_SOME WOMANLY DUTIES_
_The Housewife_--I am addressing myself to the ladies of the
Kingdom of God, to those who know how to keep their houses, furniture
and beds pure and clean, who can cook food for their husbands, and
children in a way that it will be clean, tasteful and wholesome. The
woman that can do this I call a lady. In this view I differ from the
world generally; for the lady of the world is not supposed to know
anything about what is going on in the kitchen; her highest ambition is
to be sure and be in the fashion, at no matter what cost to her husband
or father; she considers that she may as well be out of the world as
out of the fashion. 11:138.
A good housewife, whether she possesses much or little, will have a
place for everything she has in the house, and make her house orderly
and comfortable, and everything when wanted can be found in its place.
9:157.
If I had nothing but a piece of an old newspaper folded for a holder
I would have it where I could put my hand on it in a moment, in the
dark if I wanted it. And so with the dishcloth, the broom, the chairs,
tables, sofas, and everything about the house, so that if you had to
get up in the night you could lay your hand on whatever you wanted
instantly. Have a place for everything and everything in its place.
14:89.
When I go into a house, I can soon know whether the woman is an
economical housekeeper or not; and if I stay a few days, I can tell
whether a husband can get rich or not. If she is determined on her own
course, and will waste and {330} spoil the food entrusted to her, that
man will always be poor. 4:313.
It is an old saying that a woman can throw out of the window with a
spoon as fast as a man can throw into the door with a shovel; but a
good house-keeper will be saving and economical and teach her children
to be good housekeepers, and how to take care of everything that is put
in their charge. 12:195.
Ladies, if you are the means of plunging this whole people into debt so
as to distress them, will there be anything required of you? I think
there will, for you will be judged according to your works. Are not the
men as extravagant as the women? Yes, certainly they are, and just as
foolish. I could point out instances by the score and by the hundred of
men who are just as unwise, shortsighted, and foolish as the women can
be; but a condemnation of the male portion of the community will not
justify the female portion of it. 14:105.
Now, sisters, if you will consider these things you will readily
see that time is all the capital stock there is on the earth; and
you should consider your time golden, it is actually wealth, and,
if properly used, it brings that which will add to your comfort,
convenience, and satisfaction. Let us consider this, and no longer sit
with hands folded, wasting time, for it is the duty of every man and of
every woman to do all that is possible to promote the Kingdom of God on
the earth. 18:77.
If there are women who want to do good, let them do their own work,
and save their sixpences and dollars for the building of temples,
tabernacles, meeting-houses, school-houses, educating the youth,
preaching the Gospel, and gathering the poor. 11:351. {331}
What I say of housewives will fully apply to farmers and mechanics. I
labored many years as a mechanic, and in the darkest night I could put
my hand upon any tool I used. You may call this boasting, but it is
not. It is merely mentioning the order in which I kept my shop. 8:296.
Count the steps that a woman takes when she is doing her work, let them
be measured, and it will be found that in many instances she had taken
steps enough to have traveled from fifteen to twenty miles a day; I
will warrant this to be the case. 4:101.
_Woman's Fashions_--Beauty must be sought in the expression of
the countenance, combined with neatness and cleanliness and graceful
manners. 18:75.
Anything is ridiculous, more or less, that is not comely. 14:17.
Let the beauty of your adorning be the work of your hands. 19:75.
I love to see the human form and the human face adorned, but let our
adorning be the workmanship of our hands, from the elements with
which we are constantly surrounded. I love beauty whether adorned or
unadorned. I love chaste and refined manners, especially when they are
founded upon virtue. 10:6.
In the works of God, you see an eternal variety, consequently we do not
ask the people to become Quakers, and all the men wear wide-brimmed
hats, and the ladies wear drab or cream-colored silk bonnets projecting
in the front, perhaps six or seven inches, rounded on the corners, with
a cape behind. 14:17.
The daughters of Israel should understand what fashions they should
have, without borrowing from the impure and unrighteous. 12:220. {332}
Create your own fashions, and make your clothing to please yourselves,
independent of outside influences; and make your hats and bonnets to
shade you. I wish you, sisters, to listen to these counsels, and place
yourselves in a condition to administer to the poor. Get your husbands
to provide you with a little of this and a little of that of which you
can make something by adding your own labor. I do not mean that you
shall apply to them for five dollars and ten dollars to spend for that
which is of no profit, but manufacture something that will be useful as
well as beautiful and comely. 12:202.
Not flaunting, flirting and gossiping, as a great many are, and
thinking continually of their dresses, and of this that and the other
that will minister to and gratify their vanity. Such women seldom think
of their prayers. 15:162.
I am ashamed to see the tight clothes--to see the shape of the ladies.
19:75.
Ask your mothers, then, to make your clothes suitable and becoming; and
keep your hair smooth and nice. The hair is given to the female for
adornment; and therefore let the ladies, young and old, adorn their
heads with their hair. Mothers should study and children should study
to preserve the skin of the children from being ruined by dirt, and the
heat of a scorching sun, and to keep themselves clean and pure. 19:65.
If I were a lady and had a piece of cloth to make me a dress, I would
cut it so as to cover my person handsomely and neatly; and whether it
was cut according to the fashion or not, custom would soon make it
beautiful. 15:38.
It adds no beauty to a lady, in my opinion, to adorn her with fine
feathers. When I look at a woman, I look at her face, which is composed
of her forehead, cheeks, nose, {333} mouth and chin, and I like to
see it clean, her hair combed neat and nice, and her eyes bright and
sparkling; and if they are so, what do I care what she has on her head,
or how or of what material her dress is made? Not the least in the
world. 18:74.
The Lord instructs us in a revelation, to let our clothing be plain:
"Let all thy garments be plain, and their beauty the beauty of the work
of thine own hands." He never said to us, "Do not make a silk or satin
ribbon, or fine broadcloth," but he has said to us, "Make the articles
of clothing that you wear;" if we do not, we shall find by and by that
we shall not be able to get them. 10:311.
Let the sisters take care of themselves, and make themselves beautiful,
and if any of you are so superstitious and ignorant as to say that this
is pride, I can say that you are not informed as to the pride which
is sinful before the Lord, you are also ignorant as to the excellency
of the heavens, and of the beauty which dwells in the society of the
Gods. Were you to see an angel, you would see a beautiful and lovely
creature. Make yourselves like angels in goodness and beauty. Let the
mothers in Israel make their sons and daughters healthy and beautiful,
by cleanliness and a proper diet. Whether you have much or little
clothing for your children, it can be kept clean and healthy, and
be made to fit their persons neatly. Make your children lovely and
fair that you may delight in them. Cease to send out your children to
herd sheep with their skins exposed to the hot sun, until their hands
and faces appear as though they lived in an ash heap. I call upon my
sisters to lead out in these things. 12:201.
It is a disgrace to a community to drag their cloth in the dirt. How
many women are there here today who {334} walked to this Tabernacle
without throwing dirt every step they took, not only on themselves but
upon those who walked near them? I shun them; when I see them coming.
I try to make my way in some other direction in order to avoid their
dust. I can get enough of it without receiving it from them. If there
is a nuisance in the path, they are sure to wipe up a portion of it
with their dress, and then trail it on to their carpet or into the
bedrooms and distribute it through the house.
On the other hand I will say, ladies, if we ask you to make your
dresses a little shorter, do not be extravagant and cut them so short
that we can see the tops of your stockings. Bring them down to the top
of your shoes, and have them so that you can walk and clear the dust,
and do not expose your persons. Have your dresses neat and comely, and
conduct yourselves, in the strictest sense of the word, in chastity.
12:299.
If my mother and her grandmother got one silk dress, and they lived
to a hundred years old, it was all that they wanted. I think my
grandmother's silk dress came down to her children. She put her silk
dress on when I went to see her. It was, I think, her wedding dress,
and she had been married some seventy years. 19:74.
That which is convenient should be beautiful. 15:38.
As for fashion, it does not trouble me, my fashion is convenience and
comfort. 14:21.
_Some Duties of the Relief Societies_--These societies are for the
improvement of our manners, our dress, our habits, and our methods of
living. 19:68.
The sisters in our Female Relief Societies have done great good. Can
you tell the amount of good that the mothers and daughters in Israel
are capable of doing? No, {335} it is impossible. And the good they do
will follow them to all eternity. 13:34.
As I have often told my sisters in the Female Relief Societies, we have
sisters here who, if they had the privilege of studying, would make
just as good mathematicians or accountants as any man; and we think
they ought to have the privilege to study these branches of knowledge
that they may develop the powers with which they are endowed. We
believe that women are useful, not only to sweep houses, wash dishes,
make beds, and raise babies, but that they should stand behind the
counter, study law or physic, or become good bookkeepers and be able to
do the business in any counting house, and all this to enlarge their
sphere of usefulness for the benefit of society at large.
In following these things they but answer the design of their creation.
13:61.
Now, ladies, go to and organize yourselves into industrial societies,
and get your husbands to produce you some straw, and commence bonnet
and hat making. If every Ward would commence and continue this and
other industrial pursuits, it would not be long before the females of
the Wards of our Territory would have stores in their Wards, and means
sufficient to send and get the articles which they need, that cannot
yet be manufactured here and which they may want to distribute. 12:195.
When the sisters, for instance, meet together at a quilting or for a
visit, if every one speaks, believes and loves the truth, and there is
nothing in them that is deceptive, how easy it is to converse and pass
the time! We all delight in the truth; and if a wrong, or that which
is false, is manifested it must be corrected or banished, and truth be
adopted in the place thereof. It is the easiest life to lead {336} on
the face of the earth. How do I know it? By experience; I never tried
the opposite much. 14:76.
I will here say to the Latter-day Saints, if you will feed the poor
with a willing heart and ready hand, neither you, nor your children,
will ever be found begging bread. In these things the people are right;
they are right in establishing Female Relief Societies, that the hearts
of the widow and the orphan may be made glad by the blessings which are
so abundantly and so freely poured out upon them. 12:171.
Sisters, do you see any children around your neighborhood poorly clad
and without shoes? If you do, I say to you, Female Relief Societies,
pick up these children and relieve their necessities, and send them to
school. And if you see any young, middle-aged or old ladies in need
find them something to do that will enable them to sustain themselves;
but don't relieve the idle, for relieving those who are able but
unwilling to work is ruinous to any community. The time we spend here
is our life, our substance, our capital, our fortune, and that time
should be used profitably. Take these old ladies, there are a great
many of them around rather poor, and give them something to do; that is
their delight. You will hardly find an old lady in the community who
has not been brought up to work; and they would rather knit stockings
or do some other useful labor than eat the bread of charity. Relieve
the wants of every individual in need in your neighborhoods. This is in
the capacity and in the power of the Female Relief Societies when it is
not in the power of the Bishops. 14:107.
I wish to call the attention of our sisters to our Relief Societies.
We are happy to say that many of them have done a great deal. We wish
them to continue and progress. {337} In our Relief Societies we wish
to introduce many improvements. We wish our sisters of experience to
teach the young girls not to be so anxious for the gratification of
their imaginary wants, but to confine themselves more to their real
necessities. Fancy has no bounds, and I often think it is without
form and comeliness. We are too apt to give way to the imagination
of our hearts, but if we will be guided by wisdom, our judgment will
be corrected, and we will find that we can improve very much. We can
improve the language we use. 12:298.
The ladies can learn to keep books as well as the men; we have some
few, already, who are just as good accountants as any of our brethren.
Why not teach more of them to keep books and sell goods, and let them
do this business, and let the men go to raising sheep, wheat, or
cattle, or go and do something or other to beautify the earth and help
to make it like the Garden of Eden, instead of spending their time in a
lazy, loafing manner? 12:374-5.
I have a short sermon for my sisters. I wish you, under the direction
of your Bishops and wise men, to establish your Relief Societies, and
organize yourselves under the direction of the brethren, and establish
yourselves for doing business, gathering up your little amounts of
means that would otherwise go to waste, and put them to usury, and
make more of them, and thus keep gathering in. Let this be commenced
forthwith. 12:201. {338}