But he defends the position:

"My business demands much reflection--constant watchfulness."

Well, in the first place, an enterprise which demands watchfulness day
and night from the same individual is badly organized, and should be
reorganized. It runs contrary to the common sense of Nature. And, in
the second place, his defence is insincere. He does not submit to the
eternal preoccupation because he thinks he ought, but simply because
he cannot help it. How often, especially just before the dawn, has he
not longed to be delivered from the perfectly futile preoccupation, so
that he might go to sleep again--and failed to get free! How often, in
the midst of some jolly gathering, has he not felt secretly desolate
because the one tyrannic topic would run round and round in his mind,
just like a clockwork mouse, accomplishing no useful end, and making
impossible any genuine participation in the gaiety that environs him!

Instead of being necessary to the success of his business, this morbid
preoccupation is positively detrimental to his business. He would
think much more usefully, more powerfully, more creatively, about his
business if during at least thirteen consecutive hours each day he
never thought of it at all.

And there is still a further point in this connection. Let him imagine
how delightful it must be for the people in the home which he has
made, the loving people whom he loves and to whom in theory he is
devoting his career, to feel continually that he only sees them
obscurely through the haze emanating from his business!
Why--worse!--even when he is sitting with his wife, he and she might
as well be communicating with each other across a grille against which