VII On Beauty
“La beaute’ pour moi c’est la divinite’ visible, c’est le bonheur palpable, c’est le ciel descendu sur terre.”
—Theophile Gautier
Beauty, they say, is but skin-deep. That is quite deep enough to enslave mankind. As a matter of fact, it is much deeper: for, to say nothing of health and good-spirits,
Beneath true beauty lies an admirable or a loveable character. And yet—or, perhaps, and therefore—
If by some mischance beauty should arouse our resentment, with what different eyes we regard it!
The feeling for beauty is probably more highly developed in man than in woman. (N. B. Perhaps this is the source of the beauty of women.) Nevertheless,
It is a question that perhaps will never be settled, how much value should be placed upon mere beauty. For
Man soon tires of mere beauty. In fact, man, the inconstant creature, soon tires of mere anything.
Beauty should never be analyzed. At sight of graceful neck, who speaks of “musculus sterno-cleido-mastoideus”; at touch of moist red lips, who thinks upon the corpuscles of Paccini?
More women are wooed for their complexions than for their characters.
Could women only know it, nothing can add to their charms: how provokingly delightful is the uniformed demureness of an hospital nurse beside the elaborate bedizenments of a woman of fashion!
The most beautiful thing known among men is: a good woman. And this is not an anomaly.
She who captures a man by a single charm, be it even beauty, holds him by a weak chain.
Think not it was merely beauty that made Helen or Cleopatra historic.
Beauty is much, and grace is much; but there is a charm more subtle and potent than these.
Beauty without modesty is a rose without perfume: the petals may delight, but they lack an ineffable savor. Like a flower, too,
Though the tangible petals are numbered and comptable, the subtle perfume eludes the sense and is inexhaustible. For
Modesty is the exhalation of the soul: at once it enhances, as it refines, the potency of beauty. Nay more,
The sacrosanct aureole of modesty beautifies all it surrounds: though it diviner haze imperfection there is none. So,
Given a redolent balm, and the lowliest herb becomes treasured and precious. And
Each human soul has its own individual essence;
What folly were the violet to envy the rose! Since
Beauty is much, and grace is much, and mien and demeanor and wit; but a prepotent and psychic essence there is transcending the power of these. And,
As the suave and subtle essence is not distinct from, but springs from, the tangible and numerable petals, so the spirit perceives that its fleshy vesture is not a thing apart, to be donned or doffed at will, to b e contemned or left out of regards, but indeed at integral and inseparable portion of itself; for In the very woof and warp of flesh, sprit is immanent and enmeshed. Indeed—though in a mystic sense—
Vesture and wearer are mutually one. And yet
Love ever essays the task of seeking out the psychic wearer beneath the corporeal vesture—often with plaintive strife.
When seeker and sought make a mutual search—the starkest strife is condoned. But alack!
The mystic unity of the human soul is never wholly divulged—not even to love—not even to love.