*From The Excellent Woman of Proverbs 31 written in 1847 by Anne Pratt (1806-1893)
SHE PERCEIVETH THAT HER MERCHANDISE IS GOOD:
HER CANDLE GOETH NOT OUT BY NIGHT.
HER CANDLE GOETH NOT OUT BY NIGHT.
Proverbs 31:18
The regular and constant industry for which the excellent woman is commended, gives every reason for the conclusion that the work which she wrought, or which she superintended, would be of a good and valuable description. Diligence and perseverance in any pursuit give skill and taste in its performance, and enable the worker to excel one who is little interested in his work. Such a matron would, in time, become known and confided in for promptness and regularity, and for durable and beautiful workmanship; and as Boothroyd renders the passage, would see "that her traffic is profitable."
Dr. Clarke suggests that this burning of the lamp, however,implies rather a careful vigilance than a perpetual industry, in the Hebrew mistress.
Even as early as the time of Abraham we find a "burning lamp" mentioned, which appeared to him as a revelation from God (Gen 15:17). Gideon, when he led out his men against the host of Midian, bade them take their lamps in their pitchers; and from these early records of patriarchal times, even to the days of those whose pens concluded the pages of holy writ, we find the lamp and the oil continually referred to. Lamps were used in the tabernacle, and at marriage festivals were hung around the room, and cast down their light from above. Herodotus describes the lamps of the ancient Egyptians, as "small vases, filled with salt and olive oil, in which the wick floated and burned during the whole night;"
In all ages, the lamp beaming from the chamber window on the dimness and gloom of the outward world, has awakened pleasurable and poetic associations in the mind of the traveller; and whether we are attracted by the small light of a cottage candle, seen from afar, or the still fainter lustre of an eastern lamp, yet our minds form some picture of the home within. The writer of the book of Proverbs, whose eye might rest on such a lamp, would imagine a home of industrious application.