Dr. Knox will not refuse to be my auxiliary, as a grave auxiliary may be necessary to give consequence to a subject usually deemed so trivial. “Taste requires a congruity between the internal character and the external appearance,” says he; “and the imagination will involuntarily form to itself an idea of such a correspondence. First ideas are in general of considerable consequence; and I should, therefore, think it wise in the female world to take care that their appearance should not convey a forbidding idea to the most superficial observer.”
Another author shall speak for me besides this respected moralist. The very High Priest of the Graces, the discriminating Chesterfield, declared, that “a prepossessing exterior is a perpetual letter of recommendation.” To show how different such an exterior is from affectation and extravagance, is one object of these pages; and I hope that my fair and candid readers will, after perusal, lay them down with a conviction that beauty is a blessing, and is to be used with maidenly discretion; that modesty is grace; simplicity elegance; and consistency the charm which rivets the attracted heart of well-judging men.
That you have sought my sentiments on these subjects makes it easier to me to enter into the minute detail I meditate. Indeed, I have ever blamed, as impolitic, the austerity which condemns, without distinction, any attention to personal appearance. It is surely more reasonable to direct the youthful mind to that medium between negligence and nicety which will preserve the person in health and elegance, than, by leaving a young woman ignorant of the real and supposed advantages of these graces, render her liable to learn the truth in the worst way from strangers, who will either insult her aggravated deformity, or teach her to set off her before-obscured charms with, perhaps, meretricious assistance.
It is unjust and dangerous to hold out false lights to young persons; for, finding that their guides have, in one respect, designedly led them astray, they may be led likewise to reject as untrue all else they have been taught; and so nothing but disappointment, error, and rebellion can be the consequence.
Let girls advancing to womanhood be told the true state of the world with which they are to mingle. Let them know its real opinions on the subjects connected with themselves as women, companions, friends, relatives. Hide not from them what society thinks and expects on all these matters; but fail not to show them, at the same time, where the fashions of the day would lead them wrong—where the laws of heaven and man’s approving (though not always submitting) reason, would keep them right.
Let religion and morality be the foundation of the female character. The artist may then adorn the structure without any danger to its safety. When a girl is instructed on the great purposes of her existence,—that she is an immortal being, as well as a mortal woman,—you may, without fearing ill impressions, show her, that as we admire the beauty of the rose, as well as esteem its medicinal power, so her personal charms will be dear in the eyes of him whose heart is occupied by the graces of her yet more estimable mind. We may safely teach a well-educated girl, that virtue ought to wear an inviting aspect—that it is due to her excellence to decorate her comely apparel. But we must never cease to remember that it is VIRTUE we seek to adorn. It must not be a merely beautiful form; for that, if it possess not the charm of intelligence, the bond of rational tenderness, is a frame without a soul—a statue which we look on and admire, pass away and forget. We must impress upon the yet ingenuous maid, that while beauty attracts, its influence is transient, unless it presents itself as the harbinger of that good sense and principle which can alone secure the affection of a husband, the esteem of friends, and the respect of the world. Show her that regularity of features and symmetry of form are not essentials in the composition of the woman whom the wise man would select as the partner of his life. Seek, as an example, some one of your less fair acquaintance, whose sweet disposition, gentle manners, and winning deportment, render her the delight of her kindred, the dear solace of her husband. Show your young and lovely pupil what use this amiable woman has made of her few talents; and then call on her to cultivate her more extraordinary endowments to the glory of her Creator, the honor of her parents, and to the maintenance of her own happiness in both worlds. To do this, requires that her aims should be virtuous, and the means she employs to reach them of the same nature.
We know, from every record under heaven, from the sacred page to that of the heathen world, that woman was made to be the help-mate of man—that, by rendering herself pleasing in his sight, she is the assuager of his pains, the solacer of his wo, the sharer of his joys, the chief agent in the communication of his sublunary bliss. This is beautifully alluded to in the Book of Genesis, where the work of Creation is represented as incomplete, and the felicity of Paradise itself imperfect, till woman was bestowed to consummate its delights:—
“The world was sad! the garden was a wild;
And man, the hermit, sighed—till woman smiled.”
We have all read in the sacred oracles, that “a woman’s desire is unto her husband!” and for that tender relation, the first on earth, (for, before the bonds of relationship, man and woman became a wedded pair,) woman must leave father and mother, and cleave unto him alone. Hence, I shall no longer beg the question, whether it be not right that a chaste maid should adorn herself with the graces of youth and modesty, and, with a sober reference to the duties of her sex, present herself a candidate for the love and protection of manliness and virtue, in the most agreeable manner possible.
By making the fairness of the body the sign of the mind’s purity, man is imperceptibly attracted to the object designed for him by Heaven as the partner of his life, the future mother of his children, and the angel which is to accompany him into eternity. Hence, insignificant as the means may seem, the end is great; and poor as we may choose to consider them, we all feel their effects, and enjoy their sweetness.