That have no word, they tell me, to express it.”[[33]]
159. Cheerfulness, contentment, occupation, and healthy activity of mind cannot be too strongly recommended. A cheerful, happy temper is one of the most valuable attributes a wife can have. The possession of such a virtue not only makes herself, but every one around her, happy. It gilds with sunshine the humblest dwelling, and often converts an indifferent husband into a good one. Contentment is the finest medicine in the world; it not only frequently prevents disease, but, if disease be present, it assists in curing it. Happy is the man who has a contented wife! A peevish, discontented helpmate (helpmate, save the mark!) is always ailing, is never satisfied, and does not know, and does not deserve to know, what real happiness is. She is “a thorn in the flesh.”
160. One of the greatest requisites, then, for a happy home is a cheerful, contented, bright, and merry wife; her face is a perpetual sunshine, her presence is that of an angel; she is happy in herself, and she imparts happiness to all around her. A gentle, loving, confiding, placid, hopeful, and trusting disposition has a great charm for a husband, and ought, by a young wife, to be assiduously cultivated—
“For gentleness, and love, and trust
Prevail o’er angry wave and gust.”[[34]]
161. Every young wife, let her station be ever so exalted, ought to attend to her household duties. Her health, and consequently her happiness, demand the exertion. The want of occupation—healthy, useful occupation—is a fruitful source of discontent, of sin,[[35]] of disease, and barrenness. If a young married lady did but know the importance of occupation—how much misery might be averted, and how much happiness might, by attending to her household duties, be insured—she would appreciate the importance of the advice. Occupation improves the health, drives away ennui, cheers the hearth and home, and, what is most important, if household duties be well looked after, her house becomes a paradise, and she the ministering angel to her husband. But she might say—I cannot always be occupied; it bores me; it is like a common person: I am a lady; I was not made to work; I have neither the strength nor the inclination for it; I feel weak and tired, nervous and spiritless, and must have rest. I reply, in the expressive words of the poet, that—
“Absence of occupation is not rest,—
A mind quite vacant is a mind distress’d.”[[36]]
“If time be heavy on your hands,” are there no household duties to look after, no servants to instruct, no flower-beds to arrange, no school children to teach, no sick-room to visit, no aged people to comfort, no widow nor orphan to relieve?—
“Nor any poor about your lands?