What sort of housekeepers our daughters will become, enervated by late hours and all the gay and strange excitement of modern life, and crippled by the hideous freaks of fashion, it is painful to imagine and impossible to foretell. XVII. WOMAN’S KINGDOM. “I SEE unrest, discontent, strife, and sin: I see girls--children in years--from whose cheek the first blush of innocence, from whose soul the last vestige of youth, have vanished; women sold to frivolity; women wasting most precious gifts; women whose ambition has no higher object than to mislead and triumph over men; men growing hard, selfish, and wicked, the slaves of their passions, going down to death, with no hand to save,--all for the lack of a _true home_. Then I remember that the home is the true kingdom of woman, where her rights can never be dethroned; that all pure love, all right thoughts, all religion, all governments, if you would have them live, must have their roots beneath its altar. This conviction impels me to say to every woman who has a home, Let home stand first, before all other things! No matter how high your ambition may transcend its duties, no matter how far your talents or your influence may reach beyond its doors, before everything else build up a true home! Be not its slave! Be its minister! Let it not be enough that it is swept and garnished, that its silver glistens, that its food is delicious. Feed the love in it. Feed the truth in it. Feed thought and aspiration, feed all charity and gentleness in it. Then from its walls shall come forth the true woman and the true man, who, _together_, shall rule and bless the land.” Is this an overwrought picture? We think not. What honor can be greater than to found such a home? What dignity higher than to reign its undisputed, honored mistress? What is the ability to speak on a public platform to large, intelligent audiences, or the wisdom that may command a seat on a judge’s bench, compared to that which can insure and preside over a true home, with such skill that husband and children “rise up and call her blessed”? To be the guiding star, the ruling spirit, in such a position is higher honor than to rule an empire. _Woman’s rights!_ Has man any higher rights than these? To be sure man often abuses his power, and brings sorrow and woe upon her who, trusting and loving him, should always be the mistress of his heart, an equal partner in all his possessions, his joys, and his sorrows. But are there no cases on record where “the woman Thou gavest me” has abused the power with which the marriage vow endowed her; destroying the peace, and making shipwreck of all that her husband holds most precious?