Reading and Rest for Mothers.
By Nairjean Audenried
So MANY mothers complain that they can't find time for reading. Now so far as my observation goes, it confirms me in the belief that, as a general thing, a woman will find time to do whatever she considers a necessity to be done. The mother of seventeen children would hardly feel that lack of time was a sufficient excuse for appearing at the breakfast table with unwashed face and disheveled locks, even though a thousand things might seem to demand immediate attention. Few American women are so situated that they could not, if they would, find time to read at least a little every day; and it may be said that the woman who does not, either has no taste for reading or is a very poor manager. The difficulty in most cases is not so much lack of time as lack of proper arrangement of time; the want of definite plan and of persistent effort to secure a desired result is the cause that most frequently prevents regular habits of reading. I have in my mind's eye the mother of a large family, who acquired nearly all her education after her marriage, and by the habit of daily reading became not only remarkable for her intelligence and culture in the circle in which she moved, but was able to be the intellectual companion of her children, who had the advantages of schools and colleges, which were denied her. Some mothers so sacrifice themselves to the mere physical well-being of their children when they are young, that by the time they are grown there is very little mental sympathy between them, especially if the children have high educational advantages, and keep up with the intellectual progress of the age. I know one mother who felt the necessity of reading the newspaper herself, that she might keep her son, growing into manhood, from objectionable places of evening resort where he could hear politics and affairs of his country discussed. When he came to his meals, instead of fretting him with reproaches for his absence from the family circle, she talked to him concerning things of current interest in the country and the world, and whatever she thought was most likely to enlist his sympathy and stimulate his highest aspirations. This mother had delicate health and many family cares; but she felt that the time she took for reading was time well spent if it enabled her to be a wise counselor and helper to her son.—Nairjean Audenried, in Christian at Work.