“Why, she has all the help she wants, and needs to do nothing.”
“True; but there is no help to be had for the very things that have worn her out. No one can take a mother’s place. She has children too fast for her strength. She is a conscientious mother, desiring to give every child proper training. To do this requires that domestic arrangements be systematic and complete. Successful housekeeping, under modern improvements, requires the combined heads of an army general and a secretary of state.”
“Well, doctor, what is your prescription?”
“Take her away from it all.”
“Where had she better go?”
“To her mother, a hygienic institute, or what is better, can’t you get away from business awhile, and go with her yourself? It would do her a world of good. Have a second honeymoon; let her see, hear and do what pleases her best, and, mark my word, you will be well paid.”
“I declare! I never thought of matters in that light before. I believe that you are right. I can get away next week, and I will. Mother can come in and take care of the children while we are gone just as well as not.”
To parents I would say with Fowler: “By all the value of splendid children over poor or none, should all other interests be subservient to maternity, not it to them. Brush aside, like cobwebs, pecuniary, ambitional, and all other ends, and make it imperious lord over all. Your family may better live on bread and water, and you have splendid children, than do all this work, and have ill-natured, sickly ones. What are stylish rooms and furniture, many and high-seasoned dishes, in comparison with a sweet and healthful child?... Your child-rearing mission is your one duty. Do this in the very best manner possible, but make all else secondary. See that the prospective mothers want nothing. They deserve, and, as society advances, will yet receive universal sympathy, along with the utmost care and affection.”
On account of the foregoing remarks, do not suppose that an idle, dependent life is counseled. By no means. A woman in pregnancy, as at other times, should be actively employed, and if it can be in some absorbing, congenial, lucrative work, so much the better. It is the incessant nothings of woman’s work which, while accomplishing so little, yet wear out the nerves, and exhaust the patience.
“Labor is life! ’Tis the still water faileth!