sufferings, the years without rest, the invisible, exhausting travail for which no reward is expected, and of that beatitude which floods the soul at the happy issue from labour, when the body has accomplished the Law. He draws the portrait of the valiant wife who is a help, not an obstacle, to her husband. She knows that “the vocation of man is the obscure, lonely sacrifice, unrewarded, for the life of others.”
“Such a woman will not only not encourage her husband in factitious and meriticious work whose only end is to profit by and enjoy the labour of others; but she will regard such activity with horror and disgust, as a possible seduction for her children. She will demand of her companion a true labour, which will call for energy and does not fear danger… She knows that the children, the generations to come, are given to men as their holiest vision, and that she exists to further, with all her being, this sacred task. She will develop in her children and in her husband the strength of sacrifice… It is such women who rule men and serve as their guiding star… O mother-women! In your hands is the salvation of the world!”[1]
This appeal of a voice of supplication, which still has hope—will it not be heard?
A few years later the last glimmer of hope was dead.
“Perhaps you will not believe me; but you cannot imagine how isolated I am, nor in what a
- ↑ These are the last lines of What shall we do? They are dated the 14th of February, 1886.
