THE DIGNITY OF LABOUR (OR) DIGNITY OF WORK
Essay: Work is essential for man. It is a blessing. It is one of the precious privileges he has. It is the source of all other rights. It brings him the good things of life and promotes his well-being. Work is an integral part of life. Without it life is deprived of its substance and character.
Work gives us happiness. It banishes vice and poverty from life. Work, according to Carlyle, is the grand cure of all the maladies that beset mankind. It is the key to all progress. Work is life, idleness is death.
The prosperity of any nation depends on the work of the people there. If they remain like lotus-eaters, no nation can progress or achieve anything remarkable. The prosperity achieved by nations like Japan bears out this. No pains, no gains.
All kinds of work deserve our respect. But there are a number of people who consider some kinds of work ignorable and inferior. The work of farmers is much more important than that of teachers. The reason is that if the farmers do not work, we shall not get any food-stuff If street-cleaners do not work, life in cities and towns will become difficult. "It does not disgrace a gentleman" says Ruskin, "to become an errand boy or a day labourer, but it disgraces him most to become a knave and a thief."
For Carlyle, work is worship. According to him, there is perennial nobleness and even sacredness in work. To work is to pray. The worker is the saviour of society, the redeemer of the race, God is the tiller of the hard ground and the path-maker. "He is with them in sun and in shower and his garment is covered with dust." The best form of worship is to work and serve others.
Several eminent men have recognized the dignity of all work. Spinoza, famous philosopher on the continent, earned his livelihood by grinding and polishing the lenses for spectacles, telescopes and microscopes. Francis Thomson, famous English poet, kept body and soul together by selling matches and polishing shoes. He preferred doing some work to begging. Tolstoy saw the greatest satisfaction of existence in merging with the peasantry. He ploughed the soil and made boots. Quaid-i-Azam the greatest Pakistani of the twentieth century, did even the work of a lawyer. We, small fry, are averse to doing any work that is below our dignity.
Most of them prefer white collar jobs to manual labour. Parents should inculcate in the minds of their children the dignity of labour. Manual work gives an opportunity to all who wish to take part in the government and the well-being of the state. We should look up to the worker who earns his livelihood by the sweat of his brow. Our liberator Quaid-i-Azam was the great advocate of work. His motto was:
"Work, work and work."