32
Fundamentals of Christian Education
health, yet they will seek for an education that will fit them to become
teachers or clerks, or will learn some trade which will confine them
indoors to sedentary employment. The bloom of health fades from
their cheeks, and disease fastens upon them, because they are robbed
of physical exercise, and their habits are perverted generally. All this
because it is fashionable! They enjoy delicate life, which is feebleness
and decay.
True, there is some excuse for young women not choosing house-
work for employment, because those who hire kitchen girls generally
treat them as servants. Frequently their employers do not respect
them, and treat them as though they were unworthy to be members
of their families. They do not give them the privileges they do the
seamstress, the copyist, and the teacher of music. But there can be no
employment more important than that of housework. To cook well, to
present healthful food upon the table in an inviting manner, requires
intelligence and experience. The one who prepares the food that is to
be placed in our stomachs, to be converted into blood to nourish the
system, occupies a most important and elevated position. The position
of copyist, dressmaker, or music teacher cannot equal in importance
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that of the cook.
The foregoing is a statement of what might have been done by a
proper system of education. Time is too short now to accomplish that
which might have been done in past generations; but we can do much,
even in these last days, to correct the existing evils in the education of
youth. And because time is short, we should be in earnest, and work
zealously to give the young that education which is consistent with
our faith. We are reformers. We desire that our children should study
to the best advantage. In order to do this, employment should be given
them which will call the muscles into exercise. Daily, systematic labor
should constitute a part of the education of the youth, even at this late
period. Much can now be gained by connecting labor with schools.
In following this plan, the students will realize elasticity of spirit and
vigor of thought, and will be able to accomplish more mental labor in a
given time than they could by study alone. And they can leave school
with their constitutions unimpaired, and with strength and courage to
persevere in any position in which the providence of God may place
them.