On the other hand, the Creator has assigned to woman very laborious and responsible duties, by no means less important than those imposed upon the male sex, though entirely different in their character.  In the family she is a queen.  She alone is fitted for the discharge of the sacred trust of wife and the endearing relation of mother.

While the man is contending with the sterner duties of life, the whole time of the noble, affectionate, and true woman is required in the discharge of the delicate and difficult duties assigned her in the family circle, in her church relations, and in the society where her lot is cast.  When the husband returns home weary and worn in the discharge of the difficult and laborious task assigned him, he finds in the good wife solace and consolation, which is nowhere else afforded.  If he is despondent and distressed, she cheers his heart with words of kindness; if he is sick or languishing, she soothes, comforts, and ministers to him as no one but an affectionate wife can do.  If his burdens are onerous, she divides their weight by the exercise of her love and her sympathy.

But a still more important duty devolves upon the mother.  After having brought into existence the offspring of the nuptial union, the children are dependent upon the mother as they are not upon any other human being.  The trust is a most sacred, most responsible, and most important one.  To watch over them in their infancy, and as the mind begins to expand to train, direct, and educate it in the paths of virtue and usefulness is the high trust assigned to the mother.  She trains the twig as the tree should be inclined.

She molds the character.  She educates the heart as well as the intellect, and she prepares the future man, now the boy, for honor or dishonor.  Upon the manner in which she discharges her duty depends the fact whether he shall in future be a useful citizen or a burden to society.  She inculcates lessons of patriotism, manliness, religion, and virtue, fitting the man by reason of his training to be an ornament to society, or dooming him by her neglect to a life of dishonor and shame.  Society acts unwisely when it imposes upon her the duties that by common consent have always been assigned to the stronger and sterner sex, and the discharge of which causes her to neglect those sacred and all important duties to her children and to the society of which they are members.

In the church, by her piety, her charity, and her Christian purity, she not only aids society by a proper training of her own children, but the children of others, whom she encourages to come to the sacred altar, are taught to walk in the paths of rectitude, honor, and religion.  In the Sunday-school room the good woman is a princess, and she exerts an influence which purifies and ennobles society, training the young in the truths of religion, making the Sunday-school the nursery of the church, and elevating society to the higher planes of pure religion, virtue, and patriotism.  In the sick room and among the humble, the poor, and the suffering, the good woman, like an angel of light, cheers the hearts and revives the hopes of the poor, the suffering, and the despondent.