children, that you cultivate a habit of respectful address, and of cheerful obedience to those who hire your services.
LETTER X.
On Visiting, Company, and Religious Meetings. On going out, and having company. Religious meetings. A story to illustrate.
There are some particulars where domestics feel that their employers have no right to control them, and on these points I hope you will allow me, as a friend, to offer a little advice.
You perhaps may feel that it is your own concern what company you visit, and who visit you, and that, after your work is done, you have a right to go where you please without asking leave of your employers.
But here I wish you would try yourselves by “the golden rule.” Suppose you to look forward to a time when you are the mistress of a family, and hire persons to help you do the work, would you not in such a case feel thus: I have hired these persons and pay them for their time, and they have agreed to do my
family work at the time and in the way I wish. Now they cannot know, without asking, when I can spare them and when I shall need their help. There are always times when, if the regular work of the day is done up, some extra work, or some sickness, or other causes, may make it needful for them to stay at home. Therefore, I think it right to expect that those I hire will not either go out, or invite company to come and see them, without first inquiring of me whether it will be convenient. Do you not think you should feel and think thus? Now, therefore, whatsoever ye would that others should do unto you, do ye the same unto them. In obedience, therefore, to this law of Christ, I would advise you never to go out anywhere, and never to invite persons to visit you, without first inquiring of the mistress of the family whether it will be convenient to her.
In regard to selecting your companions, remember the Word of God, “He that walketh with the wise shall be wise, but the companion of fools shall be destroyed.” There is nothing that so much influences our character and happiness, as the companions we associate with,