XV.
DOMESTIC MANNERS.
GOOD MANNERS are the expressions of benevolence in personal
intercourse, by which we endeavor to promote the comfort and enjoyment
of others, and to avoid all that gives needless uneasiness. It is the
exterior exhibition of the divine precept, which requires us to do to
others as we would that they should do to us. It is saying, by our
deportment, to all around, that we consider their feelings, tastes, and
conveniences, as equal in value to our own.
Good manners lead us to avoid all practices which offend the taste
of others; all unnecessary violations of the conventional rules of
propriety; all rude and disrespectful language and deportment; and all
remarks which would tend to wound the feelings of others.
There is a serious defect in the manners of the American people,
especially among the descendants of the Puritan settlers of New-England,
which can never be efficiently remedied, except in the domestic circle,
and during early life. It is a deficiency in the free expression of
kindly feelings and sympathetic emotions, and a want of courtesy in
deportment. The causes which have led to this result may easily be
traced.
The forefathers of this nation, to a wide extent, were men who were
driven from their native land by laws and customs which they believed to
be opposed both to civil and religious freedom. The sufferings they were
called to endure, the subduing of those gentler feelings which bind us
to country, kindred, and home; and the constant subordination
of the passions to stern principle, induced characters of great firmness
and self-control. They gave up the comforts and refinements of a
civilized country, and came as pilgrims to a hard soil, a cold clime,
and a heathen shore. They were continually forced to encounter danger,
privations, sickness, loneliness, and death; and all these their
religion taught them to meet with calmness, fortitude, and submission.
And thus it became the custom and habit of the whole mass, to repress
rather than to encourage the expression of feeling.
Persons who are called to constant and protracted suffering and
privation are forced to subdue and conceal emotion; for the free
expression of it would double their own suffering, and increase the
sufferings of others. Those, only, who are free from care and anxiety,
and whose minds are mainly occupied by cheerful emotions, are at full
liberty to unvail their feelings.
It was under such stern and rigorous discipline that the first
children in New-England were reared; and the manners and habits of
parents are usually, to a great extent, transmitted to children. Thus it
comes to pass, that the descendants of the Puritans, now scattered over
every part of the nation, are predisposed to conceal the gentler
emotions, while their manners are calm, decided, and cold, rather than
free and impulsive. Of course, there are very many exceptions to these
predominating characteristics.
Other causes to which we may attribute a general want of courtesy in
manners are certain incidental results of our domestic institutions. Our
ancestors and their descendants have constantly been combating the
aristocratic principle which would exalt one class of men at the expense
of another. They have had to contend with this principle, not only in
civil but in social life. Almost every American, in his own person as
well as in behalf of his class, has had to assume and defend the main
principle of democracy--that every man's feelings and interests are
equal in value to
those of every other man. But, in doing this, there has been some want
of clear discrimination. Because claims based on distinctions of mere
birth, fortune, or position, were found to be injurious, many have gone
to the extreme of inferring that all distinctions, involving
subordinations, are useless. Such would wrongfully regard children as
equals to parents, pupils to teachers, domestics to their employers, and
subjects to magistrates--and that, too, in all respects.
The fact that certain grades of superiority and subordination are
needful, both for individual and public benefit, has not been clearly
discerned; and there has been a gradual tendency to an extreme of the
opposite view which has sensibly affected our manners. All the
proprieties and courtesies which depend on the recognition of the
relative duties of superior and subordinate have been warred upon; and
thus we see, to an increasing extent, disrespectful treatment of
parents, by children; of teachers, by pupils; of employers, by
domestics; and of the aged, by the young. In all classes and circles,
there is a gradual decay in courtesy of address.
In cases, too, where kindness is rendered, it is often accompanied
with a cold, unsympathizing manner, which greatly lessens its value;
while kindness or politeness is received in a similar style of coolness,
as if it were but the payment of a just due.
It is owing to these causes that the American people, especially the
descendants of the Puritans, do not do themselves justice. For, while
those who are near enough to learn their real character and feelings can
discern the most generous impulses, and the most kindly sympathies, they
are often so vailed behind a composed and indifferent demeanor, as to be
almost entirely concealed from strangers.
These defects in our national manners it especially falls to the
care of mothers, and all who have charge of the young, to rectify; and
if they seriously undertake the matter,
and wisely adapt means to ends, these defects will be remedied. With
reference to this object, the following ideas are suggested.
The law of Christianity and of democracy, which teaches that all men
are born equal in rights, and that their interests and feelings should
be regarded as of equal value, seems to be adopted in aristocratic
circles, with exclusive reference to the class in which the individual
moves. The courtly gentleman addresses all of his own class with
politeness and respect; and in all his actions, seems to allow that the
feelings and convenience of these others are to be regarded the same as
his own. But his demeanor to those of inferior station is not based on
the same rule.
Among those who make up aristocratic circles, such as are above them
are deemed of superior, and such as are below of inferior, value. Thus,
if a young, ignorant, and vicious coxcomb happens to have been born a
lord, the aged, the virtuous, the learned, and the well-bred of another
class must give his convenience the precedence, and must address him in
terms of respect. So sometimes, when a man of "noble birth" is thrown
among the lower classes, he demeans himself in a style which, to persons
of his own class, would be deemed the height of assumption and rudeness.
Now, the principles of democracy require that the same courtesy
which we accord to our own circle shall be extended to every class and
condition; and that distinctions of superiority and subordination shall
depend, not on accidents of birth, fortune, or occupation, but solely on
those mutual relations which the good of all classes equally require.
The distinctions demanded in a democratic state are simply those which
result from relations that are common to every class, and are for the
benefit of all.
It is for the benefit of every class that children be subordinate to
parents, pupils to teachers, the employed to their employers, and
subjects to magistrates. In addition to this, it is for the general
well-being that the comfort or convenience
of the delicate and feeble should be preferred to that of the strong and
healthy, who would suffer less by any deprivation; that precedence
should be given to their elders by the young; and that reverence should
be given to the hoary head.
The rules of good-breeding, in a democratic state, must be founded
on these principles. It is indeed assumed that the value of the
happiness of each individual is the same as that of every other; but as
there must be occasions where there are advantages which all can not
enjoy, there must be general rules for regulating a selection.
Otherwise, there would be constant scrambling among those of equal
claims, and brute force must be the final resort; in which case, the
strongest would have the best of every thing. The democratic rule, then,
is, that superiors in age, station, or office have precedence of
subordinates; age and feebleness, of youth and strength; and the feebler
sex, of more vigorous man.*
*The universal practice of this nation, in thus giving precedence to
woman has been severely commented on by foreigners, and by some who
would transfer all the business of the other sex to women, and then have
them treated like men. But we hope this evidence of our superior
civilization and Christianity may increase rather than diminish.
There is, also, a style of deportment and address which is
appropriate to these different relations. It is suitable for a superior
to secure compliance with his wishes from those subordinate to him by
commands; but a subordinate must secure compliance with his wishes from
a superior by requests. (Although the kind and considerate manner to
subordinates will always be found the most effective as well as the
pleasantest, by those in superior station.) It is suitable for a parent,
teacher, or employer to admonish for neglect of duty; but not for an
inferior to adopt such a course toward a superior. It is suitable for a
superior to take precedence of a subordinate, without any remark; but
not for an inferior, without previously asking leave, or offering
an apology. It is proper for a superior to use language and manners of
freedom and familiarity, which would be improper from a subordinate to a
superior.
The want of due regard to these proprieties occasions a great defect
in American manners. It is very common to hear children talk to their
parents in a style proper only between companions and equals; so, also,
the young address their elders; those employed, their employers; and
domestics, the members of the family and their visitors, in a style
which is inappropriate to their relative positions. But courteous
address is required not merely toward superiors; every person desires to
be thus treated, and therefore the law of benevolence demands such
demeanor toward all whom we meet in the social intercourse of life. "Be
ye courteous," is the direction of the apostle in reference to our
treatment of all.
Good manners can be successfully cultivated only in early life and
in the domestic circle. There is nothing which depends so much upon
habit as the constantly
recurring proprieties of good breeding; and if a child grows up without
forming such habits, it is very rarely the case that they can be formed
at a later period. The feeling that it is of little consequence how we
behave at home if we conduct ourselves properly abroad, is a very
fallacious one. Persons who are careless and ill-bred at home may
imagine that they can assume good manners abroad; but they mistake.
Fixed habits of tone, manner, language, and movements can not be
suddenly altered; and those who are ill-bred at home, even when they try
to hide their bad habits, are sure to violate many of the obvious rules
of propriety, and yet be unconscious of it.
And there is nothing which would so effectually remove prejudice
against our democratic institutions as the general cultivation of
good-breeding in the domestic circle. Good manners are the exterior of
benevolence, the minute and constant exhibitions of "peace and
good-will;" and the
nation, as well as the individual, which most excels in the external
demonstration, as well as the internal principle, will be most respected
and beloved.
It is only the training of the family state according to its true
end and aim that is to secure to woman her true position and rights.
When the family is instituted by marriage, it is man who is the head and
chief magistrate by the force of his physical power and requirement of
the chief responsibility; not less is he so according to the Christian
law, by which, when differences arise, the husband has the deciding
control, and the wife is to obey. "Where love is, there is no law;" but
where love is not, the only dignified and peaceful course is for the
wife, however much his superior, to "submit, as to God and not to man."
But this power of nature and of religion, given to man as the
controlling head, involves the distinctive duty of the family state,
self-sacrificing love. The
husband is to "honor" the wife, to love her as himself, and thus account
her wishes and happiness as of equal value with his own. But more than
this, he is to love her "as Christ loved the Church;" that is, he is to
"suffer" for her, if need be, in order to support and elevate and
ennoble her.
The father then is to set the example of self-sacrificing love and
devotion; and the mother, of Christian obedience when it is required.
Every boy is to be trained for his future domestic position by labor and
sacrifices for his mother and sisters. It is the brother who is to do
the hardest and most disagreeable work, to face the storms and perform
the most laborious drudgeries. In the family circle, too, he is to give
his mother and sister precedence in all the conveniences and comforts of
home life.
It is only those nations where the teachings and example of Christ
have had most influence that man has ever assumed his obligations of
self-sacrificing benevolence in the family. And even in Christian
communities, the duty of wives to obey their husbands has been more
strenuously
urged than the obligations of the husband to love his wife "as Christ
loved the Church."
Here it is needful to notice that the distinctive duty of obedience
to man does not rest on women who do not enter the relations of married
life. A woman who inherits property, or who earns her own livelihood,
can institute the family state, adopt orphan children and employ
suitable helpers in training them; and then to her will appertain the
authority and rights that belong to man as the head of a family. And
when every woman is trained to some self-supporting business, she will
not be tempted to enter the family state as a subordinate, except by
that love for which there is no need of law.
These general principles being stated, some details in regard to
domestic manners will be enumerated.
In the first place, there should be required in the family a strict
attention to the rules of precedence, and those modes of address
appropriate to the various relations to be sustained. Children should
always be required to offer their superiors, in age or station, the
precedence in all comforts and conveniences, and always address them in
a respectful tone and manner. The custom of adding, "Sir," or "Ma'am,"
to "Yes," or "No," is valuable, as a perpetual indication of a
respectful recognition of superiority. It is now going out of fashion,
even among the most well bred people; probably from a want of
consideration of its importance. Every remnant of courtesy of address,
in our customs, should be carefully cherished, by all who feel a value
for the proprieties of good breeding.
If parents allow their children to talk to them, and to the grown
persons in the family, in the same style in which they address each
other, it will be in vain to hope for the courtesy of manner and tone
which good breeding demands in the general intercourse of society. In a
large family, where the elder children are grown up, and the younger are
small, it is important to require the latter to treat the
elder in some sense as superiors. There are none so ready as young
children to assume airs of equality; and if they are allowed to treat
one class of superiors in age and character disrespectfully, they will
soon use the privilege universally. This is the reason why the youngest
children of a family are most apt to be pert, forward, and unmannerly.
Another point to be aimed at is, to require children always to
acknowledge every act of kindness and attention, either by words or
manner. If they are so trained as always to make grateful
acknowledgments, when receiving favors, one of the objectionable
features in American manners will be avoided.
Again, children should be required to ask leave, whenever they wish
to gratify curiosity, or use an article which belongs to another. And if
cases occur, when they can not comply with the rules of good-breeding,
as, for instance, when they must step between a person and the fire, or
take the chair of an older person, they should be taught either to ask
leave, or to offer an apology.
There is another point of good-breeding, which can not, in all
cases, be understood and applied by children in its widest extent. It is
that which requires us to avoid all remarks which tend to embarrass,
vex, mortify, or in any way wound the feelings of another. To notice
personal defects; to allude to others' faults, or the faults of their
friends; to speak disparagingly of the sect or party to which a person
belongs; to be inattentive when addressed in conversation; to contradict
flatly; to speak in contemptuous tones of opinions expressed by another;
all these are violations of the rules of good-breeding, which children
should be taught to regard. Under this head comes the practice of
whispering and staring about, when a teacher, or lecturer, or clergyman
is addressing a class or audience. Such inattention is practically
saying that what the person is uttering is not worth attending to; and
persons of real good-breeding always avoid it. Loud talking and laughing
in a large assembly, even when no exercises are going on; yawning and
gaping in company; and not looking in the face a person who is
addressing you, are deemed marks of ill-breeding.
Another branch of good manners relates to the duties of hospitality.
Politeness requires us to welcome visitors with cordiality; to offer
them the best accommodations; to address conversation to them; and to
express, by tone and manner, kindness and respect. Offering the hand to
all visitors at one's own house is a courteous and hospitable custom;
and a cordial shake of the hand, when friends meet, would abate much of
the coldness of manner ascribed to Americans.
Another point of good breeding refers to the conventional rules of
propriety and good taste. Of these, the first class relates to the
avoidance of all disgusting or offensive personal habits: such as
fingering the hair; obtrusively using a toothpick, or carrying one in
the mouth after the needful use of it; cleaning the nails in presence of
others; picking the nose; spitting on carpets; snuffing instead of using
a handkerchief, or using the article in an offensive manner; lifting up
the boots or shoes, as some men do, to tend them on the knee, or to
finger them: all these tricks, either at home or in society, children
should be taught to avoid.
Another topic, under this head, may be called
table manners. To persons of
good-breeding, nothing is more annoying than violations of the
conventional proprieties of the table. Reaching over another person's
plate; standing up, to reach distant articles, instead of asking to have
them passed; using one's own knife and spoon for butter, salt, or sugar,
when it is the custom of the family to provide separate utensils for the
purpose; setting cups with the tea dripping from them, on the
table-cloth, instead of the mats or small plates furnished; using the
table-cloth instead of the napkins; eating fast, and in a noisy manner;
putting
large pieces in the mouth; looking and eating as if very hungry, or as
if anxious to get at certain dishes; sitting at too great a distance
from the table, and dropping food; laying the knife and fork on the
table-cloth, instead of on the edge of the plate; picking the teeth at
table: all these particulars children should be taught to avoid.
It is always desirable, too, to train children, when at table with
grown persons, to be silent, except when addressed by others; or else
their chattering will interrupt the conversation and comfort of their
elders. They should always be required, too, to wait in silence, till
all the older persons are helped.
When children are alone with their parents, it is desirable to lead
them to converse and to take this as an opportunity to form proper
conversational habits. But it should be a fixed rule that, when
strangers are present, the children are to listen in silence and only
reply when addressed. Unless this is secured, visitors will often be
condemned to listen to puerile chattering, with small chance of the
proper attention due to guests and superiors in age and station.
Children should be trained, in preparing themselves for the table or
for appearance among the family, not only to put their hair, face, and
hands in neat order, but also their nails, and to habitually attend to
this latter whenever they wash their hands.
There are some very disagreeable tricks which many children practice
even in families counted well-bred. Such, for example, are drumming with
the fingers on some piece of furniture, or humming a tune while others
are talking, or interrupting conversation by pertinacious questions, or
whistling in the house instead of out-doors, or speaking several at once
and in loud voices to gain attention. All these are violations of
good-breeding, which children should be trained to avoid, lest they
should not only annoy as children, but practice the same kind of ill
manners when mature. In all assemblies for public debate, a chairman or
moderator is appointed whose business it is to see that only one person
speaks at a time, that no one interrupts a person when speaking, that no
needless noises are made, and that all indecorums are avoided. Such an
officer is sometimes greatly needed in family circles.
Children should be encouraged freely to use lungs and limbs
out-doors, or in hours for sport in the house. But at other times, in
the domestic circle, gentle tones and manners should be cultivated. The
words gentleman and
gentlewoman came originally from
the fact that the uncultivated and ignorant classes used coarse and loud
tones, and rough words and movements; while only the refined circles
habitually used gentle tones and gentle manners. For the same reason,
those born in the higher circles were called "of gentle blood." Thus it
came that a coarse and loud voice, and rough, ungentle manners, are
regarded as vulgar and plebeian.
All these things should be taught to children, gradually, and with
great patience and gentleness. Some parents, with whom good manners are
a great object, are in danger of making their children perpetually
uncomfortable, by suddenly surrounding them with so many rules that they
must inevitably violate some one or other a great part of the time. It
is much better to begin with a few rules, and be steady and persevering
with these, till a habit is formed, and then take a few more, thus
making the process easy and gradual. Otherwise, the temper of children
will be injured; or, hopeless of fulfilling so many requisitions, they
will become reckless and indifferent to all.
If a few brief, well-considered, and sensible rules of good manners
could be suspended in every school-room, and the children all required
to commit them to memory, it probably would do more to remedy the
defects of American manners and to advance universal good-breeding than
any other mode that could be so easily adopted.
But, in reference to those who have enjoyed advantages
for the cultivation of good manners, and who duly estimate its
importance, one caution is necessary. Those who never have had such
habits formed in youth are under disadvantages which no benevolence of
temper can altogether remedy. They may often violate the tastes and
feelings of others, not from a want of proper regard for them, but from
ignorance of custom, or want of habit, or abstraction of mind, or from
other causes which demand forbearance and sympathy, rather than
displeasure. An ability to bear patiently with defects in manners, and
to make candid and considerate allowance for a want of advantages, or
for peculiarities in mental habits, is one mark of the benevolence of
real good-breeding.
The advocates of monarchical and aristocratic institutions have
always had great plausibility given to their views, by the seeming
tendencies of our institutions to insubordination and bad manners. And
it has been too indiscriminately conceded, by the defenders of the
latter, that such are these tendencies, and that the offensive points in
American manners are the necessary result of democratic principles.
But it is believed that both facts and reasoning are in opposition
to this opinion. The following extract from the work of De Tocqueville,
the great political philosopher of France, exhibits the opinion of an
impartial observer, when comparing American manners with those of the
English, who are confessedly the most aristocratic of all people.
He previously remarks on the tendency of aristocracy to make men
more sympathizing with persons of their own peculiar class, and less so
toward those of lower degree; and he then contrasts American manners
with the English, claiming that the Americans are much the more affable,
mild, and social. "In America, where the privileges of birth never
existed and where riches confer no peculiar rights on their possessors,
men acquainted with each other are very ready to frequent the same
places, and find neither peril nor disadvantage in the free interchange
of their thoughts.
If they meet by accident, they neither seek nor avoid intercourse; their
manner is therefore natural, frank, and open.If their demeanor is often
cold and serious, it is never haughty or constrained." But an
"aristocratic pride is still extremely great among the English; and as
the limits of aristocracy are still ill-defined, every body lives in
constant dread, lest advantage should be taken of his familiarity.
Unable to judge, at once, of the social position of those he meets, an
Englishman prudently avoids all contact with him. Men are afraid, lest
some slight service rendered should draw them into an unsuitable
acquaintance; they dread civilities, and they avoid the obtrusive
gratitude of a stranger, as much as his hatred."
Thus, facts seem to show
that when the most aristocratic nation in the world is compared, as to
manners, with the most democratic, the judgment of strangers is in favor
of the latter. And if good manners are the outward exhibition of the
democratic principle of impartial benevolence and equal rights, surely
the nation which adopts this rule, both in social and civil life, is the
most likely to secure the desirable exterior. The aristocrat, by his
principles, extends the exterior of impartial benevolence to his own
class only; the democratic principle requires it to be extended
to all.
There is reason, therefore, to hope and expect more refined and
polished manners in America than in any other land; while all the
developments of taste and refinement, such as poetry, music, painting,
sculpture, and architecture, it may be expected, will come to as high a
state of perfection here as in any other nation.
If this country increases in virtue and intelligence, as it may,
there is no end to the wealth which will pour in as the result of our
resources of climate, soil, and navigation, and the skill, industry,
energy, and enterprise of our countrymen. This wealth, if used as
intelligence and virtue dictate, will furnish the means for a superior
education to all
classes, and every facility for the refinement of taste, intellect, and
feeling.
Moreover, in this country, labor is ceasing to be the badge of a
lower class; so that already it is disreputable for a man to be "a lazy
gentleman." And this feeling must increase, till there is such an
equalization of labor as will afford all the time needful for every
class to improve the many advantages offered to them. Already through
the munificence of some of our citizens, there are literary and
scientific advantages offered to all classes, rarely enjoyed elsewhere.
In most of our large cities and towns, the advantages of education, now
offered to the poorest classes, often without charge, surpass what, some
years ago, most wealthy men could purchase for any price. And it is
believed that a time will come when the poorest boy in America can
secure advantages, which will equal what the heir of the proudest
peerage can now command.
The records of the courts of France and Germany, (as detailed by the
Duchess of Orleans,) in and succeeding the brilliant reign of Louis the
Fourteenth--a period which was deemed the acme of elegance and
refinement--exhibit a grossness, a vulgarity, and a coarseness, not to
be found among the very lowest of our respectable poor. And the
biography of the English Beau Nash, who attempted to reform the manners
of the gentry, in the times of Queen Anne, exhibits violations of the
rules of decency among the aristocracy, which the commonest yeoman of
this land would feel disgraced in perpetrating.
This shows that our lowest classes, at this period, are more refined
than were the highest in aristocratic lands, a hundred years ago; and
another century may show the lowest classes, in wealth, in this country,
attaining as high a polish as adorns those who now are leaders of good
manners in the courts of kings.
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