In a Midland town two young parsons worked side by side. One of them was a genial sort of fellow, who seemed to have plenty of time for everything, work and play alike. When his labours were over for the day, people enjoyed having him in for a bit of supper and a chat.
On bright days, Mondays particularly, he would mount his bicycle or shoulder his golf clubs, and set off to have a good time of it. His doings were a puzzle to his confrère, who never had a minute to spare, and rushed at his work, sermon-making, visiting, and meetings alike, with feverish anxiety. Even his meals were hurried through in the same manner, for those, like recreation, he regarded as an interference with his duties.
When his daily work came to an end, he would proceed to make up for lost time by reading or writing till long after midnight, with the result that such sleep as he got when he went to bed was simply the broken sleep of brain exhaustion.
Little wonder that he always looked strained and anxious, and that when he went into the pulpit on Sundays he failed to get into touch with his hearers. With all his unceasing efforts, he could not but realise that his friend had a vastly greater hold on the people than he was ever able to acquire. Then he would conclude that it must be due to some fault in himself, and would begin to look for it in the wrong place, viz. in his own soul. It must be some black place in his own heart, he thought, which was hindering his work.
Now when a man indulges in too much introspection he is very liable to develop a morbid conscience, and see evil in himself that is purely imaginary. Hypochondriacs of any sort are a nuisance both to themselves and other people, but none more so than the spiritual hypochondriac. The consequence of these heart-searchings was that he would increase his efforts, and try to squeeze more work into the day.
He was sitting at breakfast one day scanning the morning paper, when a head-line attracted his notice, “Death of the Rev. X. Y.” The paragraph described how X. Y., whom the young parson had always taken as his model for energy and unremitting toil, had had to relinquish his duties owing to a nervous breakdown, brought on by overwork and the lack of holidays or recreation of any sort.
The young man’s eyes dilated with horror as he went on reading and realised the unmistakable fact that X. Y. had brought about his own death. The thought that such a fate might one day be his own sent a shudder through him, especially when it dawned upon him that he had been doing his work on precisely the same lines as those which had culminated in this tragedy.
It is not often that a man is so fortunate as to have such an object-lesson as this. More frequently he is allowed to persist in ways which lead, if not to a disaster like the one referred to, at any rate to a breakdown, which puts a stop to his career of usefulness.
No account of motives.
No matter how lofty may be the motives, Nature takes no account of them. She is a jealous mistress, and insists on having her due share of attention, allowing of no excuses. The mother who neglects her own needs through attending to the wants of her children will suffer equally with the silly girl who starves herself in order to keep her figure slim.