back--to be independent--to resent being ordered--remember how much more
beautiful, how much more noble, is a humble submissive temper, than the
miserably small ambition of being your own master. Do not be so
small-minded as to contest and resent authority. You sometimes hear a
servant say, "That's not my place," or "I won't be put upon." You never
hear a true lady speak in that temper,--and yet, is there any difference
in spirit between this tone which you would condemn, and your own way of
answering back? You cannot get out of bad habits all at once, but get
your ideal right, and you will grow to it. If you are not living in your
own family, and feel inclined to resent orders, remember the days of
chivalry, when all pages (often princes by birth) spent their youth
serving in other people's houses, and learning the motto of every true
knight, "I serve."

And whether with strangers or at home, remember Him Who was subject unto
His parents, Him of Whom Jephthah's daughter was but a faint type.




A Home Art; or, Mothers and Daughters.

Know your own work, and do it.


This is a simple sounding rule, but we all find practical difficulties in
following it. You have most of you lately left school, and I think the
difficulty of the first part of this saying must have struck some of you.
At school you knew your own work,--you had a certain time-table, you
walked with the crutches of routine; and when you left school and found