Perhaps this comes after the nerves have been shattered by some bereavement that has left desolation in every room of the house, and set the crib in the garret, because the occupant has been hushed into a slumber which needs no mother's lullaby. Oh, she could provide for the whole group a great deal better than she can for a part of the group now the rest are gone! Though you may tell her God is taking care of those who are gone, it is mother-like to brood both flocks; and one wing she puts over the flock in the house, the other wing she puts over the flock in the grave.
There is nothing but the old-fashioned religion of Jesus Christ that will take a woman through the trials of home life. At first there may be a romance or a novelty that will do for a substitute. The marriage hour has just passed, and the perplexities of the household are more than atoned by the joy of being together, and by the fact that when it is late they do not have to discuss the question as to whether it is time to go! The mishaps of the household, instead of being a matter of anxiety and apprehension, are a matter of merriment—the loaf of bread turned into a geological specimen; the slushy custards; the jaundiced or measly biscuits. It is a very bright sunlight that falls on the cutlery and the mantel ornaments of a new home.
THE PROSE OF MATRIMONY.
But after a while the romance is all gone, and then there is something to be prepared for the table that the book called "Cookery Taught in Twelve Lessons" will not teach. The receipt for making it is not a handful of this, a cup of that and a spoonful of something else. It is not something sweetened with ordinary condiments, or flavored with ordinary flavors, or baked in ordinary ovens. It is the loaf of domestic happiness; and all the ingredients come down from heaven, and the fruits are plucked from the tree of life, and it is sweetened with the new wine of the kingdom, and it is baked in the oven of home trial. Solomon wrote out of his own experience. He had a wretched home. A man cannot be happy with two wives, much less six hundred; and he says, writing out of his own experience: "Better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith."
GLORIOUS SELF-SACRIFICE.
How great are the responsibilities of housekeepers! Sometimes an indigestible article of food, by its effect upon a commander or king, has defeated an army or over-thrown an empire. Housekeepers by the food they provide, by the couches they spread, by the books they introduce, by the influences they bring around the home, are deciding the physical, intellectual, moral, eternal destiny of the race.
You say your life is one of sacrifice. I know it. But, my sisters, that is the only life worth living. That was Florence Nightingale's life; that was Payson's life; that was Christ's life. We admire it in others, but how very hard it is for us to cultivate ourselves. When in this city young Dr. Hutchison, having spent a whole night in a diphtheritic room for the relief of a patient, became saturated with the poison and died, we all felt as if we would like to put garlands on his grave; everybody appreciates that. When in the burning hotel at St. Louis a young man on the fifth story broke open the door of the room where his mother was sleeping, and plunged in amid smoke and fire, crying: "Mother! where are you?" and never came out, our hearts applauded that young man. But how few of us have the Christ-like spirit—a willingness to suffer for others!
A BARBAROUS PEDAGOGUE.
A rough teacher in a school called upon a poor, half-starved lad, who had offended against the laws of the school, and said: "Take off your coat directly, sir." The boy refused to take it off, whereupon the teacher said again: "Take off your coat, sir," as he swung the whip through the air. The boy refused. It was not because he was afraid of the lash—he was used to that at home—but it was from shame; he had no undergarment, and as at the third command he pulled slowly off his coat there went a sob through the school. They saw then why he did not want to remove his coat, and they saw the shoulder-blades had almost cut through the skin, and a stout, healthy boy rose up and went to the teacher of the school and said: "Oh, sir, please don't hurt this poor fellow; whip me; see, he's nothing but a poor chap; don't you hurt him, he's poor; whip me." "Well," said the teacher, "it's going to be a severe whipping; I am willing to take you as a substitute." "Well," said the boy, "I don't care; you whip me, if you will let this poor fellow go." The stout, healthy boy took the scourging without an outcry.[4] "Bravo," says every man—"Bravo!" How many of us are willing to take the scourging, and the suffering, and the toil, and the anxiety for other people! Beautiful thing to admire, but how little we have of that spirit! God give us that self-denying spirit, so that whether we are in humble spheres or in conspicuous spheres we may perform our whole duty—for this struggle will soon be over.