In the same way family life, if toilsome, either at home or in a new country, may be inspired by the example of the Holy Family in Nazareth; and in lonely and hard conditions, as well as in the stress of our crowded ways of living, the influence of that ideal reaches down to the foundations and transfigures the very humblest service of the household.
These primitive services which are at the foundation of all home life are in themselves the same in all places and times.

There is in them something almost sacred; they are sane, wholesome, stable, amid the weary perpetual change of artificial additions which add much to the cares but little to the joys of life.

There is a long distance between the labours of Benedictine monks and the domestic work possible for school girls, but the principles fundamental to both are the same--happiness in willing work, honour to manual labour, service of God in humble offices.

The work of lay-sisters in some religious houses, where they understand the happiness of their lot, links the two extremes together across the centuries.

The jubilant onset of their company in some laborious work is like an anthem rising to God, bearing witness to the happiness of labour where it is part of His service.