(3138)
See [Self-restraint].
SWEARING A WASTE OF TIME
Swearing is a great waste of time. Stop the leak in the kettle. This kettle is an hour with sixty drops of time in it. If there is a leak in the kettle the little drops of time will be lost. Sixty drops and the hour-kettle is empty. Swearing is a bad habit and will surely wear a hole in the kettle. It is difficult to swear without getting angry. Sometimes the kettle is emptied before the hole is made. How? Anger starts the kettle boiling and time runs over and is lost. Swearing is a great waste of time! In sixty minutes of temper an hour has run over.—J. M. Farrar.
(3139)
Wednesday, April 27, was Grant’s birthday. Some one told the following interesting story about him: “While sitting with him at the camp-fire late one night, after every one else had gone to bed, I said to him: ‘General, it seems singular that you have gone through all the trouble of army service and frontier life and have never been provoked into swearing. I have never heard you utter an oath or use an imprecation.’
“‘Well, somehow or other, I never learned to swear,’ he replied. ‘When a boy I seemed to have an aversion to it, and when I became a man I saw the folly of it. I have always noticed, too, that swearing helps to arouse a man’s anger; and when a man flies into a passion, his adversary, who keeps cool, always gets the better of him. In fact, I never could see the use of swearing. I think it is the case with many people who swear excessively that it is a mere habit, and that they do not mean to be profane; but, to say the least, it is a great waste of time.’”—J. M. Farrar.
(3140)
SWIFTNESS OF BIRDS