the other eight hours.



IV

THE CAUSE OF THE TROUBLES

In order to come to grips at once with the question of time-
expenditure in all its actuality, I must choose an individual case
for examination. I can only deal with one case, and that case
cannot be the average case, because there is no such case as the
average case, just as there is no such man as the average man.
Every man and every man's case is special.

But if I take the case of a Londoner who works in an office, whose
office hours are from ten to six, and who spends fifty minutes
morning and night in travelling between his house door and his
office door, I shall have got as near to the average as facts
permit. There are men who have to work longer for a living, but
there are others who do not have to work so long.

Fortunately the financial side of existence does not interest us
here; for our present purpose the clerk at a pound a week is exactly
as well off as the millionaire in Carlton House-terrace.

Now the great and profound mistake which my typical man makes in
regard to his day is a mistake of general attitude, a mistake which
vitiates and weakens two-thirds of his energies and interests. In
the majority of instances he does not precisely feel a passion for