Chapter III: Advantages of a Life of Humiliation and Subjection

“AH! but you do not consider what it is to be constantly working; to be looked down upon as an inferior; to be treated with contempt: all those things that belong to a life of labor. Surely it is more than one can put up with! And remember it is these very things that make the life of a working-girl different from every other. What advantage can there be in all this?”

I have taken all these things into account, and yet I say that, in the view of religion, in the view of faith, in the view of Jesus Christ our Saviour, it is that very humility of your state, that very subjection to those very insults, and all that you are liable to suffer, which make the highest privilege of your condition. These very things are precious diamonds and pearls, which the Lord gives to you and not to others. Why, this is the very money put in your hands with which you can buy your salvation! Only take these things from the hands of God with patience and thankfulness, and nothing more is required of you.

In this view, how much harder is the lot of your employers than yours! They must be humble and poor in spirit; they must put away pride and haughtiness, or they cannot get through the gate of heaven. “He that exalteth himself shall be humbled” (St. Luke xiv. 11). Think how hard this must be, surrounded as they are by all those things that nourish and increase pride.

Suppose you were in their place, do you think you would be humble and lowly before God; gentle and kind to those below you; not taken up and engrossed with riches; in a word, poor in spirit? I am afraid not. It seems to me it would be very difficult, and so it seemed to our Lord when He thought over it, for He exclaimed, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!” (St. Mark x. 23).

Be thankful, then, instead of repining, and say, “No, Lord, I ask no change; it is better for me just as I am. I am humbled in the sight of men, but blessed in Thine.”

There is a beautiful passage of Scripture which in a few words confirms all that I have said: “But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world that He may confound the wise; and the weak things hath God chosen that He may confound the strong; and the mean things and those that are contemptible hath God chosen” (1 Cor. i. 27, 28).

How beautiful! What the world esteems foolish, and weak, and mean, and contemptible, that is just what God has chosen, what He regards with peculiar favor, what He gives his blessing to and makes to be the road to everlasting life.

Moreover, our Lord shows us this by His own example. Instead of coming into the world rich and noble, He came poor and despised. Instead of coming to be waited upon, He came to wait on others. They used to say of Him: “Who is that? Only the son of Joseph, the carpenter!” They remembered always how they had seen Him carry boards, and help Joseph at the carpenter’s trade.

St. Paul says we ought to think in this respect as Jesus Christ did: “For let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus; who, being in the form of God, thought it no robbery Himself to be equal to God: but debased Himself, taking the form of a servant” (Phil. ii. 5, 6, 7). Above all other names, you see, he chooses to be called by the name of “servant.”

In the Scripture the life of labor is taken under the special protection of the Lord. Whatever you do for an earthly master is considered by Him as being done for Himself. “Whatever ye do, do it from the heart, as to the Lord, and not to men: knowing that ye shall receive of the Lord the reward of inheritance” (Col. iii. 23, 24).

What a privilege! what dignity and honor this throws around your state of life! When I think of it, I cannot help envying the good girl at work all the numerous advantages she enjoys; her opportunity for retirement and prayer; her opportunity for patience and humility, which will make her so much like Jesus Christ and so dear to Him; her opportunity of acquiring such rich merits by fidelity and good intention in her employments; the safety and peacefulness of her life; and all the good she will do to others by the force of her modest and holy example.

How well the saints understood this! St. Serapion sold himself twice in succession to the lowest comedians, and served them in the meanest offices, until by his humble example he converted them into fervent Christians. St. Alexius, of a noble Roman family, fled away from his father’s house, and after remaining many years, until entirely forgotten, returned and lived seventeen years as a beggar dependent on the charity of his own father, who only found out who he was by a writing found upon him after his death. But I have found a most beautiful example, which throws light on the whole matter and which I will relate more at length.