Domestic

“ It is, indeed, not improbable, for there is in every clime the tradition of a time when household helpers were abundant, competent, and cheap,—a golden age when harmony reigned in the household and domestic discord was unknown. ”

“ More than this, have we not homes where domestic endearments charm us, where domestic duties require our attention, where the relations of wife, of husband, of children have the ties of mutual affection and mutual confidence to attach us to our firesides? ”

“ The Economic Function of the Home.—Up to this point the domestic function of the family has been under consideration. Marriage and parenthood must hold first place, because they are fundamental to the family and to the welfare of the race. But the family has an economic as well as a domestic function. ”

“ DOMESTIC RELATIONS, a term used to express the legal relations subsisting between the various units that comprise the family or domestic group. Those units which go to build up the domestic structure of modern society are parent, child, husband, wife, master and servant. ”

“ It is that unitive power which {46} arises out of the manifold relations and associations of domestic life. The specific influence of husband and wife, of parent and child, of brother and sister, of teacher and pupil, united and harmoniously blended, constitute the home influence. ”

“ Domestic work, therefore, is all work for the family which, under our present arrangements, must be done at home, upon a small scale, by individual workers, free from the organization and competition of business. ”

“ By following this advice about your manners, dress and language, and by faithfully endeavouring to perform all your duties to God and your fellow creatures, you will find, that every day, you will gain in the esteem and good will of all around you, and that few will be found with that silly pride which will make them shun your society because you are a domestic. On the contrary, your employers and their children, will love and respect you, and be pleased to procure for you all the comforts and advantages they can secure, consistently with the convenience and prosperity of the family. ”

“ From what I had an opportunity of observing of the domestic concerns of the lowest class, the house seemed to be under the direction of one man and woman, and the children in the like state of subordination as in civilized countries. ”

“ I will venture to say that there are at least, to speak very moderately, a hundred houses where these humble lines will be read and discussed, where there are no servants except the ladies of the household. I will venture to say, also, that these households, many of them, are not inferior in the air of cultivation and refined elegance to many which are conducted by the ministration of domestics. ”

“ In considering deductively the connections between the forms of domestic life and the forms of social life, and in showing how these are in each type of society related to one another because jointly related to the same type of individual character, it will be convenient to deal simultaneously with the marital arrangement, the family structure, the status of women, and the status of children. ”

“ These positions and relationships not only enrich him with certain privileges and invest him with certain rights, but they also make certain demands on him and imply certain duties. Thus, in a man's domestic relationships, as a son or brother or husband or father, he finds that certain duties pertain to him. ”

“ The domestic economy of a family is entirely a woman's province, and furnishes a variety of subjects for the exertion both of good sense and good taste. If you ever come to have the charge of a family, it ought to engage much of your time and attention ”

“ Social Characteristics Illustrated by the Family.—A study of the family such as has been made illustrates the characteristics of social life that were noted in the introductory chapter. There is activity in the performance of every domestic, economic, and social function. ”

“ Families look forward to the buying of landed homesteads, and the scattered brothers and sisters work awhile in domestic service to gain, the common fund for the purpose; your seamstress intends to become a dressmaker, and take in work at her own house; your cook is pondering a marriage with the baker, which shall transfer her toils from your cooking-stove to her own. ”

“ I now wish to point out some of the reasons why it is very important, both to employers and to domestics, that this employment should be raised, in general estimation, to that honour and respectability which really belongs to it.
To understand the subject properly, you must bear in mind these things. This nation is now more prosperous than any other in the world, and almost any man of intelligence, [79] industry, and honesty, can, after a few years, gain so much wealth that he can afford to hire a domestic to help his wife. ”

“ The study of domestic economy engages her attention from the moment she undertakes the varied duties in the inner department of a household, the proper management of which, is, to her, a congenial occupation, becoming her sex, her position, her habitude, her taste. ”

“ Every year, as the prosperity of this Nation increases, good domestics will decrease, and young mothers are hereafter to be called to superintend and perform all branches of domestic business, to nurse children, direct ignorant domestics, attend the sick, entertain company, and fulfil all other family duties ”

“ Let a family among us be reduced, from any cause, to a condition in which they cannot maintain themselves, and what follows? The children find employment, some of them in families, in various kinds of domestic service. Indented apprenticeships in this commonwealth are within the memory of all who are forty or fifty years of age. ”

“ Here we find most marked the personal affection, the intimate companionship, the community of interests, the common responsibility and care for the children, which are the characteristics of the family. The related life of the group so formed constitutes domestic life. ”

“ The treatment and conduct of domestics depend on causes which lie far deeper than the principles and tempers of particular servants and masters, as may be seen by a glance at domestic service in England, Scotland, and Ireland. ”

“ Let servants feel, in their treatment by their employers and in the atmosphere of the family, that their position is held to be a respectable one; let them feel, in the mistress of the family, the charm of unvarying consideration and good manners; let their work- rooms be made convenient and comfortable, and their private apartments bear some reasonable comparison in point of agreeableness to those of other members of the family, and domestic service will be more frequently sought by a superior and self-respecting class. ”

“ A history of the occupations of a domestic man during one day, will lay ,open in great measure the habits of the more respectable families.—At six he rises, and if it be one of their numerous feast days, accompanies his wife to mass, at which rich and poor, masters and servants indiscriminately kneel without distinction of rank or place. ”

“ If people would consider their domestics as sisters of the great human family, differing from them only in having, for the time being, a different use to perform in society—if they would have a tender regard to their health, a reasonable regard to their convenience, a friendly interest in their characters and plans—in a word, if they would perpetually acknowledge a reciprocity of duties—we should soon cease to hear complaints of the indifference and carelessness of domestics. ”

“ Any study of the subject of domestic service must lead to the conclusion that household service and household employments do not occupy an isolated position; that while they may be indifferent to the political, industrial, and social changes constantly occurring, they cannot by virtue of this indifference remain unaffected by them; that the inventions of the past hundred years have revolutionized household employments, and that the present generation must adapt itself to these new conditions ”

“ In some portions of our country, the great influx of foreigners of another language and another faith, and the ready entrance they find as domestics into American families, impose peculiar trials and peculiar duties on American housekeepers. ”

“ Observing closely the lives of the immense majority, I think we shall see, that, in conducting their household affairs, the object they have in view is one and the same. I think we shall see that they all strive, some by their own labors wholly, the rest by covering over and piecing out the shortcomings of "help," to present a smooth, agreeable surface to husbands and company. ”

“ When the fact is everywhere recognized that both men and women have a vital concern in the affairs of the house, the relation between the different parts of the household will become an organic one, and its highest development reached. ”

“ But the beauty of a household consists in the conjunction of man and wife who are united to each other by destiny, are consociated to the gods who preside over nuptials, births, and houses; and who accord, indeed, with each other, and have all things in common as far as to their bodies, or rather their souls themselves;—who exercise a becoming authority over their house and servants, are properly solicitous about the education of their children and pay an attention to the necessaries of life, which is neither expensive nor negligent, but moderate and appropriate. ”

“ Inside, in the servants' part of the house, the half-clad domestics were talking in low whispers to each other. Old Mrs. Leaf was crying and wringing her hands. ”

“ So, too, in those families of public men or women or in those of the directors of industry or commerce who crush out [Pg vii] the true family life by bringing home their unrelaxing business manners and trying to regulate the family as they regulate the details of a great business house—the reading world has imbibed a sympathy for the rights of the home. ”

“ Each family has its pack-horse—perhaps a few families have two—carrying household goods. These are not so bulky as ours to-day, for pioneer life is simple, and the people have at most only what they need. ”

“ After the scenes which I have recently passed through I realise, as never before, the sweets of quiet, liberty, and independence. My household consists of the most faithful, honest people, attached to me, without dissension, bribery, or malice. ”

“ Then growing to man’s estate, and some small practice of the law, I took a wife, by whom I have had many children; the keeping of us all being a great impoverishing to my estate, and the daily living of us all nothing but my daily industry. ”

“ And in the event of the failure of such a family business as I have described, the head of the household, however firmly convinced he might be that the true and only sphere of woman is the home, would probably do his level best to obtain for his daughter a situation and means of livelihood outside her proper sphere. ”

“ We have reviewed the daily labors indispensable to all classes of homes, giving whatever suggestions or criticisms seemed to us most needed or desirable, not only as regards the manual labor of a household, but also the actions, motives, and principles which build up and secure the happiness of a family ”

“ The parts of household management correspond to the persons who compose the household, and a complete household consists of slaves and freemen. Now we should begin by examining everything in its fewest possible elements; and the first and fewest possible parts of a family are master and slave, husband and wife, father and children. ”

“ I have already told you how easy it is for a gentleman to gain an introduction to any family: the slightest occasion will produce what is called an offer of the house, when you are literally told that the house is yours. ”

“ I am not directing myself to citizens or townsmen, as masters of families, but as heads of trade, and masters in their business; the other part would indeed require a whole book by itself, and would insensibly run me into a long satirical discourse upon the loss of all family government among us; in which, indeed, the practice of house-keepers and heads of families is grown not remiss only in all serious things, but even scandalous in their own morals, and in the personal examples they show to their servants, and all about them. ”

“ Of the art of acquisition then there is one kind which is natural and is a part of the management of a household.24 Either we must suppose the necessaries of life to exist previously, or the art of household management must provide a store of them for the common use of the family or state. They are the elements of true wealth ”

“ And there is another element of a household, the so-called art of getting wealth, which, according to some, is identical with household management, according to others, a principal part of it; the nature of this art will also have to be considered by us. ”

“ Plainly, too, the strength and beauty of the traditionally received form of the household—that is to say, the habits of life and of complacency which are bound up with this household—are elements of importance in the modern situation as affects the degree of persistence and the direction of change which this institution shows under modern circumstances. ”

“ This gentleman, by inheriting some property and by profitable investments, was able to live quite independent and very comfortably. The family, on account of its wealth, was on the verge of society, sometimes inside, but oftener on the outside. ”

“ Today we see the narrowing effects of custom. The Sons in a family are taught and urged to develop their business tact, to learn a trade, to become independent, to mingle freely in the world of business. The daughters in a family are kept under the authority of the parents ‘til they pass under the authority of a husband. They are taught to make the most of their books and look out for a good catch, that is, a husband able to support them. ”