n the first place, a woman, who has charge of a large household, should
regard her duties as dignified, important, and difficult. The mind is so
made, as to be elevated and cheered by a sense of far-reaching influence
and usefulness. A woman, who feels that she is a cipher, and that it
makes little difference how she performs her duties, has far less to
sustain and invigorate her, than one, who truly estimates the
importance of her station. A man, who feels that the destinies of a
nation are turning on the judgement and skill with which he plans and
executes, has a pressure of motive, and an elevation of feeling, which
are great safeguards from all that is low, trivial, and degrading.

So, an American mother and housekeeper, who looks at her position in the
aspect presented in the previous pages, and who rightly estimates the
long train of influences which will pass down to thousands, whose
destinies, from generation to generation, will be modified by those
decisions of her will, which regulated the temper, principles, and
habits, of her family, must be elevated above petty temptations, which
would otherwise assail her.

Again, a housekeeper should feel that she really has great difficulties
to meet and overcome. A person, who wrongly thinks there is little
danger, can never maintain so faithful a guard, as one who rightly
estimates the temptations which beset her. Nor can one, who thinks that
they are trifling difficulties which she has to encounter, and trivial
temptations, to which she must yield, so much enjoy the just reward of
conscious virtue and self-control, as one who takes an opposite view of
the subject.

A third method, is, for a woman deliberately to calculate on having her
best-arranged plans interfered with, very often; and to be in such a
state of preparation, that the evil will not come unawares. So
complicated are the pursuits, and so diverse the habits of the various
members of a family, that it is almost impossible for every one to avoid
interfering with the plans and taste of a housekeeper, in some one point
or another. It is, therefore, most wise, for a woman to keep the loins
of her mind ever girt, to meet such collisions with a cheerful and quiet
spirit.

Another important rule, is, to form all plans and arrangements in
consistency with the means at command, and the character of those
around. A woman, who has a heedless husband, and young children, and
incompetent domestics, ought not to mak