Romantic Love and Personal Beauty / Their development, causal relations, historic and national peculiarities

by Henry T. Finck

Dr. Magnus suggests that the reason why we dislike decidedly green or yellow eyes is simply because they are of rare occurrence, and therefore appear anomalous; for in animals we do not hesitate to pronounce such eyes beautiful. He also explains ingeniously why it is that we are apt to attribute moral shortcomings to persons whose eyes are of a vague, dubious colour. Such eyes displease our æsthetic sense, and this displeasure we transfer to the moral sense, and thus confound and prejudice our judgment. In the same way our dislike of unusual green eyes disposes us to accuse their owners of irregularities of conduct. Moral: Keep your æsthetic and ethical judgments apart.

Conversely, in the case of snakes, our fear and horror make it difficult for us to appreciate the æsthetic charm of their colours. And all these cases show that the æsthetic sense, if properly understood and specialised, is independent of moral and utilitarian considerations: which knocks the bottom out of the theory of Alison, Jeffrey, and Co.

One more abnormality of colour in the iris must be referred to. It happens not infrequently that the colour of the two eyes is not alike, one being brown, the other blue or gray. In such cases, though each eye may be perfect in itself, we dislike the combination. What is the ground of this æsthetic dislike? Simply the fact that the dissimilarity of the eyes violates one of the fundamental laws of Beauty—the law of Symmetry, which demands that corresponding parts on the two sides of the body should harmonise.

(c) Movements of the Iris.—The jetblack pupil of the eye, as already noted, is not always of the same size. It becomes smaller if an excess of light causes the iris to relax, larger if diminution of light makes the iris contract its fibres. Another way of altering the size of the pupil is by gazing at a distant object, which causes it to enlarge, while gazing at a near object makes it smaller. According to Gratiolet and some other writers, there is still another way in which the pupil is affected, namely, through emotional excitement. Great fear, for instance, enlarges the pupil, according to Gratiolet. Dr. Magnus, however, remarks that, apart from the fact that some observers have denied that the pupil is affected by emotions, the alterations in its size are as a rule too insignificant to be noted by any but a trained observer; so that they could not play any important physiognomic rôle.

Yet a large pupil is everywhere esteemed a great beauty, and is often credited with a special power of amorous expression. “Widened pupils,” says Kollmann, “give the eye a tender aspect; they seem to increase its depth, and fascinate the spectator by the strangeness this imparts to the gaze. Oriental women put atropine into their eyes, which enlarges the pupil. They do this in order to give their eyes the soulful expression which they believe is imparted by large pupils, distinctly foreshadowing the joys of love.”

Whether emotionally expressive or not, so much is certain that large pupils are more beautiful than small ones, for the same reason that large eyes are more beautiful than small ones, i.e. because we cannot have too much of a thing of Beauty.

Finally, there is this to be said regarding the lustre, colour, and size of pupil and iris, that they emphasise the language of the eye. If we play a love-song on the piano, we may admire it; but if it is sung or played on the violoncello, it makes a doubly deep impression; and why? Because the superior sensuous beauty of the voice, or the amorous tone-colour of the ’cello, paints and gilds the bare fabric of the song. A small dull-coloured eye, similarly, may speak quite as definite a language of command or entreaty, pride or humility, as any other; but the flashing large pupil and the lustrous deep-dyed iris intensify the emotional impressiveness of this language a hundredfold, by adding the incalculable power of sensuous Beauty. Thus lustre and colour are for the visible music of the spheres what orchestration is to audible music.

(d) Movements of the Eyeball.—The socket of the eye contains (besides the fat-cushion in which the eyeball is imbedded, the blood-vessels, and other tissues) seven muscles; one for raising the upper lid, and six for moving the eyeball itself upwards, downwards, inwards, outwards, or forwards and obliquely. To the action of these muscles the eye owes much of its expressiveness.

It has been noted that elating emotions have a tendency to raise the features, depressing emotions to depress them. The eyeball is no exception. Persons who are elated by their real or apparent superiority to others turn their eyes habitually from the humble things beneath them; hence the muscle which turns the eyeball upwards has long ago received the name of “pride-muscle”; while its antipode, the musculus humilis, is so called because humility and modesty are characterised by a downward gaze.

The muscle which turns the eyeball towards the inner corner, nosewards, is much used by persons who are occupied with near objects. If this convergence of the eyes is too pronounced, it gives one a stupid expression; whereas, if moderate, the expression is one of great intellectual penetration, as Dr. Magnus points out. He believes that the trick, made use of by some portrait-painters, of making the eyes appear to follow you wherever you go depends on this medium degree of convergence of the eyes.