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YUDHVIRSINGHROHA
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As usual it is necessary to begin at the beginning. Work, as the dictionary says, is the exertion of energy, physical or mental. In common speech, however, we distinguish between the exertion of energy for the sake of pleasure or recreation, and the same exertio when it is made for the sake of or as a means to the earning or procuring of the means of living. The former we commonly call play; the word work we commonly reserve for occupations by means of which we get the
necessaries of life. SSC FORUM It is clear, therefore, that work is a good thing, for that
which enables us to live must be good. We must assume that to live is good and that therefore to work is we may also freely agree with the Apostle when he says : "if good. And any man will not work, neither let him eat', for to eat what the labour of others has produced is, unless freely given, a form of robbery. It follows that nothing which truly sub serves our life can be bad, and therefore there can be no form of necessary work which is in itself degrading. In these latter days we have to be more than usually clear in our minds about this. The idea is prevalent that physical labour is a bad thing, a thing to be avoided, a thing from which we may rightly seek release. We cannot discuss the question of work, the question of the factory system, of the machine, until we have right notions as to the nature of physical labour itself. For there can be nothing made, either for man's service or for his pleasure, which is not, at bottom, dependent upon some amount of physical labour for its existence. In sports and pastimes physical exertion is delighted in, but in the things we do to earn our living we regard the elimination of physical exertion as desirable and a mark of good civilization. We must therefore return again and again to this simple doctrine, that physical labour, manual work, is not in itself bad. It is the necessary basis of all human production and, in the most strict sense of the words, physical labour directed to the production of things needed for human life is both honourable and holy.
On a recent de y in early autumn I stood leaning against a tall larch tree, on the edge of a broad plantation, in a wood land corner of the North of Devon. I had been an indoor prisoner for a long, long time, and this was my first country walk- What a blessing to breathe again the sweet, honey- scented air! How very fresh-looking those meadows below, how green the trees! For, autumn notwithstanding, the herbage had just reached that stage when it crowds.all its many-tinted greens and the whole of its remaining vitality info one last sunny day, then very quickly follow death and decay. Even now, a few leaves on that sturdy oak, solitary in the field yonder, have turned to golden russet; the larches,
too, overhead are growing ragged and thin. sSC FORUM In the solemnity and silence of the fire-wood I find an
analogy with the atmosphere of mysterious repose in some stately cathedral, in the midst of, yet apart from, the vortex of busy life without, Into the dim recesses of the fire-wood few sounds of natural life make their way except, perhaps, the call of a crow passing over the tree-tops, or the scream of a startled jay, and these are but momentary. Presently I leave the still woods to pass through the gap in the hedge, and so enter the busy whirl of wild life in the fields. It is a long way down to the little ivy-covered bridge that spans the
river, so I do not hurry. Here is the litile bridge at last. It is built for the cattle
to cross upon from one meadow to the other when the stream is flooded with winter rains. During the summer they scorn the bridge and splash across the water. Always a beautiful spot, it is never more beautiful than in the early autumn; moreover, for me has pleasant associations. Up beyond the bridge is a waterfall, over which the water gallops from the shimmering silvery weir-poot above into the boulder scattered shallows beneath. Solitude adds to the charm. Indeed, a companion's voice could scarcely be heard amidst the little thunder of these dancing falls.