Ladies' Home Journal

“ When there are so many Woman's Journals devoted to the wants and aspirations of women alone, it is perhaps time to think of having a Man's journal, which should try to keep his head above-water in the struggle for social supremacy. ”

“ Deprived of the little elegancies which are so necessary for a woman’s comfort—separated from the society of her children, who were almost always away at school—nothing stood in the way of her fealty to her husband, and she was content thus to live. ”

“ How I despise all these time-honored phrases, which, dead letters as they are, act as links to strengthen the chain that binds women in a state of inferiority. Why not say "a woman's work"? But that is a different sort of thing, I should be told: a woman should stay at home and take care of her house and children. ”

“ A Lady Leaves Home
1 'I have nothing,' she thought, 'but myself. No parents that count; no longer a fiancé; no home. I'm not even young any more, actually twenty-four. Ladies in novels are never out of their teens. ”

“ The woman now known throughout Europe and America by her exquisite Journal and Letters—the starting-point of a new class of domestic literature—tells us simply and playfully enough in those writings—which during life she never dreamed of giving to the public—of her humble avocations in her father’s household. ”

“ For a long time she had been intending to follow the instructions given in a ladies' magazine, wherein a young woman was depicted in many unusual attitudes, each of which was stated to be helpful to some part of the human frame and to the system generally. ”

“ The worst of it is that they are clever, they write well, they talk well, and they interest the women who are really normal, who only half-read, only half-analyze, and only get a part of the idea! These normal women are devoting, as they should, most of their energies to the normal things of woman life—children, home, charity, and neighborliness. ”

“ Yet in spite of this perfectly obvious fact, there are people to-day asking, with all appearance of sincerity, what a woman of fifty or more can do! Their confining work in the home, say these observers, is done. ”

“ How many women have I met during my twenty years of contact with the literary, artistic, dramatic, and social circles of life who completely lost their heads over a sudden personal success! I have seen women immediately lose all interest in home and family life ”

“ She must be the nurse of her children alike by day and by night, in sickness and in health; and with the attention which American ladies pay to their husbands, their married life is by no means an idle one. Under these circumstances, the early fading of their bloom is not to be wondered at, and I cannot but admire the manner in which many of them cheerfully conform to years of anxiety and comparative seclusion, after the homage and gaiety which seemed their natural atmosphere in their early youth. ”

“ For women often sew the tragedy or comedy of life into their work as they sit apparrently safe and serene at home, yet are thinking deeply, living whole heart-histories, and praying fervent prayers while they embroider pretty trifles or do the weekly mending. ”

“ To the Editor of The British Lady's Magazine
MR. EDITOR,—In early life I passed eleven years in the exercise of my needle for a livelihood. Will you allow me to address your readers, among whom might perhaps be found some of the kind patronesses of my former humble labours, on a subject widely connected with female life—the state of needlework in this country.
To lighten the heavy burthen which many ladies impose upon themselves is one object which I have in view: but, I [Pg 205] confess, my strongest motive is to excite attention towards the industrious sisterhood to which I once belonged. ”

“ Between these two groups of women there is a third, made up of women who have kept up their reading in spite of family cares, and who also believe in the practical work outside the home which seems to them almost within their grasp. ”

“ The newspapers and periodicals of to-day are crowded with advice to women, and while much of it is found in magazines for women, written and edited by men, it is also true that a goodly quantity of it comes from feminine writers ”

“ Delicacy in woman is sentiment, not appearance, not enamel, not languishing airs. But it is asked, why make this disturbance? Why not let a woman, if it is desired that she should be a student, inquire of her husband? Suppose she hasn't got one. Young gentlemen that are so fond of talking about the matter say, let the women stay at home and take care of their families. Let me ask you if you will agree to give every woman a family that hasn't got one? ”

“ Almost every lady suggested that she might have decorated the staff of her journal an appreciable number of years, if that supposition had not been forbidden by the fact that the feminine element in journalism is of comparatively recent introduction. ”

“ To those young ladies who have the time and the wish to improve their complexion, much information can be given, and, indeed, it is the bounden duty of every woman to use all means within her power to make herself as beautiful as she can. ”

“ Depend on it that this is the grandest position in this world for a woman, and this home-audience is nearer and sweeter to the affectionate heart of a mother whose brain is properly developed, than all the applause and flatteries that the outer world can bestow. It is not in the court-room, the pulpit, and rostrum, but it is among the household congregation that woman's influence can achieve so much, and reign paramount. ”

“ The former may add to the luxuries of life; the latter is essential to the happiness of home—to the joys and endearments of a family, to the affection of relations, to the fidelity of domestics. “Woman’s mission” has become almost a phrase of the day. That there are other duties for women besides household, and for some women especially, we by no means deny. But here are the broad, general, and permanent duties of the sex. ”

“ Why, womanliness was a prime human quality, integrally necessary to the work of the world—a great positive quality, not a little passive one, productive, not sterile, of the spirit, not of the body. Womanliness was the mother and guardian of great social virtues: of a finer and deeper emotion, of more sensitive perceptions, of a subtler intuition of the sources of life, of an all-mothering sympathy, a more embracing tenderness. Womanliness had no more to do with the light bright plumage of the mating-season than a waxed mustache had to do with being a soldier. ”

“ A woman's place is at home. Of course I know that there have been some women physicians who have attained eminence, and some artists, and all that. But I would rather see a daughter of mine take a more retired place. ”

“ Croly, the able editor of The Home Maker, in this book for girls, shows in her practical, common-sense way, what chances there are open to young women, when the necessity comes for self-support. The wise, prudent words of one who has had so much experience in dealing with the problems of life will be welcomed by a large class of readers. ”

“ The Morning Post, after giving the names of the guests present, added that the wide range of feminine activity, shown in the lives and work of those ladies present, proved that into the last four decades women had compressed the work of four centuries. That the interests, work, and present place in the social scheme of women were entirely on a level with that of men, this being the strongest testimony of the enormous advance in civilisation made by all the English-speaking peoples in the past forty years. ”

“ On the other hand, a writer on the position of women confesses to ‘an admiration for the commonplace, unambitious kind of old maid, who is content to do good in her own neighbourhood, and among the few persons whom she really knows—who takes [Pg 26] a lively interest in the welfare of her nephews and nieces, and who regales herself occasionally with tea and gossip.’
One writer tells us that there are things for which women are exclusively fitted. ‘In the first place, women have the power of pleasing. ”

“ Enough to cause every thinking young woman to reflect seriously on its importance, has, however, been introduced. It must not be inferred that we would shut every woman up, a prisoner in her house, and cause her to devote every hour of her time to domestic duties. ”

“ There seems to be absolutely no limit to the range of subjects which women are capable of working up in romance; whether in novels of incident or novels of character, treating historical or social subjects, didactic or imaginative themes, with the plot in any period of time, among any people or set of conditions, women writers appear to be equally at home. ”

“ Whether the course female education has taken of late days—whether the pursuit of giddy frivolities, and empty nothings, has tended to unfit women for that quiet domestic life, in which they show far more beautifully than in the most crowded assembly, is a question we should feel little gratification in discussing: we hope not. ”

“ The Lady’s Magazine has, with that tenderness peculiar to its sex, adopted one of our children as its own, not from any supposed cruelty or neglect on our part we are sure,—nor from any extraordinary liberality on her’s,—but, as we conjecture, from that extravagance which often springs up in those who are themselves destitute of offspring. ”

“ Dress and flattery take up all their thoughts. What time have they to learn to be useful? What time have they to cultivate the still and gentle affections, which must, in every situation of life, have such an important effect on a woman's character and happiness? ”

“ She must pay attention to any good word that is said in her own house, or in that of her friend: how good women live, how they keep house, manage their household, instruct their children and servants, obey their husbands, and ask their advice in everything, and submit to them. ”

“ One would think it could hardly help growing. The hosts of women who are earning their living—they are immersed in the world even as men. But the women who are at home, with little children about them! They’re abstracted from the world, aren’t they? Yes, physically, just as much as ever. But mentally they come closer and closer to the world all the time.
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“Have you read the Home Economics books? The day is coming, you know, when every girl will have the training those books suggest. It will make her a home woman, you say. ”

“ Volumes may be written and spoken, extolling the tidy kitchens, the trim wives, the snowy table-cloths, and telling us how beautiful a woman is when doing her house-work; and a few foolish women will be found to accept it all and work the harder. ”

“ I appeal to my readers to give me an honest answer; when you enter a woman's room what makes you think more highly of her, what makes you address her with more respect—to see her busy with feminine occupations, with her household duties, with her children's clothes about her, or to find her writing verses at her toilet table surrounded with pamphlets of every kind and with notes on tinted paper? If there were none but wise men upon earth such a woman would die an old maid. ”

“ I'm of the glamorous ladies
At whose beckoning history shook.
But you are a man, and see only my pan,
So I stay at home with a book. ”

“ At this eventful period, when the fountains of youth dry up, and the scanty circulation is turned from its accustomed channel, the woman ceases from the periodical discharges, which in health and with care are the secret of her beauty, her attractions, her charms. ”

“ One day she is all smiles and gladness. A stranger seeing her in the house will praise her. ‘In all the world,’ says he, ‘there is not a better or a fairer lady.’ But another day she is insupportable to look at or to approach. ”

“ It would seem as if the task before these two dauntless women were almost endless, for every letter must be read and carefully noted, every newspaper clipping gleaned—and these alone would make volumes—old diaries perused, and the whole digested and woven into the fabric of facts which not only go to make the story of one woman, but the history of the great progressive movement of women during the past fifty years. ”

“ It opens its pages hospitably, and hopes to draw around it, both within and without, many women of many minds. It will be edited for women generally interested in affairs, topics of the home, handiwork, physical and beauty culture, literature, fiction, and humanity. ”

“ I will venture to assert furthermore that these same ladies who live thus find quite as much time for reading, letter-writing, drawing, embroidery, and fancy work as the women of families otherwise 90 arranged. I am quite certain that they would be found on an average to be in the enjoyment of better health, and more of that sense of capability and vitality which gives one confidence in one’s ability to look into life and meet it with cheerful courage, than three quarters of the women who keep servants ”

“ The popular magazine article is theoretical in character, and often proposes remedies for existing evils without sufficient consideration of the causes of the difficulty. Household journals and the home departments of the secular and the religious press usually treat only of the personal relations existing between mistress and maid. ”

“ Some374 women are especially fitted for the important work of mother and homemaker, and such wives will find for themselves a worthy career in the home and its neighborhood activities. Each woman must find a field of action suited to her own temperament, education, experience, talents, and opportunities. ”

“ Looking down deeper than the surface and out beyond my quarter section, I see that our life here is another part of the great feminist movement of the world, a real and very vital part for the young women who are fortunate enough to be classed among the homesteaders. ”