an," his
feeling, notwithstanding all his affection, is--"poor simplicity."[86]

On the other hand, in 1723, Elizabeth Gesner, sits opposite her husband
in the sitting-room of the Conrectorat at Weimar; he is working at his
"_Chrestomathie des Cicero_," and writes with one hand while he rocks
the cradle with the other. Meanwhile Elizabeth industriously mends the
clothes of her children, and playfully disputes with the little ones,
who object to the patches, till at last the mother proposes to them to
cut out the new pieces as sun, moon, and stars, and to sew them on in
this beautiful form. The bright light which then shone from the heart
of the housewife through the poorly furnished room, and the cheerful
smile that played on the countenance of the husband, may be discovered
from his account. When she died, after a long and happy union, the
grey-headed scholar said: "One of us must remain alone, and I had
rather be the forlorn one myself than that she should be so." He
followed her a few months later. Again, soon after 1750, we find Frau
Professorin Semlerin at Halle, sitting with her industrious husband,
some feminine work in her hand; both rejoice that they are together,
that he uses his study only as a receptacle for his books, and that she
considers all society as a separation from her husband. He has so
accustomed himself to work in her presence, that neither the play and
laughter, nor even the loud noise, of his children disturb him; he has
an unbounded respect for the discretion and judgment of his wife. She
rules with unlimited sway in her household; if the excitable man is
disquieted by any adverse occurrence, she knows how to smooth it down
quickly, in her gentle way. She is his true friend and his best
counsellor, even in his relations with the University; his firm
support, always full of love and patience, yet she has learnt little,
and her letters abound in errors of writing. There will be farther
notice of her.

Similar women, simple, deep-feeling, pious, clear-headed, firm and
decided, sometimes also with extraordinary vigour and cheerfulness,
were at this period so frequent that we may truly reckon them as
characteristic of the time. They are the ancestresses and mothers, to
whose worth the literary men, poets, and artists who have sprung up in
the following generations may attribute a portion of their success. It
was not able men, but good housewives,--not the poetry of passion, but
the home life of t