doesn't seem so, because we have wrong ideas about the nobility
of labor. If we really believed what the Bible says,--that the servant
of all is the chiefest of all,--we should value work and workmen just in
proportion to the use which the work they do is to the community and the
world. In that sense, Alfred, a doctor's work or a minister's work might
stand a little higher than a manufacturer's, a teacher's position be
more desirable than that of a factory-girl, because in all of these
professions there is more opportunity to do good to the bodies and souls
of men; and yet I doubt if any are in a position to do more good than
your Mr. James Mountjoy and his family. And as to being gentlemen or
ladies, it is just as much your duty and just as possible to be those in
the rag-room as in a palace, should your lot be cast there."

"It is not considered so genteel," said Tessa, who had not quite
forgotten the teachings of her novels.

"By whom? Foolish butterflies? or men and women of sense? Gentility
meant, originally, gentleness: that gentleness which better
opportunities of education were supposed to give. But so much culture as
that is now within the reach of every one, and there is no reason why it
should not exist in the mill and the counting-room, the kitchen and the
store, as well as in the parlor and the library."

"But after all," said Mrs. Robertson, "there seems something low and
sordid in working for money."

"That is because we should not work for money--as the motive of work, I
mean. If every one in the world were a Christian, and did the work which
came to him to do, upon Bible principles, endeavoring to fulfil the
precept: 'Whether ye eat or drink or whatsoever ye do, do all to the
glory of God,' and accepted his living, small or great, from his hands,
just as a little child accepts his from his father's hands, we should
hear nothing about the degradation of service. Every one would
constantly say: 'Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?' And we should take
our daily bread, as well as all the pleasant things of our lives,
thankfully from him who has given us all things to enjoy."

Mr. Robertson was rather answering his sister and talking a little above
the level of his auditors, but some of them understood and remembered
his words. To Katie, henceforth work had an added dignity. It was raised
even above the high level upon which she had thus far placed it,--that
of helping her mother,--and became something t