Woman's Life.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 194, 12 March 1887, Page 2 (Supplement)

Woman's Life.

"WoKk and worry" includes what are uflnally' called social enjoyments, for when these are crowded fast upon one another without pause or cessation they involve the hardest kind of labour. It is impossible to keep mind and. body constantly keyed tip to the pitch necessary to make of these things pleasures, and yet those who have been drawn into the current and on into the whirlpool of' social gayeties find it impossible to get outside the tumult ani ■ reaoh the quiet shore beyond. And this is in no sense strange, for it is only the churl who does not appreciate and desire to nhow an appreciation of an attention that speaks of kindly feeling. When it comes, however, to two, three and four social gatherings within the twenty-four hours, no one can endure the strain and have aay physical or mental power for anything elee. It is not the society l ft dy only who finds her life one prolonged hurry. Those who have other aims and purposes, who are interested in philanthropic undertakings, the business woman, the writer, the artist, the student, find the day too short to accomplish all that ambition, desire or duty bring to their hand. Even the few who hold back out of the whirl find themselves perilously near its edges, and feel its influence in epite of all efforts to the contrary. It would not matter so much if we could always be cure, in the midst of thib rush, that we are doing the things we ought to do and not leaving vital duties unfulfilled, th© ghosts of which will on© day rice up ! and reproach us with bitterness for our neglect, in our effort to accomplish so much it is inevitable that some things will remain undone, and there is danger that they will be the very ones that should be the most sacred, whose demands should be moat rigorously regarded. Even when t.he conscience is kebnly alive to what is just and right, it is often difficult to decide whether the motive of action is the dictate of duty, the prompting of ambition or tho love of pleasure. How is one to know, then, where to draw the line ? It is h3rd to tell. One thing is always certain. Just ac soon as you find yourself always weary, and yet with a constant importunate feeling that you have a mountain of work before you, and that there are Alps upon Alps beyond ; when you iiocover that you are, however unwittingly, neglecting those who have tho strongest and most undoubted right to your time and efforts ; when you perceive that you are growing nervous and irritable at home, and that you can no longer enter sympathetically into home pleasantries and pleasures ; then you may be cure that you are undertaking too much. The woman never lived yet, or if she did pbe is an anomaly among womon, who could fulfil her duties to her family, enter largely into social lite, bo a working member of a half dozen charitable and liteiary organisations, besides, peihapn, doing church work, help her poor neighbours and read and study enough to keep her intellectual faculties bright without breaking down un ler the strain ; and yet this U what many are attempting to do. The only way out of the whirl is to study carefully and deliberately what duties you cannot under any consideration let go of Next see where your efforts are most needed aad where is the labour ino 4 adapted to you ; then retain active participation and interest in what you can do without exhaustion, and with some time left which you can call your very own to use as you please. I do not in the least counsel an idle or a selfish life, nor the narrowing of the sympathies to the home circle and immediate! friends. The world is full of opportune t- 3s 3 s to do good, but to lift the fallen, to heir) luo unfortunate, and that woman who never lots her thoughts go out to struggling tuuivmity ic> to be pitied. It is true that (hero are tho3e who confine their thought* :un! labours to their own domestic circle-, not through real selfishness, but that rhoy do not see their way to other doing or have not been aroused to a personal realisation of the necessities of the outside world. The overburdened woman may look around her and find juft such persons who will be ready and willing to assume some of her responsibilities, thus bringing relief to ho* ;wri broadening their own mental and mou nature"--.