The Values That Come With Labor

There have been times and places in which the struggle for mere physical sustenance was foremost, and everyone had to work simply to survive, and there have been times and places when many could live off the efforts of others. He who is not purposefully employed may not starve, but to labor is the law of life, and the fact that physical survival may be had without effort, will not insure any person against moral, spiritual, and mental deterioration. In a machine age it is possible for a small part of the population to produce food, clothing, and shelter for all. But it is not possible for any man in our age or in any other to give to others the moral, spiritual, and intellectual values that come with labor, service, and creative resourcefulness. No man transmits knowledge into experience except by doing. No man grows in spiritual or moral stature except by serving, creating, achieving. A generation that lives by the effort of others grows soft and strays from the principles and ideals that have built the heritage we have. We have never been more pressingly aware that the spirit and the body are the soul of man, and that both must be nourished. We cannot now, and never could, live by bread alone. To be at our best, we must work. There is no other way.