Elizabeth daily monitor. [volume] (Elizabeth, N.J.) 1868-1880, 1869-08-16
CIRCULATION UNRlVALLED
IN ELIZABETH.

HAPPY HOMES. 1t is the wholesome
ambition of every young man that is
worth anything, to be some day the
joint proprietor of happy home. If
his hopes in this respect are not duly
realized, the fault will be almost inva-
riably his own. 1t is shame to put,
as we too often do, the blame of the
domestic infelicity we see upon the
weaker side of the house. We are
tired of this endless clack and clamor
against the girl of the period gone to
seed. Said girl is doubtless bad enough
in any stage of her existence, but she,
at least, is not responsible, in one case
out of ten, for the unhappiness of homes
Hardly the worst OF the weakest woman
is. Home is her realm, her throne,
her ALL She will not voluntarily abdi-
cate her prerogative. The woman who
knows nothing else, knows enough to
make, to the extent of her unaided
feebleness, her table and fireside at
tractive to her husband and her chill
dren. Even the most unmitigated
periodical girl has generally both the
disposition and the capacity to be-
come an affectionate, unselfsh, cheer
full, and tolerably successful wife and
mother.
Let the man contribute as much, and
his home will be happy enough. Where
you see unhappiness in home, look to
the husband. Men are naturally, or,
we would say, unnaturally, more or
less tyrants and brutes in the domestic
circle. And we don't mean essentially
bruitish men, either. We are not in
Guiding that indispensable class of the
community who keep local newspaper
agoing by making their wives and chill
dren's heads the raw material for police
items-not sots, nor churls, nor pecu-
liarly blood thirsty hends. We mean
that unfortunately vastly larger class
of eminently respectable brutes who
are so exemplary in their business, in
society, in church and the prayer-meet-
ing, who, in their homes, are only i'm
perious, stern, stingy, unreasonable
frettish, or freakish. They may pos
sess any single one of these traits, or
any combination of them. but they are
brutes all the same. Theirs are not
happy homes. Their children bright
en- oh, how sadly, as they leave home
in the morning, and scud for bed be-
fore they come home at night. Their
wives. who give them their lives and
thoughts and bodies, are afraid to give
them the butchers bill. The family
Bible is stained with tears from young
eyes that cannot learn to read by reason
of them. The hottest place on earth,
the hearth, is desecrated by the I'M
spoken and underlined curses of your
hearts embittered 10y sense of injus
tice witnessed and suffered. Such hus-
bands are loved often by those they
make miserable, who, poor things,
must love something yet their homes
are not happy ones. The stroke that
fells the head of such house would
be mourned as a calamity, but it would
be felt as a relief. There are tragedies
at many breakfast tables this morning
which are not read from papers.
Tragedies enacted by monsters who
are good citizens, and in the main good
men-the tragedies of bullied children
and scolding wife. God forgive the
man be he otherwise sinner or saint,
who has allowed trivial foible in his
own character to wreck the happiness
ola home! No wonder that the sons
of so many good men and reputable
families grow up sceptic aud scape
grace. No wonder that well-born
daughters acquire an unholy taste for
fashionable dissipation, and horror
of home. No wonder that wives wilt
and perish without visible maladies.-
No wonder that our streets are filled at
night with homeless women and pre-
cious boys-that our prisons teen with
human wrecks. They all come from
the happy homes that ought to be, but
are not.
Young men of high hopes and an
unsealed future; would you make
yourself a happy home ? You need
not be advised to be industrious, affec
tionate and faithful. You will be that
anyway.
AS you value the attainment of your
ambition, the realization of your hopes,
the success of your life. your own hap
piness and the happiness of your home
Learn to keep your temper.
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