Where is the habit of order better acquired, than amid the routine of a well arranged household? In what school can a girl so well learn lessons of energy and firmness, as in that where she relieves a mother more and more, as her ability increases, of the charge of her family? Neatness is of primary importance. The care of a brother’s linen, or even so humble a teacher as the duster, may inculcate this virtue. Let her, who prizes cheerfulness aright, know that never does she sing lullaby to an infant sister, or act as a peace-maker between two contentious brothers, without making music in her own heart.
At the period of my writing no quality is more loudly commended than frugality. It should always be encouraged, for its Christian influences. She, who is prodigal of her father’s possessions, is seldom mindful of the calls of charity, or marked by propriety of dress, and the subordination of the appetites. I have elsewhere spoken of habits of industry as a preparation for reverses of fortune; but were a young lady perfectly assured of pecuniary independence through life, for the sake of her own character, she should be diligent and frugal. Let her expend freely for her mental culture, and devote large sums rather to the relief of the needy, than to selfish indulgences. She who belongs to the mass in this country, removed alike from the extremes of wealth and poverty, can never with impunity allow herself in habits of extravagance. This thought should be kept daily in mind, as she pursues the round of domestic duty. The wardrobe and the table constantly suggest it.
The duties of the fireside are friendly to Contentment. Why are females so often restless and disquieted at their own abode? Why does ennui prey on their spirits, save when some visit or visitor is in prospect? How should it be, that daughters, blest as those of America now are, should pant for the excitements of a round of public pleasures? Providence designed our institutions for the promotion of woman’s content and peace, no less than for that of man. Her hearth-stone was intended to be dear to her soul. She, who takes right views of herself and her duties, will ever find it so.
Here is an individual, who is disturbed by ambition. Her own little family circle is too narrow a sphere for her. But she mistakes the springs of content. Let her know that the wreath she wears should rest on her heart. The reply of the illustrious Lady Jane Grey, to those who informed her that her father had left her the crown of England, is worthy of her sex. “I am not so young, nor so little read in the smiles of fortune, to suffer myself to be taken by them. My liberty is better than the chain you proffer me, with what precious stones soever it may be adorned, or of what gold soever framed;—if you love me sincerely and in good earnest, you will rather wish me a secure and quiet fortune, though mean, than an exalted condition, exposed to the wind and followed by some dismal fall.” Her melancholy fate, which occurred within ten days from the utterance of this language, gave a new and sad proof of her rare sagaciousness.
She who is faithful in the domestic walk, enjoys singular opportunities for the exercise of Gratitude. Not only may she, by her assiduous attentions, partially requite a mother’s services, but she can thus express her grateful sense of the superior elevation now allotted her sex. At the table and the fireside she may cause man to bear witness to, and rejoice in, the use she is making of her increased privileges. Here may she describe, in Christian colors, the much sought “line of beauty.”
Our country has done for her what Greece and Rome proudly denied her sex. It has conferred on her the blessings of education, equality of companionship with man, new means of benevolence, and the pledge of new spheres of action, so far as nature qualifies her, and the paramount claims of undeniable duty shall permit. What returns shall she make? Her country asks but one. Fresh zeal in self-tuition and in training those subject to her charge, for domestic fidelity, for true citizenship, and for immortal virtue and blessedness.
Another moral aspect of home, to be regarded by woman, is that it affords room for the practice of habitual Disinterestedness. A selfish man is an object of painful contemplation. How much more is this defect to be deplored in woman. She, whose nature, so ardent and susceptible, prompts to an almost instinctive kindness, cannot fail in this quality, without shedding a blight on her entire character.
But designate a female insulated by circumstances from the usual family connections, uninterested in domestic duties, and how often do you see one destitute of sympathy and an expansive benevolence. Elizabeth of England had no love of home; and what do we hear of her? That she had a lion-like port; but woman-like, Christian-like, humane, she certainly was not. She passed through life, it is said, without a single friend.
She who performs the domestic duties aright, will find time for, as she must have calls and incentives to, Charitable services. The Sunday school is a sphere in which her fireside virtues prepare her to instruct. Teaching in general accords beautifully with the inspirations of home. Every female should be an intellectual and moral guardian to some portion of the young around her. In bestowing of her substance, and especially of her personal attentions, on the sick and the poor, she will find all she has done of good at home an invaluable prompter and aid. For the sake, therefore, of others, as a social and responsible being, let the flame she would support on the public altar be kindled from the vestal fire of the domestic one.
Again, what purity would it infuse into her Friendships, did the young maiden love first and serve best her own kindred. Let her deep affections be developed by fireside fidelity, and how may she expend, of these heart-gathered riches, on the friends she is making of her own sex. What a pledge has she given too of constancy in every new relation she may form.