IN directing organized industry to its highest efficiency, scientific management makes the elimination of time-waste one of its chief points of reform. No disposal of this problem can be thoroughly scientific, however, which does not take account of the fundamental nature of its raw material, the passing hour.
Mrs. Eddy writes, "This time-world flutters in my thought as an unreal shadow" (The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 268). The prevailing belief that time is a thief, is evidenced by popular proverb and experience. That its depredations are not more often checked, is due to their seductive nature. The illusions of space-perception (matter) seem to be such an integral part of our mental outlook, that they crowd upon us as apparently unescapable. Time-perception, on the contrary, is so fluid that it continually runs away from us; on occasion it even seems to run away with us. We are admittedly unable to check its advance or to retard its retreat; time eludes us, deceives us, mocks us, yet with it we are again and again persuaded to assume friendly terms. We assent to the tradition that "time cures all ills," "redeems all mistakes."
Formerly we pleaded excuse for all present errors of temperament or habit, and the mere flight of the hours seemed to put responsibility for our faults far behind and apart from us. Time in our hands may be profligate or niggard. We worry at its scarceness, we abuse its abundance. An indolent time-present we condone by burying in the future most of our hopes, much of our endeavor, and all of our heaven; and the mere coming of the hours we imagine will bring all these to us, deserved or undeserved. Thus it often happens that past and future despoil us and the present escapes us.
