But so much the more was the practice of house duties inculcated. To look after the welfare and comfort of those around them, of parents and brothers, and afterwards of husbands and children, was the task of the grown-up daughters. That this should be the object of their life was unceasingly impressed upon them; it was understood according to every one's own views. And this care was no longer limited, as in the sixteenth century, to giving orders in the kitchen, the preparation of electuaries, and the arrangements of the linen: women were, during the last century, brought imperceptibly into a worthier position with respect to their husbands--they had become their friends and confidants. Although with perhaps scanty knowledge, many of them could boast of firm minds, clear judgment, and depth of feeling; concerning some of these, information has accidentally remained to us. We find it, also, in the wives of simple artisans. If the men, under the influence of the State and of Pietism, became more timid and less independent, the women of the same period were manifestly more elevated. We will draw a comparison with the past. Let us remember Kate Bora, who begged of the laborious Luther to suffer her to be near him. She sits there for hours silent, holds his pen for him, and gazes with her large eyes on the mysterious head, of her husband; and, anxiously gathering, together in her own mind all her poor knowledge, suddenly breaks out with the question, which, transposing it into the position of 1750, would run thus: "Is the Elector of Brandenburg brother to the King of Prussia?" and when Luther laughingly replies, "He is the same man," his feeling, notwithstanding all his affection, is--"poor simplicity."[86]