A Domestic Problem : Work and Culture in the Household

by Abby Morton Diaz

Herbert Spencer asks, in view of this omission, "What is to be expected when one of the most intricate of problems is undertaken by those who have given scarcely a thought as to the principles on which its solution depends? Is the unfolding of a human being so simple a process that any one may superintend and regulate it with no preparation whatever?… Is it not madness to make no provision for such a task?"

Horace Mann speaks out plainly, and straight to the point. "If she is to prepare a refection of cakes, she fails not to examine some cookery-book or some manuscript receipt, lest she should convert her rich ingredients into unpalatable compounds; but without ever having read one book upon the subject of education, without ever having sought one conversation with an intelligent person upon it, she undertakes so to mingle the earthly and celestial elements of instruction for that child's soul that he shall be fitted to discharge all duties below, and to enjoy all blessings above." And again, "Influences imperceptible in childhood, work out more and more broadly into beauty or deformity in after life. No unskilful hand should ever play upon a harp where the tones are left forever in the strings."

In a newspaper I find this amusingly significant sentence: "Truthfully, indeed, do the Papists boast that the Episcopal Church is training-ground for Rome. The female mind is frequently enticed by display of vestments and music; and, if the Ritualists can pervert the mothers, they know that the next generation is theirs." This is significant, because it signifies that, however weak and easy of enticement the "female mind" may be, it has a mighty power to influence the young.

But we can show not only opinions and prophecies, but the results of actual scientific experiments. A recent number of "The Popular Science Monthly" contains an account of experiments made in Jamaica upon the mental capacity for learning of the different races there existing. The experimenter found, he says, "unequal speed," but saw "nothing which can be unmistakably referred to difference of race. The rate of improvement is due almost entirely to the relative elevation of the home circle in which the children live. Those who are restricted to the narrowest gauge of intellectual exercise live in such a material and coarse medium that their mental faculties remain slumbering; while those who hear at home of many things, and are brought up to intellectual employments, show a corresponding proficiency in learning."

This, and the editor's comments, bear directly on our side, that is to say, the culture side. The editor says it is inevitable "that the medium in which the child is habitually immersed, and by which it is continually and unconsciously impressed, should have much greater value in the formation of mental character than the mere lesson experiences of school. Home education is, after all, the great fact; and it is domestic influences by which the characters of children are formed. Where men are exhausted by business, and women are exhausted by society (or other means), we may be pretty sure that but little can be done to shape and conduct the home with a reference to the higher mental needs of the children who live in it."

Now, who, more than any one, "shapes and conducts the home"? Who creates these "domestic influences," this "medium in which the child is habitually immersed"? Woman. In the name of common sense, then, throw open to woman every avenue of knowledge. Surround her with all that will elevate and refine. Give her the highest, broadest, truest culture. Give her chances to draw inspiration from the beautiful in nature and in art. And, above all, insure her some respite from labor, and some tranquillity. Unless these conditions are observed, "but little can be done to shape and conduct the home with reference to the higher mental needs of the children who live in it."

I once heard "Grace Greenwood" tell a little story which ought to come in here, for our own object is to make out as strong a case as we possibly can. We want to prove that mothers must have culture because they are mothers. We want to show it to be absolutely necessary for woman, in the accomplishment of her acknowledged mission. When this fact is recognized, then culture will take rank with essentials, and receive attention as such.

"Grace Greenwood" said that a friend of hers, a teacher "out West," had in her school four or five children from one family. The parents were poor, ignorant, and of the kind commonly called low, coarse sort of people. The children, with one exception, were stupid, rough-mannered, and depraved. The one exception, a little girl, showed such refinement, appreciation, and quickness of apprehension, that the teacher at last asked the mother if she could account for the striking difference between this child and its brothers and sisters. The mother could not. The children had been brought up together there in that lonely place, had been treated alike, and had never been separated. She knew the little girl was very different from her brothers and sisters, but knew not the reason why. The teacher then asked, "Was there any thing in your mode of life for the months preceding her birth, that there was not in the corresponding time before the births of the others?" The mother at first answered decidedly that there was nothing; but after thinking a few moments said, "Well, there was one, a very small thing, but that couldn't have had any thing to do with the matter. One day a peddler came along; and among his books was a pretty, red-covered poetry book, and I wanted it bad. But my husband said he couldn't afford it, and the peddler went off. I couldn't get that book out of my mind; and in the night I took some of my own money, and travelled on foot to the next town, found the peddler, bought the book, and got back before morning, and was never missed from the house. That book was the greatest comfort to me that ever was. I read it over and over, up to the day my child was born."

Also would come in well here that oft-told story of a pauper named "Margaret," who was once "set adrift in a village of the county … and left to grow up as best she could, and from whom have descended two hundred criminals. The whole number of this girl's descendants, through six generations, is nine hundred; and besides the 'two hundred' a large number have been idiots, imbeciles, drunkards, lunatics, and paupers."

Friends, to say nothing of higher motives, would it not be good policy to educate wisely every girl in the country? Are not mothers, as child-trainers, in absolute need of true culture? In cases where families depend on the labor of their girls, perhaps the State would make a saving even by compensating these families for the loss of such labor. Perhaps it would be cheaper, even in a pecuniary sense, for the State to do this, than to support reformatory establishments, prisons, almshouses, and insane-asylums, with their necessary retinues of officials. Institutions in which these girls were educated might be made self-supporting, and the course of instruction might include different kinds of handicraft.