y
of the woman the more important, the more difficult, and the more
honorable of the two; on the whole I respect the woman who does her duty
even more than I respect the man who does his.

No ordinary work done by a man is either as hard or as responsible as
the work of a woman who is bringing up a family of small children; for
upon her time and strength demands are made not only every hour of the
day but often every hour of the night. She may have to get up night
after night to take care of a sick child, and yet must by day continue
to do all her household duties as well; and if the family means are
scant she must usually enjoy even her rare holidays taking her whole
brood of children with her. The birth pangs make all men the debtors of
all women. Above all our sympathy and regard are due to the struggling
wives among those whom Abraham Lincoln called the plain people, and whom
he so loved and trusted; for the lives of these women are often led on
the lonely heights of quiet, self-sacrificing heroism.

Just as the happiest and most honorable and most useful task that can be
set any man is to earn enough for the support of his wife and family,
for the bringing up and starting in life of his children, so the most
important, the most honorable and desirable task which can be set any
woman is to be a good and wise mother in a home marked by self-respect
and mutual forbearance, by willingness to perform duty, and by refusal
to sink into self-indulgence or avoid that which entails effort and
self-sacrifice. Of course there are exceptional men and exceptional
women who can do and ought to do much more than this, who can lead and
ought to lead great careers of outside usefulness in addition to--not as
substitutes for--their home work; but I am not speaking of exceptions; I
am speaking of the primary duties, I am speaking of the average
citizens, the average men and women who make up the nation.

Inasmuch as I am speaking to an assemblage of mothers, I shall have
nothing whatever to say in praise of an easy life. Yours is the work
which is never ended. No mother has an easy time, the most mothers have
very hard times; and yet what true mother would barter her experience of
joy and sorrow in exchange for a life of cold selfishness, which insists
upon perpetual amusement and the avoidance of care, and which often
finds its fit dwelling place in some flat designed to furnish with the
least possible expenditure of effort the max