The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-10-13
How TO RIM Satan Ont of Business.


The desire among women for financial
independence, irrespective of class or con-
dition, seems to be growing. A prominent
Boston physician asserts that there is fully
four times as much chronic invalidism
among females as among males, and that a
great deal of it is due to the lack of suffi-
Gent food for thought.
In the face of this, Mr.. Henry George
goes about preaching that he looks forward
to the time when nobody will have to work
more than an hour day. What wretched
race we shall be then Even cursory study
of Dr. Watts well known hymn, concern
ing his Satanic majesty and idle hands,
ought to show Mr.. George, or anybody else,
that human beings cannot, as constituted
throughout all history and as, presumably
to be constituted until they shuttle off this
mortal coil, endure such life of idleness.
One can but shudder at the thought of the
condition the world would soon be in if but
one hours work per diem were eXacted Of
every man.
Yet there are many thousands of women
who do no more than this, if as much, of
down right work. Minds once keen and
intelligent become dull under inactivity;
muscles lose their tension; even bones be
come weaker. Above all, the will, that
originator of energy, becomes impaired.
Idleness is like an insidious plague, sap
ping every faculty we have. Moth and
rust corrupt things unused, and bats and
cobwebs seek deserted corners.
Most men object to having their wives
do anything for money, as a matter of
pride, if nothing more; but this foolish
prejudice is gradually wearing away. A
woman with a taste of art, literature, or
business can only be happy while eXercis-
ing that taste. To enter any of these pur-
suits without pay would be worse than fool
ish, as taking bread out of others mouths
Those women who are rearing little ones
belong at home-there is no question about
that; but the time soon comes when the
children have to go to school during the
greater part of the day, and then IS the
mothers opportunity. If she can manage
it without neglecting any higher and para
mount duties of home let her gradually
enter whatever line of work her taste and
capacity fit her for. A reasonable man will
only rejoice when he sees his wife happily
and usefully employed. He will know that
it is her earthly salvation, mentally and
physically, remembering that the cranky,
fretful and peevish women are almost in
variably those whose minds lie ike fallow
fields, or are allowed to prey upon them
selves for want of occupation.
It is not enough that one can manage to
keep busy by pottering around the house or
running in ''to gossip with the neighbors, "
or perpetrating useless ''fancy-work," or
doing jobs OF various kinds that better be
left undone; engage in some earnest and
worthy work that the world needs.
Heaven knows that there is plenty of it TO
be done! The field is white to the harvest,
and the laborers are few. Do something in
which you can feel enthusiasm, and which
will make you exalt in doing well.
Get work! Get work! Be sure that it
is better than what you work to get.'
Too much work is a misfortune, but as an
unmitigated calamity it does not begin to
compare with too little work.