The Ministry of Toil. 
483 
There can be no question but that the homage paid to idlers in 
silks has bred innumerable paupers in rags; aud pauperism will lift 
its head unblushingly and utter its loud and imperious demands un¬ 
til public opinion pronounces idleness, in rich or poor, in man or 
woman, a disgrace and a sin. 
This utilitarian age insists that all shall be producers; if some- 
are released from the direct labor of bread-winning, it is that by 
their intelligent oversight their neighbors may secure larger returns 
for their toil. 
Persons of leisure are not necessarily a drain upon the workers. 
They are often the generous helpers of the people, and as such are 
deserving of all praise. The leisure class among us, unlike that in 
most countries, is composed almost entirely of women, the daugh¬ 
ters of indulgent parents and wives of prosperous business-men. 
Relieved of the necessity of self-support, they are free to engage in 
the higher activity of work for others. Men of leisure have done 
much in science, art, literature, and social reform, women very little 
heretofore, but they are now awaking to their duty and their priv¬ 
ilege; especially are they beginning “to put their shoulders to the 
lagging wheels of social revolution,” and to them the future will 
look still more as leaders in acts of charity and reform. Woman’s 
direct aid is a new factor in public motive power and as yet an un¬ 
determined quantity, but its value can not fail to prove considera¬ 
ble—though some still affect to see disaster threatening the homes 
if women once look beyond them. But as they are always the best 
workers who are something more, so they are invariably the best 
home-makers who are interested in the world’s life. Narrowness 
is self-destructive. Even personal interest is best subserved by 
comprehensive aims. 
Our daily work is a prop—we never know how great until through 
failing powers there come days of enforced idleness when we grow 
spiritless and despondent. It is a ladder by which we climb—re¬ 
move it and we sink to the dead level of stupid inaction. “ What 
a stay work is, the work that must be done.” Its very inexora- 
ableness is its chief blessing; it will not allow us to give way to 
weak whims and caprices. 
If work is not a prop, how shall we account for the suicides that 
so often follow disaster in business enterprises or trouble in domes¬ 
tic affairs ? When one has labored long and zealously for an object 
