The ledger. [volume] (Gaffney City, S.C.) 1896-1907, January 20, 1898, Image 5
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THK LEDGER: GAFFNEY, S. C., JANUARY art, 18!>8.
tb(
WOMEN ENCOURAGED
DR. TALMAGE’S WORDS OK CHEERIO
THE GENTLE SEX.
Bettor Slnclrt BleiMsdnefl* Tliun a Ufe of
Misery WUri nu l.'nworthy Husband.
Girls Should Ue Taught to Take Cate of
Themselves.
(Copyright, 1S3?, by American Press Asso
ciation.]
Washington, Jan. 1G.—This sormony
of Dr. TahiuiRO is a h’rcat eucouruKo-
ment to women who have to earn their
own living, as well as to all toilers with
hand or brain; text, Proverbs xiv, 1,
“Every wise woman buihkth her
honse.”
Woman a mere adjunct to man, an
appendix to the masculine volume, an
appendage, a sort of afterthought, some
thing thrown in to make things even—
that is the heresy entertained and im
plied by seme men. This is evident to
them, because Adam was first created,
and then Eve. They don’t read the
whole story, or they would find that the
porpoise and the bear and the hawk
were ereated before Adam, so that this
argument, drawn from priority of crea
tion, might prove that the sheep and
the dog were greater than man. No.
Woman was an independent creation
and was intended, if sho chose, to live
alone, to work alone, act alone, think
alone and fight her battles alone. The
liible says it is not good for man to be
alone, but never says it is not good for
woman to bo alone, and the simple fact
is that many women who are harnessed
for life in the marriage relation would
be a thousandfold better oil if they were
alone.
Who are these men who year after I
year hang around hotels and engine j
houses and theater doors and come in |
and out to bother busy clerks and mer- j
chants and mechanics, doing nothing j
when there is plenty to do? They aro i
men supported by their wives and moth- .
crs. If iho statistics of any of our cities ■
could bo taken cn ibis subject, you i
would find that a vast multitude of wo- i
men not only support themselves, but }
masculines. A great legion of men j
amount to nothing, and a woman by j
marriage manacled to one of these non- |
entities needs condolence. A woman |
standing outside the marriage relation
is several hundred thousand times bet
ter off than a woman badly married.
Many a bride, iusttr.d of a wreath of
orango blossoms, might more properly
wear a bunch cf nettles and nightshade,
and instead of the wedding march a
more appropriate tune would bo the
dead march in “Saul, "and instead of
a banquet of confectionery and ices
there might bo more appropriately
spread a table covered with apples of
Sodom.
Mistakes of Marriage.
Mp.sy ar. attractive woman cf good
sound senso in other things lias married
one of theso men to refoirn him. What
was tbo result? Like when a dove, no
ticing that a vulture was rapacious and
cruel, set about to reform it and said,
“I have a mild disposition, and 1 like
peace and was brought up in the quiet
of a dovecot, and I will bring the vul
ture to tho same liking by marrying
him,” so one day, after the vulture de
clared ho would give up his carnivorous
habits aud ccaso longing for blood of
flock and herd, at an altar of rock cov
ered with moss and lichen tho twain
were married, a baldbeaded eagle offi
ciating, tho vulture saying, “With all
my dominion of earth aud sky I thee
endow and premise to love and cherish
till death do us part.” But one day the
dove in her fright saw tho vulture busy
at a carcass and cried: “Stop that! Did
you not promise mo that you would quit
your carnivorous and filthy habits if I
married you?” “Yes, ” said tbo vulture,
“but if you don't liko my way you can
leave.” And with one angry stroke of
tho beak and another fierce clutch of
tho claw the vulture left the dove eye
less and wingless and lifeless, and a
flock of robins flying past tried to < uch
other and said: ”fc*eo there! That comes
from a dovo marrying u vulture to re
form him. ”
Many a woman who has had tho baud
of a young inebriate offered, but de
clined it, or who was ask«d to chain
her life to a man selfish or of bad tem
per and refused tbo shackles, will bless
God throughout all eternity that she es
caped that earthly pandemonium.
Husband* Not Kecesnary.
Besides all this, in our country about
1,000,000 men were sacrificed in our
civil war, aud that decreed 1,000,000
women to celibacy. Besides that, since
the war several armies of men as large
as the Federal and Confederate armies
put together have fallen under malt
liquors aud distilled spirits, so full of
poisoned ingredients that the work was
done more rapidly, and the victims fell
while yet young. Aud if 60,000 men
are destroyed every year by strong drink
before marriage that makes in the 83
years since the war 1,650,000 men slain
and decrees 1,050,000 women to celib
acy. Take, then, the fact that so many
women aro unhappy in their marriage
and tho fact that tho slaughter of
3,650,000 men by war and rum com
bined decides that ut least that number
of women shall be unafflaucd for life,
my text cornea in with a cheer aud a po
tency and appropriateness that you may
never have seen in it before when it
says, “Every wise woman buildoth her
house”—that is, let woman be her own
architect, lay out her own plans, be her
own supervisor, achieve her own des
tiny.
In addressing those women who have
to fight tbo battle alone I congratulate
fo« m your happy escape. Rejoice for-
aver that you will not have to navigate
the faults of the other eex when you
have faults enough of your own. Think
of the bereavements you avoid, of the
tisks of unassimilated temper which
you will not have to run, of the carea
you will never have to carry and of the
opportunity of outside usefulness from
which marital life would have partially
debarred yoo, aud that you aro free to
go and come as one who has the respon
sibilities )f a household can seldom be.
God has not given you a hard lot as
compared with your sisters. When
young women tball make up their
minds at the start that masculine com
panionship is not a necessity in order to
happiness and that there is a strong
probability that they will have to light
the battle of life alone they w ill be get- J
ting the timber ready for their own for
tune and their saw aud ax and plane !
sharpened for its construction, since “ev- i
ery wise woman buildeth her bouse.”
Girl* Should Be Tiuiglit Self Keliance.
As no boy ought to be brought up
without learning some business ut ;
which ho could earn a livelihood, so no j
girl ought to bo brought up without
learning the science of self support.
The difficulty is that many a family
goes sailing on the high tides of success,
and tho husband aud father depends on '
his own health and ufumeu for the wtl
faro of bis household, but one day be |
gets his feet wet, and in three days j
pneumonia hau closed his life, and the
daughters are turned out on a cold
world to earn bread, and there is noth
ing practical that they can do. Tho
friends come in and hold consultation.
“Give music lessons,” says an outsider.
Yes, that is a useful calling, and if you
have great genius for it go on in that
direction. But there are enough music
teachers now starving to death in all
our towns and cities to occupy all the
piano stools and sofas aud chairs and
front doorsteps of tho city. Besides
that, tho daughter has been playing on
ly for amusement aud is only at the
foot of the ladder, to the top of which a
great multitude of masters on piano and
harp and flute and organ have climbed.
“Put the bereft daughters as sales
women in stores,” says another adviser.
But there they must compete with sales
men of long experience or with m< n
who have served an apprenticeship in |
commerce and who began ns shopboys I
at 10 years of age. Some kind hearted
dry goods man, having known the la
ther, now gone, says, "We are not in
need of any more help just now, but
send your daughters to my store, and 1
will do us well Ly them as possible.”
Very soon the question comes up, Why
do not the female employees of that es
tablishment get ns much wages is the
male employees? For the simple reason,
in many cases, the females were sud
denly flung by misfortune behind that
counter, while tho males have from the
day they lift the public school been
learning tbei business.
How is this evil to be cured? Start
clear back in the homestead aud teacli
your daughters that life is an earnest
thing, and that tbirc is a possibility if
not a strong probability that they will
have to fight the battle of life alone.
Let every father aud mother say to thsir
daughters, “Now, what would you do
for a livelihood if what I now own were
swept, nwey by financial disaster cr eld
age or death should end my career?”
Advice to Ciimarried Women.
“Well, I could paint on pottery and
do such decorative work.” Yes, that is
beautiful, and if you have genius for it
go on in that direction. But there are
enough busy at that now to make a line
of hardware as long as yon Pennsyl
vania avenue.
"Well, I could make recitations in
public and caru my living us a drama
tist. I could render ‘King Lear’ cr ‘Mac
beth’ till your hair would rise on cud or
give you ‘Sheridan’s Bide’ or Dickens’
‘Pickwick.’” Yes, that is a beautiful
art, but ever and anon, as now’, there is
an epidemic of dramatization that makes
hundreds of households nervous with
the cries and shrieks and groans of
young tragediennes dying in the fifth
act, and the trouble is that while your
friends would like to hear you aud real
ly think that you could surpass Bistort
and Charlotte Gust man aud Fanny
Kemble of the past, to say nothing of
the present, you could not in the way
of living in ten years earn 10 cents.
My advice to all girls and all unmar
ried women, whether in affluent homes
or in homes where most stringent econ
omies are grinding, is to learn to do
some kind of work that the world must
have while the world stands. I am glad
to see a marvelous change for the better
aud that women have found out that
there are hundreds of practical things
that a woman can do for u living if she
begins soon enough and that men have
been compelled to admit it. You aud I
can remember when tho majority of oc
cupations were thought inappropriate
for women, but our civil war came,
and the hosts of men wont forth from
north and south, and to conduct the
business of our cities during the patri
otic absence women were demanded by
the tens of thousands to take the vacant
places, and mnltitudes of women who
had been hitherto supported by fathers
aud brothers aud sous were compelled
from that time to take care of them
selves. From that time a mighty change
took place favorable to female employ
ment.
Occupation* For Women.
Among the occupations appropriate
for woman I place the following, into
many of which she has already entered,
aud all the others she will enter: Ste
nography, aud you may find her at near
ly all the reportorial stands in our edu
cational, political and religious meet
ings. Savings banks, tho work cleau
aud honorable, aud who so great a right
to toil there, for a woman founded the
first savings lank—Mrs. Priscilla Wake
field? Copyists, and there is hardly a
professional man that does not need the
service of her penmanship, aud as
amanuensis many of the greatest books
of our day have been dictated for her
writing. There they are as florists and
confectioners and music teachers aud
bookkeepers, for which they are special
ly qualified Ly pitticuie aud accuracy,
and wood engraving, in which tho Coop
er institute has turned out so many
qualified, aud telegraphy, for which
she is specially prepared, ns thousands
of tho telegraph offices will testify.
Photography, and in nearly all our es
tablishments they may tie found there
at cheerful work. As workers in Ivory
and gutta pereba and gum elastic and
tortoise shell and gilding, and in chem
icals, in porcelain, in terra cotta. As
postmistresses, and presidents havo
given them appointments all over tho
land.
As proofreaders, as translators, asmed-
elers, as designers, as draftwomeu, as
lithographers, as teachers in schools
aud seminaries, for which they aro es-
pecially endowed, tho first teacher of
every child, by divine arrangement, be
ing a woman. As physicians, having
graduated after a regular course of
study from the female colleges of our
largo cities, whero they get as scientific
and thorough preparation as any doctors
ever had and go forth to a work which
no one but women could so appropriate
ly and delicately do. On the lecturing
platform, for you know tbo brilliant
success of Mrs. Livermore and Airs.
Hallowell and Miss Willard and Mrs.
Latbrop. As physiological lecturers to
their own sex, for which service there
is a demand appalling and terrific. As
preachers of the gospel, aud all tho pro
tests of ecclesiastical courts cannot hin
der them, for they have a pathos and a
power in their religious utterances that
men can never reach. Witness all those
who have heard their mother pray.
l.'nefal Employment.
Oh, young women of America, as
many of you will have to fight your
own battles alone, do not wait until
you are flung of disaster and your father
is dead and all tho resources of your
family ha'-e been scattered, but now,
while in a good house and environed by
all prosperities, learn bow to do somo
kind of work that tbo world must have
us long us tbo world stands. Turn your
attention from the embroidery of fine
slippers, of which there is a surplus,
aud make a useful shoo. Expend the
time in which you adorn a cigar case in
learning how to make a good, honest
loaf of bread. Turn your attention from
the making of flimsy nothings to tho
manufacturing of important somethings.
Much of the time spent in young la
dies’ seminaries in studying what are
tailed tho “higher brunches” might bet
ter be expended in teaching them some
thing by which they could support
themselves. If you are going to be
teachers or if you havo so much assured
wealth that you tan always dwell in
those high regions, trigonometry of
course, metaphysics of course, Latin
and Greek aud German and French and
Italian of course, and u hundred other
things cf course, but if you are not ex
pecting to teach and your wealth is not
established beyond misfortune after you
have learned the ordinary brunches take
hold of that kind of study that will pay
in dollars aud cents in case you aro
thrown on yaur own resources. Learn
to do someihiug better than anybody
else.
“No, no,” says some young woman,
“I will not undertake anything so uu-
romuutic and commonplace as that.”
An excellent author writes that after bo
had, in a book, argued for efficiency in
womanly work in order to success aud
positive apprenticeship by way of prep
aration a prominent chemist advertised
that he would teach a class of women to
become druggists aud apothecaries if
they would go through an apprentice
ship as men do, aud a printer advertised
that he would take a class of women to
learn tho printer’s trade if they would
go through an apprenticeship us men
do, aud how many, according to the ac
count of the author, do you suppose
applied to become skilled in the drug
gist business and printing business?
Not one!
A Cr-tnmon Delusion.
“But,” you ask, "what would my
father and mother say if they saw I was
doing such nnfasbionablo work?” Throw
the whole responsibility upen us, the
pastors, who are constantly hearing of
young women in all these cities who,
unqualified by their previous luxurious
surroundings for the awful struggle of
life into which theydiuve been suddenly
hurled, seemed to Lave nothing left
them but a choice between starvation
and damnation. There they go along
the street ut 7 o’clock in the wintry
mornings through the slush and storm
to the place where they shall earn only
half enough for subsistence, the daugh
ters cf once prosperous merchants, law
yers, clergymen, artists, bunkers aud
capitalists, who brought up their chil
dren under the infernal delusion that it
was not high toned for women to learn
a profitable calling. Young women,
take this affair in year own hand, and
let there be an insurrection in all pros
perous families on tho part of the daugh
ters of this day, demanding knowledge
in occupations aud styles of business by
which they may be their own defense
aud their own support if all fatherly
and husbandly and brotherly bauds for
ever fail them. I have seen two sad
sights, the one a woman in all the glory
of her young life, stricken by disease
aud in a week lifeless in a home of
which she had been the pride. As her
hands were folded over tbo still heart
and her eyes closed for tho last slumber
aud she was taken out amid the lamen
tations of kindred and friends I thought
that was a sadness immeasurabla But
I have seen something compared with
which that scene was bright aud song
ful. It was a young woman who had
been all her days amid wealthy sur
roundings by tho visit of death and
bankruptcy to the household turned out
on a cold world without one lesson
about bow to get food or shelter and
into the awful whirlpool of city life,
where strong ships have gone down,
and for 20 years not one word has been
heard from her. Vessels went out on
the Atlantic ocean looking for a ship
wrecked craft that was left alone and
forsaken on the sea a few weeks before,
with the idea of bringing it into port,
ttut who shall ever bring again into the
baruor of peace and hope and heaven
that lost womanly immortal, driven in
what tempest, aflame in what conflagra
tion, sinking into what abyss? O God,
help! O Christ, rescue! My sisters, give
not your time to learning fancy work
which the world may dispense with in
hard times, but connect your skill with
the indispensables of life.
The world will always want some-
thing to wear and something to eat,
and shelter and fuel for the body, and
knowledge for the mind, aud religion
for the soul. And all these things will
continue to be tbo necessaries, and if
you fasten your energies upon occupa
tions aud professions thus related the
world will be unable to do without you.
Remember that in proportion as you are
skillful in anything your rivalries be
come less. For unskilled toil there are
women by the millions. But you may
rise to where there are only thousands,
and still higher till there are only a
hundred, aud still higher till there aro
only ten, and still higher, in some par
ticular department, till there is only a
unit, and that yourself. For awhile yon
may keep wages aud a place through
the kindly sympathy of an employer,
but you will eventually get no more
compensation than you can mako your- |
self worth.
Let mft say to all women who have ]
already entered upon the battles cf life |
that the time is coming when women j
shall not only get ns much salary nud 1
wages as men get, but for certain ctyles j
of employment women will have higher
salary and mere wages, for the reason
that for some styles of work they have
more adaptation. Lut this justice will
come to woman not through any senti
ment of gallantry, not because woman
is physically weaker than man, and
therefore ought to have more consider
ation shown her, but because through
her finer natural taste, aud more grace
of manner, and quicker perception, and
more delicate touch, and more educated
adroitness, she will in certain callings
be to her employer worth 10 per cent
more or 20 per cent more than tho oth
er sex. She will not get it by asking for
it, but by earning it, and it shall be
hers by lawful conquest.
Now, men of America, be fair and
give the women a chance. Aro you
afraid that they will do some of your
work, and hence harm your prosperities?
Remember that there are scores of
thousands of men doing women’s work.
Do not be afraid. God knows the end
from the beginning, aud he knows how
many people this world can feed and
shelter, and when it gets too full he will
end tho world and if need bo start an
other. God will halt the inventive fac
ulty which, by producing a machine
that will do the work of 10 or 20 or
100 men aud women, will leave that
number of people without work. I hope
that there will not bo invented another
sewing machine, or reaping machine,
or corn thrasher, or any other new ma
chine for the next 500 years. We want
no more wooden bauds, and iron hands,
and steel hands, and electric hands sub
stituted for men and women, who would
otherwise do tho work aud get the pay
and earn the livelihood.
Trust Id God.
But God will arrange all, and all we
have to do is to do our best and trust
him for the rest. Let me cheer all wo
men fighting the battle of life alone
with tbo fact of thousands of women
who havo won the day. Mary Lyon,
founder of Mount Holyoke Female sem
inary, fought tho battle alone; Adelaide
Newton, the tract distributer, alone;
Fidelia Fisk, the consecrated mission
ary, alone; Dorothea Dix, the angel of
tbe insane asylums, alone; Caroline
Herschel, the indispt usable ro-euforce-
ment of her brother, alone; Maria
Takrzewska, tho heroine of tbe Berlin
hospital, alone; Helen Chalmers, pa
tron of the sewing schools fur tho poor
of Edinburgh, alone, aud thousands
aud tens of thousands of women, of
whose bravery and self sacrifice and
glory of character the world has made
no record, but whose deeds are in the
heavenly archives of martyrs who fongbt
the battle alone, and, though unrecog
nized for the short 80 or 60 or 80 years
of their earthly existence, shall through
the quiutilliou ages of the higher world
be pointed out with the admiring cry,
“These are they who came out of great
tribulation and had their robes washed
and made white in tbe blood of the
Lamb. ”
Let mo also say for the encourage
ment of all women fighting the battle
of life alone that their conflict will soon
end. There » one word written over the
faces of many of them, and that word
is “despair.” My sister, you need ap
peal to Christ, who comforted tho sisters
of Bethany in their domestic trouble
and who in his last hours forgot all the
pangs of his own hands and feet aud
heart as he looked into the face of ma
ternal anguish and called a friend's at
tention to it, in substance saying:
“John, I cannot take care of her any
longer. Do for her as I would have
done if I had lived. Behold thy moth
er!” If under tbe pressure of unreward
ed and unappreciated work your hair is
whitening and the wrinkles come, re
joice that you are nearing tbe hour of
escape from your very last fatigue and
may your departure be as pleasant as
that of Isabella Graham, who closed her
life with a smile and the word “peace.”
The daughter of a regiment in any
army is all surrounded by bayonets of
defense, and in the battle, whoever falls,
she is kept safe. And you are the daugh
ter of the regiment commanded by the
Lord of Hosts. After all, you are not
fighting tbe battle of life alone. All
heaven is on your side. You will be
wise to appropriate to yourself the
words of sacred rhythm:
One- who hn* known In storms to sail
I have on board.
Above tho roaring of the gale
I hour my Lord.
Be holds me. When the billows smite,
I Khali not fall.
If short, 'tu sharp; If long, 'tl* light.
Be tempers ell.
1 ORICKLY ASH BITTERN!
| Jl cleanses the lever AND BOWELS ’
ATO FORTIFIES TEE SYSTEM TO RESIST PREVAILIRG DISEASES. A
PRICK •1-00 VEK BOTTLE. C 0LD B y f DRUGGIoTG. ’ i
“Cherokee Drug Co. Special Agents.
Try Lai.i.emanii'8 Kfecihc for Uhkuma-
ti.-.m. It euros <|ulckly umi permanently.
Thousand* hj-vc oxed ft and all recommend
It. Price, $1.00 per vial. Sold by Cherokee
Drug Co,
An Old Idea.
Every day strengthens the belief of emi
nent physicians that impure blood is the
cause of the majority of our diseases.
Twenty-five years ago tliia theory wa* uacd
as a basin for the formula of Browns’ Iron
Bitters. The many remarkable cures effected
by this famous old household remedy are
sufficient to prove that the theory is carreer.
Browns’ Iron Bitters is sold by all dealers.
am}\
The People’s Friend. In use for fifty years.
Cures Cough, Cold, Croup, Whooping-Cough,
Grippe, Bronchitis, Asthma and Lung Affections.
DR. BULL’S COUGH SYRUP is sold everywhere
for only 25 cents. Refuse cheap substitutes.
Chew LANGE'S PLUG^. The Great Tobacco Anlidots.lOc. Dealers err.:var t Co. Ba!to.,M<l
CANDY
CATHARTIC
ALL
DRUGGISTS
txx.
->§ MONTGOMERY & GAINES,§<-
AIMI>
FURNITURE DEALERS.
Plain and Fancy Furniture at Rock Bottom Prices for Cash or
on Installment Plan. Our Undertaking Department is the Most
Complete in the City. Orders will Receive Prompt and Courteous
Attention.
MONTGOMERY & GAINES.
GOOD FL
S12.< X >.
GOOD GOFF
10 11>S.
JTor—^
Building and Plastering Lime, Coal, Shingles, Laths
and Plaster Hair, [Dynamite, Blasting Powder, Fuse
and Dynamite Caps, call on
THE LIMESTONE SPRINGS LIME WORKS,
Telephone r57. CARROLL & CO., Lessees
The Gaffney City Land and Improvement Company
Offers for sale Hu tiding Lots In this nourishing town. Gaffney City: Also Farms near
by and In reach of the Schools of Limestone Springs and of this place. In lots of from
3o to I0O acres on llU-ral time rates; also Agricultural Lands to rent for Farm pur
poses. For full particulars apply to
W< )< >1 >. IY ufciiL.
N. 1L—All tresspassing on lands of this company, cutting and removing timber, fishing or
punting, are forbidden under penalty of law.
THE NATIONAL BANK OF GAFFNEY. •
CAPITAL $50,000.00
This bank respectfully solicits the accounts of individual firms
and corporations and will extend every reasonable accommoda
tion to those doing business with it.
Call to see us if you wish to borrow money.
F. G. Stacy, Prest,
J. G. Wardlaw, Vice-Prest,
D. C. Ross, Cashier.
-K HOT
Hot Coffee,
rLJF'F'. 4-
Hot Chocolate,
Hot Clam Booiliion,
Hot Cocoa Cola, Hot Beef Tea, Hot Lemonade,
Hot Cocoa.
Served Day and Night at
111*ire iDruig: Co’s.