"Some of it is; but Spartan pride refused all toil, even for necessaries. The laborers of the present day do the work of the helots in Sparta. To work was beneath the dignity of a Spartan."
"And we have no helots in England now," said Hester.
"Would you wish to have?" asked Mr. Godfrey.
"No! Why should one part of mankind be sacrificed to the happiness of the other? I would have no men slaves, no women slaves. Let all be free and equal. If there is work to be done, let all do a portion, and let all have a portion of rest, or rather of leisure, for the improvement of the mental faculties."
"No man will work, unless compelled, at hard, daily labor. Those who have property are not compelled. How will you compel them? For instance, my neighbor, the blacksmith, has a wife and six children to support. He works from twelve to fourteen hours daily. His wife keeps no servant; she scrubs, washes, cooks, and attends to all herself. Now, you [{476}] and I, being people of leisure, should do half their work for them. Suppose you go and help the wife, and I go and help the blacksmith half of every day; they might then study perfectibility the other half."
Hester laughed. "We might do worse than that," she said; "but that would only be helping two individuals, whereas I wish to place society on a right principle. I no longer wonder at the French revolution. Had I to toil hard and to live hard, seeing all the while some few privileged beings do nothing at all but revel in luxury, I should be a revolutionist too; only I should not know how to set the matter right. One thing is clear from all history, luxury is an injury to the individual who uses it, and all states have been weakened when luxury has become common; therefore, father, I will make myself hardy, that I may not be corrupted in my own proper person."
And true to her resolution, Hester, regardless of public opinion, became simple in her habits. A hard bed, plain diet, an uncarpeted room, with singular plainness of dress, distinguished this young aspirant after perfectibility. Her mother would willingly have seen her dress in a manner becoming her station; but Hester "did not choose to make herself a peg on which to hang dressmakers' fancies. Clothes were for two purposes," she said, "for warmth and decency; when these two objects were attained it was enough." Her mother's remonstrances availed nothing, and her father laughed: the eccentricities of the spoiled child amused him, and daily he became more accustomed to gratify every wish that she expressed.
Hester was in earnest. She founded schools, she formed societies in which adult laborers might receive instruction in the evenings; she established libraries and promoted the scientific associations afterward more fully developed under the name of "Mechanics' Institutes." Hester visited the lowly that she might form an estimate of their real position, observe their improveable points, and cultivate these latter to good purpose; but the intricacies thickened upon her. She heard complaints that the poor were improvident and wasteful.
"How can that be," said she, "when a man pays rent, and provides fuel, clothing, and food for himself, his wife, and four children, out of wages at twelve shillings a week? How much does our mere board cost? twenty times that sum at least, and mamma is called economical. Oh! it must be a miserable life they lead on such a poor pittance as that! Papa, a man must have food; he gets it from the ground: he must have shelter; a few trees chopped down will give him that: he must have clothes; these also he can grow: why not place man on land where they can get these, rather than let them half starve at home?"
"It is being done in or colonies; but an emigrant's life, my Hester, would scarcely assist your perfectible theories. Every moment is employed in drudgery of some kind. A large proportion of the emigrants die of hardship."