5 Men Who Paid for Their Laziness

Posted on Dec 15, 2010 in Top-10's | 6 comments

You wouldn’t think laziness or sloth would be a character trait that would achieve fame of any kind. In fact, there are men throughout history that achieved fame or infamy and then following their rise to the top, they succumbed to laziness that brought them far back down. There are others who used their laziness as a pretense for their success and yet others who saw laziness as a means to a beneficial end.
Here are the top five men who have been known for their laziness or succumbed to laziness or even benefited if not in a small way for being lazy when time called for it.

King David (c.1040–970 BC)

King David ruled over Israel for forty years, but his reign was not without issues caused by David succumbing to laziness and committing the sin of adultery. King David stopped leading his own army and sent commanders like Joab out in his place. While his army was away in battle David conceived a child with Bathsheba while she was the wife of Uriah the Hittite. He tried to cover his crime of passion by calling for Uriah to return from the battle so that he may sleep with his wife and the identity of the child’s true father would remain a secret. Uriah, a dedicated soldier refused. King David sent him back to the battlefield. With him went instructions for Joab the commander of the Israelite army.
“Put Uriah in the front line where the fighting is fiercest. Then withdraw from him so he will be struck down and die.”

Stephen Ambrose (January 10, 1936 – October 13, 2002)

Ambrose was a noted historian and professor at several prominent universities including the Naval War College, Johns Hopkins University, University of California at Berkeley and Rutgers University. He was also President of the National World War II Museum and founder of The Eisenhower Center. Among his famous writings are the biographies of Presidents Eisenhower and Nixon.

Laziness and accusations of plagiarism found Ambrose later in life when he was accused by The Weekly Standard of stealing passages from a book by Thomas Childers, Wings of Morning: The Story of the Last American Bomber Shot Down over Germany in World War II. It was asserted that he used graduate assistants to pen his work and often used the work without altering it at all. Further research during a Forbes investigation found that there was a basis for accusations of plagiarism in at least six of Stephen Ambrose’s books including his doctoral thesis.

Judson Kilpatrick (January 14, 1836 – December 4, 1881)

Kilpatrick was a decorated and at times, respected leader for the Union Army during the Civil war and later. After failing to earn a seat in the US Congress, he was appointed Minister to Chile. Throughout his military career he was hampered by assertions of impetuousness. Early in his career he was known as energetic and a risk taker who often took the lives of his soldiers for granted.

Later in his military career, he did not lead his troops, but traveled in a carriage at the rear. He became lazy and corrupt. His camps were known as filthy, poorly guarded and rife with prostitution among other crimes. He was also jailed for a drunken tirade. His ultimate shame at the hands of laziness came at the Battle of Monroe when he left the rear of his camp poorly guarded. Upon waking one morning, he found his camp being overrun in a Confederate attack and was forced to escape into the woodland in just his nightgown and bare feet.

General Helmuth von Moltke (October 26, 1800 – April 24, 1891)

Von Moltke was an influential leader of the Prussian Army in the 18th century. Regarding by many as a great military strategist, it was not laziness in a physical sense that he succumbed to, but his theories on how laziness influenced his choice of leaders.

Von Moltke broke down his men into four categories, two of which were mentally bright/ physically energetic and mentally bright / physically lazy. Common sense determines that the mentally bright and physically energetic member of his army would be the men he would choose for advancement, but General von Moltke saw things differently. He felt these men were a detriment to his cause. He believed they would be overbearing and micro-managers. It was this reason these men were never promoted under his command.

It was the bright but lazy men who the General looked to for his future leaders. He felt they had the minds to see the needs of their troops and the battles that lay before them, but their laziness allowed them to find the easiest and simplest ways to achieve those goals. These were the men who achieved the highest ranks under General Helmuth von Moltke.

Adolf Hitler (April 20, 1889 – April 30, 1945)

Notorious, bloodthirsty and a deranged genocidal leader, Hitler orchestrated his rise to power as a soldier, but not a hard working soldier. Hitler was a true sloth. He believed in working only a few hours a day. What Hitler did to rise to power was to promote himself through charisma and delegation. He did not do his work for himself, but instead found others to do his bidding for him. Although it was too late for the millions who died, it was this laziness that led to his demise. Beginning with the failed July 20 plot to assassinate the maniacal leader in 1944, and his subsequent suicide under duress with his enemies closing in on him in 1945, Hitler’s laziness brought him to the top of Germany and all the way back to the bottom.

---

From Joe Gibbs: Do you have a passion and determination about your life? Are you focused on playing the full sixty minutes in the game of life? As a coach and race team owner, I’ve always emphasized a fast start to the season to instill confidence. Then I wanted the middle part of the season to set us up for a strong stretch run. I want to be consumed with storing up treasures in Heaven as I strive to finish well. Check out Tony Evan‘s Chapter on Purpose in Game Plan For Life for more direction on getting the most out of life.