COMMENCEMENT, JUNE, 1898. 651 



finds rest and peace after the day's work. Under its shelter, the energies 

 are refreshed for the coining day. Led by its guiding hand, the young 

 lives which will some day be the world's rulers and toilers are brought to 

 manhood and womanhood. 



Because of the dear ones in that home, nobler motives arise and grander 

 effort is put forth in the world's strife. There, those who sway the 

 opinions of the country, who make and execute our laws, who lead armies 

 into battle, are known at their best and purest. There, man is noblest 

 and woman is loveliest. In the home — the society, the religion, and the 

 civil polity of the future are formed. The home is the most perfect of 

 schools, and so much depends upon it that "if this be right, nothing else 

 can be wholly wrong; so much that if this be wrong, nothing else can be 

 altogether right." 



But what would be the picture of home without woman as its central 

 figure? Woman has ever been the home-maker. It is her influence which 

 is most felt, and it is in her power to make of home the happiest or the 

 unhapniest spot on earth. From the beginning of time, woman has laid 

 out her line of work and kept to it unremittingly. God has given her a 

 character and a realm of her own with her special work to do. Yet it 

 was only with the beginning of Christianity, that the ideal of woman- 

 hood was raised to its present exalted position. The life of the primitive 

 woman was one of obscurity and darkness — her only future being a mar- 

 riage, which meant only a life of slavery, and drudgery, and ignorance. 

 Christianity has raised woman to what she is today — educated., refined, 

 ennobled, working shoulder to shoulder with her brother in nearly every 7 

 branch of labor. She occupies everywhere positions of honor and trust, 

 but she fills no higher place in the world than that in her own home as 

 queen over her own household. 



Frances Willard has said, "If I were asked the mission of the ideal 

 woman, I would reply, il is to make the whole world homelike. Home 

 is woman's climate, her vital breath, her native air. A true woman car- 

 ries home with her everywhere." What a gain to the race if the true 

 woman brings the outside life into the home, and beautifies and ennobles 

 it under the rosy hues of the home-life. What need is there for woman 

 to go to the polls to bring purity into politics? If she would take the 

 interests of the country's welfare into her home, and there interpret every 

 event with personal interest and sympathy, how much more lasting would 

 be her influence. Let the home be the bond of our nation's intere t and 

 our private welfare. Let the whole world be brought to the hearthstone, 

 and so make of home the dynamic force for the advancement of the whole 

 race and of future nations. 



Knowing the influence of the home to be so powerful, can we give too 

 much thought to perfecting it into an environment which shall give the 

 conditions for the best development of our people? The needs of the 

 home and the requirements of the housekeeper stand first in importance. 

 For the demands of the household, who can be too well prepared? No 

 doctor, or lawyer, or minister would think of making a place for himself 

 in the world without years of study and training. If so much importance 

 is given to the previous preparation of the professional man, what can be 

 said of the necessity for the preparation of the professional woman, who 

 undertakes the profession of housekeeping, which means the making of 

 men strong to be good doctors, or lawvers, or ministers? 



