worse, they forget to recriminate
each other, and think only of the timid sister with whom the infant was
left in charge: for in the hurry of getting off, the husband had made
no provision for quieting her fears of being alone. She passes the
time, however, in much less mental agitation than might have been
expected, and takes as good care as she can, of a fretful, crying,
half-starved babe. As the clock strikes one, the family are all quiet
in bed, and endeavoring to sleep.
How much uneasiness is here caused by being just about one minute (and
no more) too late! And whence came it? Not by her not knowing she was
running a risk by being tardy. Not that she had no apprehensions of
evil. Not because her conscience was uneducated, or unfaithful. It was
neither, nor any of these. There was, in the first place, a little want
of decision. She suffered herself to vacillate between a sense of duty
and the inclination to say a few words more, or bestow another parting
kiss. And in the second place, it was the wretched habit she had always
indulged, of delaying and deferring every thing she put her head or her
hand to, till the very last moment.
I will give you a brief but correct account of her general habits. Not
that the picture is a very uncommon one, but that you may view it in
connection with the anecdote I have related, and thus get a tolerable
idea of the inconveniences to which the wretched habit of which I have
spoken, is continually exposing her.
She makes it a rule--no, I will not say that, for she has no rules, but
she has a sort of expectation on the subject--to rise at five o'clock.
Yet I do not suppose she is up at five, six times in the year. She is
never awake at that timer or but seldom, unless she is awakened. Her
husband, indeed, makes it a sort of rule to wake her at that hour; but
he, alas, poor man! has no roles for himself or others; and if he
undertakes to awaken her at five, it is usually ten or fifteen minutes
afterward; and if she is let alone, she is often in bed till half past
five--oftener, indeed, than up earlier. The breakfast hour is six; but
I never knew the family to sit down at six. It is ten minutes, fifteen
minutes, thirty minutes, and sometimes forty-five minutes after six,
before the breakfast is on the table. The fire will not burn, and the
tea is not ready; or the milk or cream for the latter has not arrived;
or something or other is the matter--so she says, and so she
believes--and indeed sometimes so it is.
The dinner time is half past twelve-that is, professedly so; but it is
not once in twenty times that they sit down much before one
o'clock--and I have known it to be even later. So it is with supper;
and I might add, with every thing else. If an engagement is made,
directly or indirectly, positively or only implied, it is never
fulfilled at the time. She is never in her seat at church, till almost
every body else is in, and the services have commenced; although the
kind, but too indulgent parson waits some five or ten minutes for his
whole congregation--whom, alas! he has unwittingly trained to delay. In
short, she does nothing, and performs nothing, punctually, not even
going to bed; for this is deferred to a very late hour-sometimes till
near midnight.
Now herein is the secret--the foundation, rather--of her trouble at
Lowell. Had she been trained to punctuality in other things, she would,
in all probability, have been punctual there. The misfortune which I
have described, is but a specimen of what is ever and anon occurring in
the history of her life.
Nor are her sufferings--though they are severe--from her unhappy habit,
the end of the matter. I have already more than intimated that her
companion has caught the disease; but it is still more visible in the
conduct of her sons and daughters. They, like herself, seldom do any
thing at the proper time. They are never punctual in their engagements,
nor decided in their conduct. I know not, however, what the daughters
may yet do--several of them being quite young. If they should chance to
meet with better instructions than they are accustomed to
receive--should take warning, and do all they can in the way of
self-improvement--they may be able to break the chains of an inveterate
and almost unconquerable habit, and make themselves useful in their day
and generation.
I do think, most sincerely, that if all the rest of the world were
disorderly, or fell short in matters of punctuality, the young woman
should not do so. Let her, in every duty, learn to be in time. Let her
resolve to do every thing a little before the time arrives; nothing, a
moment after it.
The keeper of a boarding house, who is at the same time the principal
of one of our most flourishing schools for both males and females,
makes it a point to have every one of his boarders in their seats at
dinner, when the clock strikes twelve, which is the appointed hour.
And the late principal of a very highly distinguished female school in
Boston, used to have every exercise regulated by a clock kept in the
room; and whatever else was going on--whether it was finished or
unfinished--whenever the hour for another exercise arrived, it was
attended to. The whole school, as if with one impulse, seemed to obey
the hour, rather than the teacher. Such order and punctuality, every
where and in every thing, constitute the beauty of life; and I was
going to say, the beauty of heaven--of which this life should be a sort
of emblem. Heaven, in any event, is not only a world of order, but of
punctuality also; and she who goes there, must be prepared to observe
both, or it will be no heaven to her.
As I have strongly insisted in respect to the formation of other
important habits, so in regard to this. It must be commenced in the
smaller matters of life. Let the young woman be in time--that is, be
punctual--in the performance of what she regards as trifles, and when
she becomes a matron, she will seldom be tardy in what are deemed the
weightier matters.
I have spoken of the importance of punctuality, and have strongly
insisted that whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing well. I am
now about to insist, with equal earnestness, that what is worth
beginning and performing well, is worth doing thoroughly, or finishing.
Some young women never do any thing thoroughly--even the smallest
matters. All their lives long, they live, as it were, by halves, and do
things by halves. If they commence reading a book, unless it is
something very enticing and exciting, they neither read it thoroughly
nor finish it. Their dress is never put on thoroughly; and even their
meals are not thoroughly eaten.
In regard to what is last mentioned, they fail in two respects. Either
through fear that they shall be unfashionable, if they use their teeth,
or from sheer carelessness in their habits, they never masticate their
food thoroughly; and they never seem to get through eating. The true
way is, to finish a meal in a reasonable time, and then let the matter
rest; and never be found eating between meals. Whereas, the class of
persons of whom I am speaking, seem never to begin or end a meal. They
are nibbling, if food chance to fall in their way, all their lives long.
But--to return to other habits than those which pertain to eating and
drinking--this want of thoroughness, of which I am speaking, wherever
it exists in a young woman, will show itself in all or nearly all she
does.
Suppose she is washing dishes, for example; something is left unwashed
which ought to have been washed; something is left only partly washed;
or the whole being done in a hurry, something is not set away in its
place, and along comes a child and knocks it over and breaks it.
Perhaps site is sewing. She is anxious to get her work along; and
though she know, how it ought to be done, she ventures to slight it
especially if it is the property of another. Or having done it well
till she comes near the end, the place where, perhaps, every thing
ought to be particularly firm and secure--ought to be done
thoroughly--she leaves a portion of it half done; and the garment gives
way before it is half worn.
Or she is cooking; and though every thing else is well boiled, a single
article is not well done--which gives an appearance of negligence to
the whole. At any rate, it is not done well; and she gets the credit of
not being a thorough house-keeper.
"For who hath despised the day of small things?" is a scriptural
inquiry on a most important subject; and were it not likely to be
construed into a want of reverence for sacred things, the same inquiry
might be made in regard to the matter before us. There is a universal
disposition abroad to despise small matters, and to stigmatize him who
defends their importance.
One might suppose a young woman would find out the mischiefs that
result from a want of thoroughness, by the inconvenience which
inevitably results from it. It is not very convenient or comfortable,
to be obliged to do a thing wholly over again, or suffer from want,
because a piece of work, very trifling in itself, was not done
thoroughly. Nor is it very convenient to go and wash one's hands every
time a lamp is used, because it was not thoroughly cleaned or duly put
in order, when it should have been. Nor is it easy to clean an elegant
carpet which has become soiled, or replace a valuable astral lamp, or
mirror, which has been broken, simply for the want of thorough
attention in those who have the care of these things. These little
inconveniences, constantly recurring, might rouse a person to
reflection, one would think, as effectually as occasional larger ones.
We do not, however, always find it so.
Young people ought to consider what a host of evils sometimes result
from a slight neglect. The trite saying--"For want of a nail, the shoe
was lost; for want of a shoe, the horse was lost; and for want of a
horse, the rider was lost"--will, however, illustrate this part of my
subject. Had the single nail which was omitted--the last one--been
driven, and driven properly; had the work, in short, been done
thoroughly, the shoe, horse and rider might all have been preserved.
Do not dread the imputation of being over-nice or whimsical, if you do
your work thoroughly. You must learn to regard your own sense of
right--your regard to duty--as a thing of far more importance than
either the sneers or the approbation of thousands of the unthinking. I
have heard an individual of great worth and respectability complain of
a young friend of his, because he made it a point to finish thoroughly
every thing he undertook, and charge him with having what he called a
_mania_ for finishing, I remember, too, a very worthy, and, in the
main, excellent farmer, who used to complain of a very conscientious
son of his, because, forsooth, he was determined to finish every thing
he began, in the best possible manner, without paying much regard to
the opinions of others. But these facts only show that wise and good
men may not fully understand the nature and power of habit--or the
necessity of being thorough in small as well as larger matters. The
first individual I have named, was forever suffering from his own want
of thoroughness--and was miserable through life; and the last would
have been far happier all his life time, had he been as much disposed
to finish the things he undertook, as his son.