_My Dear Daughter:_--There is no disputing the fact that in making plans
for life very different motives and aims influence young girls from
those which influence young men. Every right-minded and
affectionate-natured young girl looks forward to, and hopes most of all
to have, a home of her own, which it shall be her life-work to keep and
guide. To prepare herself rightly to fulfill all the duties that belong
to the mistress of a home, should be the one all-embracing aim of any
young girl's life; but with this should be other aims, which may help to
prepare her for vicissitudes, emergencies, or disasters, and also give
her worthy occupation and interest in life should she never be called
to the duties of a wife and mother.
To speak first of preparation to become the mistress of a home, should
Providence have such a future in store. What qualities are needed to
insure that a woman shall be a happy home-keeper? Certainly, a good
temper, a cheerful disposition, a willingness to give time and thought
to the details of home-keeping, commonly called domestic cares, habits
of order and neatness, and good health, so that one may both give and
receive pleasure while discharging the duties of the home.
This thought of a possible future home, the abode of love and happiness,
should be the greatest safeguard to every young girl in her acquaintance
and association with young men. A high ideal of the exclusiveness of
that affection which must be the foundation of every true and happy
home, should constrain every young girl to exercise the greatest
possible caution in regard to the advances of acquaintances of the
opposite sex. Not that there should be a prudish self-consciousness of
manner, or a disposition to suspect matrimonial intentions in every
young gentleman who is friendly and polite to her, but that all young
men should be firmly prevented from coming into any intimacy of
acquaintance or relationship that might cause unhappy and mortifying
reflection in after-time. Treat all young men kindly and respectfully,
if they are polite and respectful to you. Scorn to encourage any to make
advances which you know you will one day repel. But in discouraging such
advances, be kind and respectful. Never do or say anything wilfully to
wound and give pain to the feelings. Remember that the sharpest grief of
life, as well as its greatest happiness, is connected with the
love-making period in the life of all good young people, and never
treat with frivolity or rudeness any earnest feeling on the part of
anyone. The young girl who can rudely repulse the sincere advance of any
honorable young man has some defect in her moral and affectional nature
And as for any advance by a gentleman, young or old, that is not
respectful or sincere, a young girl is much to blame if it ever happens
more than once. Chaffing and teasing about beaux and courtship and
marriage are very unbecoming, and blur that delicacy of feeling which is
the greatest charm in the relation between young people of opposite
sexes.
Cherishing as the happiest ideal of life the possible future home of
your own, you should still remember that it may never be yours, and
should make such other provision for living your life as shall help you
to the next best thing. The first and highest good, next after a home of
your own, is to be able to render to the world some service for which
it will pay you, thus making you independent and enabling you to shape
your life as you wish. You and all young girls of the present generation
are happy in having avenues of useful remunerative occupation open to
you on every hand, and society smiles and approves if you work at
something to win independence and make money. It is scarcely necessary
to remind you that in order to do effective paying work you must choose
some specialty and acquire skill in its exercise before you can hope to
earn any considerable wages or salary. While perfecting yourself in the
specialty you will have abundant opportunity to observe that it takes
patience, perseverance, and determination, to do any kind of work well.
One great reason why so many fail of making any success in life is that
they have not the power of sticking steadily to their work. They get
tired, and want to stop; whereas the true worker works though he is
tired--works till it doesn't tire him to work; works on, unheeding the
numerous temptations to turn aside to this or that diversion. There are
now so many fields of honorable and profitable employment open to young
girls that it is only necessary for you to choose what you will do. But
make a choice to do something useful and worthy of your powers. You will
be happier, and you will be a better and nobler woman, for so doing. You
will be spared the discontent and restlessness of spirit which
characterize the girl with nothing in particular to do, and who often
becomes on this account a nuisance to all earnest people around her.
In order to fulfill aright the duties of any relation of life, the first
requirement the greatest necessity, next to a firm resolution and will,
is good health. Without good health there is no substantial foundation
for anything earthly. Good health is the fountain of human enjoyment and
the greatest of earthly riches. It is the great beautifier; it is the
great preservative of good looks. How strange, then, that so many girls
are so careless, so provokingly careless, of this priceless blessing!
How strange that they will wear clothing that they know tends to break
down their health; tight corsets that compress the lungs and spoil the
natural shape of the body; tight shoes that interfere with the
circulation of blood, and make their noses and hands red, and give them
predisposition to colds and coughs and nervous headaches, all of which
put to severe tests the patience and affection of those around them.
Good health is always attractive; ill-health, invalidism, nervousness,
are very apt to be repellant. Better good health than beauty, if one
were obliged to choose--which one is not, for good health is one of the
chief elements of beauty.
So, if you aim first to be good and kind and intelligent and industrious
and skillful, so that you may be fitted to guide and adorn a home should
you be blessed with one, or to be fitted to shape your life to
usefulness and independence if you never have a home of your own, and if
in connection with these aims you seek to obtain and preserve good
health, you will, so far as this life is concerned, "be thoroughly
furnished unto all good works." You will become a noble woman, whose
adorning will be not alone of the outward appearance, but of the inner
life and of the soul--an adorning which, according to St. Paul, "is in
the sight of God of great price."