Minister's daughter

“ The minister, like most of his brethren, soon took to himself a wife, the daughter of a neighbouring 'gentleman tacksman,' and the grand-daughter of a minister, well born and well bred; and never did man find a help more meet for him. ”

“ As her loving and confiding daughter, the family should live under her government and discipline, listen to her maternal voice, and be led by her maternal hand. The minister in his pastoral functions, is the representative of the church in each of the families of his flock ”

“ Little does the indulgent hostess dream that she is ministering to the inflammation of passions which may imperil the virtue of her daughter, or even her own. Salacity once aroused, even in a minister, allows no room for reason or for conscience. If women wish to preserve the virtue of their ministers, let them feed them more in accordance with the laws of health. Ministers are not immaculate. ”

“ The gladness of living was in your step, your voice was melody, and he was wondering what love might be.
You were the daughter of a summer night, born where all the birds are free, and the moon christened you with her soft light to dazzle the eyes of man. Not our little minister alone was stricken by you into his second childhood. To look upon you was to rejoice that so fair a thing could be; to think of you is still to be young. ”

“ The woman who neglects her nursery or her housekeeping duties, and her own heart-life for any outside work in the parish does both them and herself serious injury. If a minister's wife has the grace of a kind and tactful courtesy toward all classes, she may contribute mightily to the popular influence of her husband; and if she is a woman of culture and literary taste, she can be of immense service to him in the preparation of his sermons. The best critic that ministers can have is one who has a right to criticize and to "truth it in love." ”

“ But mere prejudice against the woman minister should not deprive the country churches of her sympathetic service if she is a woman of the right sort. Let fitness, training and worth decide, not mere traditions and prejudices. Sometimes a man and his wife, both ordained ministers, can together serve two churches acceptably and successfully. In fact, a case can be cited where in a western state the important work of church supervision is done conjointly by the state superintendent of home missions and his equally capable wife, both being trained, ordained ministers. ”

“ Non ministrari sed ministrare—not to be ministered unto but to minister—is not alone the motto of those who stand under the Wellesley banner, but of true women everywhere.
For centuries a woman's own home had not only first claim, but full claim, on her fostering care. ”

“ I answered that I did not personally aspire to the presidency, but when the nation decided a woman was most competent for that office, I would be willing she should fill it. "Well," said he, "if the Bible teaches anything, it is that women should be quiet keepers at home and not go gadding round the country;" and much more. In all my traveling, in short or long skirts, I have never been treated so contemptuously, so insultingly, as by this same wretch of a minister. He is void of the first spark of reverence for humanity, therefore must be equally so for God. ”

“ He is very often thrown into the society of pretty women of his flock, under circumstances which are dangerously fascinating. The 'sister,' instead of maintaining a proper reserve, grows too communicative and too familiar, and the minister, who is but a man, subject to all the weaknesses and frailties of humanity, often in an unguarded moment forgets his sacred calling, and becomes the seducer—though we question if literal seduction be involved, where the female so readily complies with voluptuous wishes, which perchance, she responds to with as much fervor as the other party entertains them. ”

“ Many of them strongly believed that women were out of place in the ministry. I did not blame them for this conviction. But I was in the ministry, and I was greatly handicapped by the fact that, although I was a licensed preacher and a graduate of the Boston Theological School, I could not, until I had been regularly ordained, meet all the functions of my office. I could perform the marriage service, but I could not baptize. I could bury the dead, but I could not take members into my church. That had to be done by the presiding elder or by some other minister. ”

“ When two loving hearts desire to join hands and walk the earthly pathway side by side, why should not a woman minister pronounce the sacred formula and convey the sanction of the Law and the Gospel to their matrimonial purpose? ”

“ A committee of bishops and scholars—and one woman—has now been appointed to see how much farther women may be permitted to go on the way to the pulpit itself. A few of the smaller churches in America have a woman minister in charge. But from the arduous duties of the highest ecclesiastical positions women in all lands are still “protected.” ”

“ Few can realize the perils which threaten our country from the present condition of women. The grand instrumentality, not only for perpetuating our race, but for its training to eternal blessedness, is the family state, and in this woman is the chief minister. As the general rule, man is the laborer out of the home, to provide for its support, while woman is the daily minister to train its inmates. ”

“ Well, every attaché is in a fury, and none of them will speak to the minister except in the most formal way and only when it's absolutely necessary. As for the minister's wife, the other women—but what's the use of describing it; we all know how nasty women can be about matters of rank. ”

“ The preparation of young ministers for the duties of the church does not surpass in importance the training of the minister of the nursery and school-room. The clergyman meets his parishioners two or three times a week to train them for an immortal [29] existence. But the mother and school-teacher have their ministry in charge every hour of the day, and with a power of influence such as no clergyman can command. ”

“ She realized that it is woman's honor and happiness to be, in an especial manner, a ministering spirit; and thus she learned to resemble the bright hosts above, whom she hoped one day to join, and grow in the likeness of Him who declared, "The Son of man came not into the world to be ministered unto, but to minister." ”

“ No wife of a minister, or any other, possessed more of the art of managing an establishment, of combining order with ease and magnificence, of adroitly warding off inconveniences by looking forward without showing solicitude, of making dignity harmonise with politeness—a politeness so measured and advised as put all the world at ease. She had a great deal of spirit, without any ambition to show it, and a complaisance which was devoid of hollowness or duplicity. ”

“ For a minister who only goes to the court he resides at, in form, to ask an audience of the prince or the minister upon his last instructions, puts them upon their guard, and will never know anything more than what they have a mind that he should know. Here women may be put to some use. A king’s mistress, or a minister’s wife or mistress, may give great and useful informations; and are very apt to do it, being proud to show that they have been trusted. But then, in this case, the height of that sort of address, which, strikes women, is requisite ”

“ Mary groaned. ‘Then there was another young minister? It doesn’t make any difference, Rhoda, whether you spend your summers in the woods or by the sea, in the valleys or on the mountains, there is always a young minister. Have all the old ones perished off the face of the earth, pray? And what do the young ones see in you, you dear unregenerate, that they persist in following you about threatening my peace of mind and your future career? ”

“ Into her new life she had carried three matchless assets for a minister's wife,—a supreme confidence in the exaltation of the ministry, a boundless adoration for her husband, and a natural liking for people that made people naturally like her. ”

“ Linden with a sort of resigned gravity.
"Well it would not be much comfort to me," said Miss Essie. "When a woman marries, she naturally expects her husband to belong to her;—but a minister belongs to everybody else!" ”

“ She is expected to support her husband in the ministry, and to be ready to receive those women who, after baptism, come up from the water. This office and that of voting seem to be the only important ones held by women in this society. Herein they differ greatly from another plain sect,—Friends or Quakers, among whom women minister, transact business, etc. ”

“ Now the family state is instituted to educate our race to the Christian character,—to train the young to be followers of Christ. Woman is its chief minister, and the work to be done is the most difficult of all, requiring not only intellectual power but a moral training nowhere else so attainable as in the humble, laborious, daily duties of the family state. ”

“ Eldred would have chosen a modest, sensible person for his wife, who would be useful in the church, but then, that was the way, a minister was just like any other man, money and a pretty face would cover up a good many failings." Mrs. Graves was the mother of three sensible, modest girls, who would have made capital ministers' wives. Why will ministers be so shortsighted?
"But, mother," Tom Graves asked, "aren't you pretty fast? How do you know but she is sensible and modest; you never heard her speak a word?"
"Anybody with half an eye don't need to hear her speak to know all about her." ”

“ A doctor's wife isn't at the beck and call of her husband's patients, a lawyer's wife isn't briefed along with her husband. It doesn't seem to me fair."
"How odd," said Pamela; "only yesterday I was talking to Mrs. Macdonald—Jean's minister's wife—and I said just what you say, that it seems hard that the time of a minister's wife should be at the mercy of everyone, and she said, 'My dear, it's our privilege, and if I had my life to live again I would ask nothing better than to be a hard-working minister's hard-working wife.' I stand hat in hand before that couple. ”

“ The following record of a passage in the life of a faithful minister and his wife, when about to leave a beloved people and enter on the missionary work, will show how hard it is for woman to sunder the ties that bind her to her home, and go she knows not where, and yet with what childlike trust she enters that perilous and difficult field of effort to which she is called. ”

“ Fer, when yer come ter think of it, they never bark until A feller's really started and a good ways up the hill; So, 'f I was climbin' up ter fame I wouldn't care a rap, But I'd think I was somebody when the curs begun ter "yap."
THE MINISTER'S WIFE She's little and modest and purty, As red as a rose and as sweet; Her children don't ever look dirty, Her kitchen ain't no way but neat. She's the kind of a woman ter cherish, A help ter a feller through life, Yet every old hen in the parish Is down on the minister's wife. ”

“ I am glad the minister's wife can stay at home when she feels like it; and not be trotted out with the toothache of a wet day to see if there is not danger of Squire Smith's baby sneezing because the wind is east; under penalty of her husband's dismissal from his pastoral charge. It does me good to see modern ministers' spouses hold up their heads and face the daylight like other men's wives, instead of creeping round on all fours, apologizing for their existence, and inviting cuffs from people who, born without souls, consequently can have no call for "a minister." ”

“ If, after some time, she no longer pleases the king or prince, she is married to some minister or rich man; but, if she has a child, she is immediately considered as the king’s or prince’s acknowledged wife, and remains permanently at court. When, on the contrary, a girl does not please the regent at first sight, her family are very much disappointed, and consider themselves unfortunate. ”

“ We can not separate subjects and say we will vote on temperance or on school matters, for all these questions are part of government. .... When women as well as men are voters, the church will get some recognition. I marvel that all ministers are not in favor of woman suffrage, when I consider that their audiences are almost entirely composed of women and that the church to-day is brought into disrepute because it is made up of disfranchised members. The minister would stand a hundred-fold higher than he does now if women had the suffrage. ”

“ A preacher is a lawyer for heaven." The promptings and workings of the human heart must be well understood by a minister. One in this holy office should not connive at the faults of her congregation, or give herself up to the acquirement of popular applause. We think one half the good accomplished in a church is done by the ladies of the church, particularly single women. ”

“ But it shall not be so among you; but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant, even as the Son of man came, not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.’ Surely woman need not hesitate to estimate her status by a criterion of dignity sustained by such authority. She need not shrink from a position which was sought by the Son of God, and in whose trials and griefs she will have his sympathy and companionship. ”