Are there parties in our Home?
Could we but be _not_ so tenacious of our own interests, but look at the
thing in a larger way!
Is there a great deal of canvassing and misinterpreting Sisters and
Matron and other authorities? every little saying and doing of theirs?
talking among one another about the superiors (and then finding we were
all wrong when we came to know them better)?
We must all of us know, without being told, that we cannot be trained at
all, if in training this will of our own is not kept under.
Do not question so much. Does not a spirit of criticism go with
ignorance? Are some of you in all the “opposition of irresponsibility”?
Some day, when you are yourselves responsible, you will know what I
mean.
Now could not the Ladies help the Nurse-Probationers in this: (1) in
never themselves criticising; and (2) in saying a kindly word to check
it when it is done?
Let me tell you a true story about this.
In a large college, questions--about things which the students could but
imperfectly understand in the conduct of the college--had become too
warm. The superintendent went into the hall one morning, and after
complimenting the young men on their studies, he said: “This morning I
heard two of the porters, while at their work, take up a Greek book
lying on my table; one tried to read it, and the other declared it ought
to be held upside down to be read. Neither could agree which _was_
upside down, but both thought themselves quite capable of arguing about
Greek, though neither could read it. They were just coming to
fisticuffs, when I sent the two on different errands.”
Not a word was added: the students laughed and retired, but they
understood the moral well enough, and from that day there were few
questions or disputes about the plans and superiors of the college, or
about their own obedience to rules and discipline.
Do let us think of the two porters squabbling whether the Greek book was
to be read upside down, when we feel inclined to be questioning about
“things too high for us.”
We are constantly making mistakes in our judgment of our little world.
We fancy that we have been harshly treated or misunderstood. Or we
cannot bear our fellow-Probationers to laugh at us.
Believe me, there will come a time when all such troubles will simply
seem ridiculous to us, and we shall be unable to imagine how we could
ever have been the victims of them. (One of your number told me this
herself. She has left St. Thomas’ for another post.) Let us not brood or
sentimentalise over them. They should be met in a common-sense way. How
much of our time has been spent in grieving over these trifles, how
little in the real sorrow for sin, the real struggle for improvement.
4. As for obedience to rules and our superiors: “True obedience,” said
one of the most efficient people who ever lived, “obeys not only the
command, but also the intention” of those who have a right to command
us. Of course, this is a truism: the thing is, _how to do it_. As it is
a struggle, it requires a brave and intrepid spirit, which helps us to
rise above trifles and look to God, and His leadings for us. Oh, when
death comes, how sorry we shall be to have watched others so much and
ourselves so little; to have dug so much in the field of others’
consciences and left our own fallow! What should we say of a “Leopold”
Nurse who should try to nurse in “Edward” Ward, and neglect her own
“Leopold”? Well, that is what we do. Or who should wash her patients’
hands and not her own?
It is of ourselves and not of others that we must give an account. Let
us look to our own consciences as we do to our own hands, to see if they
are dirty.
We take care of our dress, but do we take care of our words?
It is a very good rule to say and do nothing but what we can offer to
God. Now we cannot offer Him backbiting, petty scandal,
misrepresentation, flirtation, injustice, bad temper, bad thoughts,
jealousy, murmuring, complaining. Do we ever think that we bear the
responsibility of all the harm we do in this way?
Look at that busybody who fidgets, gossips, makes a bustle, always
wanting to domineer, always thinking of herself, as if she wanted to
tell the sun to get out of her way and let her light the world in its
place, as the proverb says.
And when we might do all our actions and say all our words as unto God!
So many imperfections; so many thoughts of self-love; so many selfish
satisfactions that we mix with our best actions! And when we might offer
them all to God. What a pity!
5. One word more for the Ladies, or those who will have to train and
look after others.
What must she be who is to be a Ward or “Home” Sister?
We see her in her nobleness and simplicity: being, not seeming: without
name or reward in this world: “clothed” in her “righteousness” merely,
as the Psalms would say, _not_ in her dignity: often having no gifts of
money, speech, or strength: but never preferring seeming to being.
And if she rises still higher, she will find herself, in some measure,
like the Great Example in Isaiah 1iii., bearing the sins and sorrows of
others as if they were her own: her counsels often “despised and
rejected,” yet “opening not her mouth” to be angry: “led as a lamb to
the slaughter.”
She who rules best is she who loves best: and shows her love not by
foolish indulgence to those of whom she is in charge, but by taking a
real interest in them for their own sakes, and in their highest
interests.
Her firmness must never degenerate into nervous irritability. And for
this end let me advise you when you become Sisters, always to take your
exercise time out of doors, your monthly day out, and your annual
holiday.
Be a judge of the work of others of whom you are in charge, not a
detective: your mere detective “is wonderful at suspicion and
discovery,” but is often at fault, foolishly imagining that every one is
bad.
The Head-Nurse must have been tested in the refiner’s fire, as the
prophets would say: have been tried by many tests: and have come out of
them stainless, in full command of herself and her principles: never
losing her temper.
She never nurses well till she ceases to command for the sake of
commanding, or for her own sake at all: till she nurses only for the
sakes of those who are nursed. This is the highest exercise of
self-denial; but without it the ruin of the nursing, of the charge, is
sure to come.
Have we ever known such a Nurse?
She must be just, not unjust.
Now justice is the perfect order by which every woman does her own
business, and injustice is where every woman is doing another’s
business. This is the most obvious of all things: and for that very
reason has never been found out. Injustice is the habit of being a
busybody and doing another woman’s business, which tries to rule and
ought to serve: this is the unjust Nurse.
Prudence is doing your nursing most perfectly: aiming at the perfect in
everything: this is the “seeking God and His righteousness” of the
Scriptures.
And must not each of us be a Saviour, rather than a ruler: each in our
poor measure? Did the Son of God try to rule? Oh, my friends, do not
scold at women: they will be of another mind if they are “gently
entreated” and learn to know you. Who can hate a woman who loves them?
Or be jealous of one who has no jealousy? Who can squabble with one who
never squabbles? It is example which converts your patients, your
ward-maids, your fellow-Nurses or charges: it is example which converts
the world.
And is not the Head-Nurse or Sister there, not that she may do as she
likes, but that she should serve all for the common good of all? The one
worst maxim of all for a future Matron, Sister, or Nurse is “to do as I
like”: that _is_ disorder, not rule. It is giving power to evil.
Those who rule must not be those who are desirous to rule.
She who is best fitted is often the least inclined to rule: but if the
necessity is laid upon her, she takes it up as a message from God. And
she must no longer live in her own thoughts, making a heaven or hell of
her own. For if she does not make a heaven for others, her charge will
soon become something else.
She must never become excited: and therefore I do impress upon you
regularity and punctuality, and never to get hurried. Those often get
most excited who are least in earnest. She who is fierce with her
Nurses, her patients, or her ward-maid, is not truly above them: she is
below them: and, although a harsh ward-mistress to her patients or
Nurses, has no real superiority over them.
There is no impudence like that of ignorance. Each night let us come to
a knowledge of ourselves before going to rest: as the Psalm says:
“Commune with your own heart upon your bed, _and be still_.” Is it
possible that we who live among the sick and dying can be satisfied not
to make _friends_ with _God_ each night?
The future Sister should be neither mistress nor servant, but the
_friend_ of every woman under her. If she is mistress of others when she
is not mistress of herself, her jealous, faithless temper grows worse
with command (oh, let not this be the case with any of us!)--wanting
everything of everybody, yet not knowing how to get it of anybody.
Always in fear, confusion, suspicion, and distraction, she becomes more
and more faithless, envious, unrighteous, the cause of wretchedness to
herself and others. She who has no control over herself, who cannot
master her own temper, how can she be placed over others, to control
them through the better principle? But she who is the most royal
mistress of herself is the only woman fit to be in charge.
For this is the whole intention of training, education, supervision,
superintendence: to give self-control, to train or nurse up in us a
higher principle; and when this is attained, you may go your ways safely
into the world.
But she who nurses, and does not nurse up in herself the “infant
Christ,” who should be born again in us every day, is like an empty
syringe--it pumps in only wind.
The future Sister must be not of the governessing but of the Saviour
turn of mind.
Let her reason with the unjust woman who is not intentionally in error.
She must know how to give good counsel, which will advise what is best
under the circumstances; not making a lament, but finding a cure;
regarding _that_ only as “bettering” their situation which _makes them
better_. She must know and teach “how to refuse the evil and choose the
good,” as Isaiah says.
She must have an iron sense of truth and right for herself and others,
and a golden sense of love and charity for them.
When a future Sister unites the power of command with the power of
thought and love, when she can raise herself and others above the
commonplaces of a common self without disregarding any of our common
feelings, when she can plan and effect any reforms wanted step by step,
without trying to precipitate them into a single year or month, neither
hasting nor delaying: that is indeed a “Sister.”
The future Sister or Head must not see only a little corner of things,
her own petty likes and dislikes; she must “lift up her eyes to the
hills,” as David says. She must know that there is a greater and more
real world than her own littlenesses and meannesses. And she must be not
only the friend of her Nurses, but also, in her measure, the angel whose
mission is to reconcile her Nurses to themselves, to each other, and to
God.