מוסר אויף משלי 18:9

Any work is measured by the value of what it can acquire. Cheap and silly things can be acquired with almost no work. Things more expensive than that are acquired with more work. So one can only acquire Torah and be in His holy shade with hard work; but not with work that is too hard or too much for man's capabilities. For God, may He be blessed, did not give us work that is beyond our strength and our abilities. Yet we must redouble our efforts and exert ourselves in it - not to just work in it when it comes to us; but rather to be a worker in one's essence, and not be lax. And King Solomon said (Proverbs 18:9), "Even one who is lax in his work is a brother to him who destroys." The lazy one does not want to work at all, so he is one who destroys. While the lax one does work when something that must be done comes to his attention, he, himself, is not a true worker. He falls asleep on the job and takes his time for no reason. He wants to do a superficial job and does not exert himself or invest himself in it. But the industrious person is himself a true worker. He seeks to work because it is impossible for him to walk around idly. And when he has no control over it and a few hours - and all the more so, a whole day - go by without work, he is disgusted with himself and sees himself as contaminated. Work is his life and his pleasure. He is not satisfied with easy work, nor will superficiality soothe his work-hungry spirit. He works with alacrity and happily invests of himself. He is like a stream of water that builds up when impeded and gains strength when stopped, in order to break through and surge. [The true worker] too becomes more resolved with each impediment; and each delay only furthers his anticipation to surge and work more.

Shlomo further said: "also he who is slack in his work is a brother to the destroyer" (Mishlei 18:9). For even though this person is not a destroyer who commits evil directly with his own hands, don't think he is far removed from being one. On the contrary, he is the destroyer's brother and his comrade.

The fifth quality is laziness. This is an evil quality which nullifies the worship of God. For the lazy man does not complete any of his tasks, and therefore the worship of a lazy person is not complete, for he is too lazy to fulfill all of the conditions of the service to God. And know that laziness comes from folly, and from weakness of the will, and from little knowledge, because the man does not know what benefit will come to him from the worship of God, may He be extolled. Laziness may afflict him because of his lack of envy for the alert ones who occupy themselves with the worship of God. Therefore, every intelligent person should guard himself against this quality and seek ways of removing it from his being. And let him envy his companions who exert themselves day and night in the service of God, may He be extolled. For no one who is not alert in his worship will attain benefit from it. Anyone who is slack in his work will destroy it, as it is said (Proverbs 18:9), “Even one that is slack in his work is brother to him that is destroyer.”