Sister R has leaned too heavily upon her husband. She has been all her life too dependent upon others for sympathy, thinking of herself, making herself a center. She has been petted too much, and has not learned to be self-reliant. She has not been the help to her husband that she might have been in temporal or spiritual things. She must learn to bear bodily infirmities and not dwell upon them as she does. She must fight the battles of life for herself; an individual responsibility rests upon her. (2T 433.1) MC VC

Sister R, your life has been a mistake. You have indulged in reading anything and everything. Your mind has not been benefited by so much reading. Your nerves have been excited while hurriedly chasing through the story. If your children interrupt you while thus employed, you speak fretfully, impatiently. You do not have self-control, and therefore fail to hold your children with a firm, steady hand. You move from impulse. You pet and indulge them, and then fret and scold, and are severe. This variable manner is very detrimental to them. They need a firm, steady hand; for they are wayward. They need regular, wise, judicious discipline. (2T 433.2) MC VC

You might save yourself much perplexity if you would put on the woman and move from principle, not from impulse. You have imagined that your husband must be with you, that you could not stay alone. You should see that his duty is to labor to sustain his family. You should bring yourself to deny your desires and wishes, and not lead him to feel that he must accommodate himself to you. You have a part to act in bearing the burdens of life. You must put on courage and fortitude. Be a woman, not a capricious child. You have been petted and have had your burdens borne for you too long. It is now your duty to seek to deny your wishes and desires, and act from principle, for the present and future good of your family. You are not well; but if you should cultivate a contented, cheerful mind, it would help you to a better hold on this life, and also on the life to come. (2T 433.3) MC VC

Brother R, it is your duty to make a careful, judicious use of the capital of strength which God has given you. (2T 434.1) MC VC

Sister R, your brain is wearied and taxed by reading. You should deny your propensity for crowding your mind with everything it can devour. Your lifetime has not been spent in the best manner. You have not benefited yourself, nor those around you. You have leaned on your mother more than has been for your good. If you had depended more upon the powers within yourself, if you had been more self-reliant, you would have been happier. Now you should bear your own burdens as well as you can, and encourage your husband to bear his in doing his work. (2T 434.2) MC VC

If you had denied your taste for reading and seeking to please yourself, had devoted more time to prudent physical exercise, and had eaten carefully of proper, healthful food, you would have avoided much suffering. A part of this suffering has been imaginary. If you had braced your mind to resist the disposition to yield to infirmities, you would not have had nervous spasms. Your mind should be drawn away from yourself to household duties, keeping your house with order, neatness, and taste. Much reading, and permitting your mind to be diverted with small things, has led to a neglect of your children and your household duties. These are the very duties which God has given you to perform. (2T 434.3) MC VC

You have had much sympathy for yourself. You have called your mind to yourself and have dwelt upon your poor feelings. My sister, eat less. Engage in physical labor, and devote your mind to spiritual things. Keep your mind from dwelling upon yourself. Cultivate a contented, cheerful spirit. You talk too much upon unimportant things. You gain no spiritual strength from this. If the strength spent in talking were devoted to prayer, you would receive spiritual strength and would make melody in your heart to God. (2T 434.4) MC VC

From what the Lord has shown me, the women of this class have had their imaginations perverted by novel reading, daydreaming, and castle-building, living in an imaginary world. They do not bring their own ideas down to the common, useful duties of life. They do not take up the life burdens which lie in their path, and seek to make a happy, cheerful home for their husbands. They rest their whole weight upon them, not bearing their own burden. They expect others to anticipate their wants and do for them, while they are at liberty to find fault and to question as they please. These women have a lovesick sentimentalism, constantly thinking they are not appreciated, that their husbands do not give them all the attention they deserve. They imagine themselves martyrs. (2T 463.1) MC VC

The truth of the matter is, if they would show themselves useful their value might be appreciated; but when they pursue a course to constantly draw upon others for sympathy and attention, while they feel under no obligation to give the same in return, passing along reserved, cold, and unapproachable, bearing no burden for others and having no feeling for their woes, there can be in their lives but little that is valuable. These women have educated themselves to think and act as though it was a great condescension in them to marry the men they did, and that therefore their fine organizations would never be fully appreciated. They have viewed things all wrong. They are unworthy of their husbands. They are a constant tax upon their care and patience, when they might be helps, lifting the burdens of life with them, instead of dreaming over unreal life found in novels and love romances. May the Lord pity the men who are bound to such useless machines, fit only to be waited upon, to breathe, eat, and dress. (2T 463.2) MC VC

These women who suppose they possess such sensitive, refined organizations make very useless wives and mothers. It is frequently the case that they withdraw their affections from their husbands, who are useful, practical men, and show much attention to other men, and with their lovesick sentimentalism draw upon the sympathies of others, tell them their trials, their troubles, their aspirations to do some elevated work, and reveal the fact that their married life is a disappointment, a hindrance to their doing the work they had hoped to do. (2T 464.1) MC VC

Oh, what wretchedness exists in families that might be happy! These women are a curse to themselves and a curse to their husbands. In supposing themselves to be angels, they make themselves fools, and are nothing but heavy burdens. The common duties of life which the Lord has left for them to do, they leave right in their path, and are restless and complaining, always looking for an easy, more exalted, and more agreeable work. Supposing themselves to be angels, they are found human after all. They are fretful, peevish, dissatisfied, jealous of their husbands because the larger portion of their time is not spent waiting upon them. They complain of being neglected when their husbands are doing the very work they ought to do. Satan finds easy access to this class. They have no real love for anyone but themselves. Yet Satan tells them that if such a one were their husband, they would be happy indeed. They are easy victims to the device of Satan, being readily led to dishonor their own husbands and to transgress the law of God. (2T 464.2) MC VC

I would say to women of this description: You can make or destroy your own happiness. You can make your position happy or unbearable. The course which you pursue will create happiness or misery for yourself. Have these persons never thought that their husbands must tire of them in their uselessness, their peevishness, their faultfinding, their passionate fits of weeping while imagining their case so pitiful? Their irritable, peevish disposition is indeed weaning from them the affections of their husbands and driving them to seek for sympathy, and peace, and comfort elsewhere than at home. A poisonous atmosphere is in their dwelling, and home is to them anything but a place of rest, peace, or happiness. The husband is subject to Satan’s temptation, and his affections are placed on forbidden objects, and he is lured on to crime and finally lost. (2T 464.3) MC VC

Sister I, as the peculiarities of your case come clearly before me, I see a serious objection to your traveling. You do not take upon yourself the burdens that you should. You call forth sympathy from others, but do not give in return. You lay your whole weight where you are, and too frequently are waited upon when those who bear their own burden and yours also are no more able to do this than yourself. You are too helpless for your own good, and the influence is not such as that of a minister’s wife should be. You need more physical labor than you have; and from what has been shown me, I think that you would be more in the line of your duty engaging cheerfully in the work of educating your daughter and encouraging a love of domestic duties. You did not receive the education in this direction that you should have had in your girlhood, and this has made your life more unhappy than it would otherwise have been. You do not love physical labor; and when journeying, you fill the bill of an invalid, and fail to be helpful and do what you can to lighten the burdens you make. You fail to realize that frequently the very ones who wait on you are no more able to perform the extra task than you are. You lean on others, and lay your whole weight upon them. I have no evidence that God has called you to do a special work in traveling. (2T 567.1) MC VC

You have an education to obtain that you do not yet possess. Who can so well instruct the child as the mother? Who can so well learn the defects in her own organization and in her child’s as the mother while in the performance of the duties which Heaven has allotted her? The fact that you do not love this work is no evidence that it is not the work which the Lord has assigned you. You have not sufficient physical or mental strength to make it an object for you to travel. You wish to be ministered unto, instead of ministering to others. You are not helpful enough to offset the burden you are to your husband and to those around you. (2T 567.2) MC VC

Those who cannot wisely manage their own child or children are not qualified to act wisely in church matters or to deal with wiry minds subject to Satan’s special temptations. If they can cheerfully and lovingly perform the part required of them as parents, then they can better understand how to bear burdens in the church. Dear sister, I advise you to make a good wife to your husband and a good home for him. Rely upon your own resources, and lean less heavily upon him. Arouse yourself to do the very work which the Lord would have you do. You are inclined to be anxious to do some great work, to fill some large mission, and neglect the small duties right in your path, which are just as necessary to be accomplished as the larger. You walk over these and aspire to a larger work. Let your ambition be aroused to be useful, to be a workman in the world instead of a spectator. (2T 568.1) MC VC

My dear sister, I speak plainly; for I dare not do otherwise. I plead with you to take up life’s burdens instead of shunning them. Help your husband by helping yourself. The ideas which you both hold of the dignity to be maintained by the minister are not in accordance with the example of our Lord. The minister of Christ should possess sobriety, meekness, love, long-suffering, forbearance, pity, and courtesy. He should be circumspect, elevated in thought and conversation, and of blameless deportment. This is gospel dignity. But if a minister comes to a family where he can wait on himself, he should do so by all means; and he should by his example encourage industry by engaging in physical labor when he has not a multiplicity of other duties and burdens. He will not detract from his dignity, and will better relate himself to health and life, by engaging in useful labor. The circulation of the blood will be better equalized. Physical labor, a diversion from mental, will draw the blood from the brain. It is essential for your husband to have more physical labor in order to relieve the brain. Digestion will be promoted by physical exercise. If he would spend a part of every day in physical exercise, when not positively urged by a protracted effort in a course of meetings, it would be an advantage to him, and would not detract from ministerial dignity. The example would be in accordance with that of our divine Master. (2T 568.2) MC VC