The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1903-01-10
IJmdn's WorId. e esss.s sss
Specially Prepared for Our Feminine Readera

he-be an artist, is able to- comprehend
all esthetic forms, the organism of each
being adapted to appreciate certain
things. Michael Angelo comprehended
certain forms which Raphael repealed
with horror And without being either
a Raphael or a Michael Angelo, each OF
us is Raphaelesque or Michael Angel
esque.
Among the secondary and complex
forms of womanly beauty 1 will men,
ton but two-the sentimental and the
! capricious types. In the sentimental
type the forces of thought and affec-
ton predominant more than the lines
and curves, and in the woman who has
it we find less satisfaction for our
esthetic feelings than of others of a
superior and different type. In ex-
aggerating the muscular feebleness of
woman so as to give her an invalid
aspect, in eXaggerating the mobility of
her features to a point of neuroism,
we find certain delicate and most fas-
cinating types, which are especially
pleasing to this nervous age. 1t is
most probable that the Greeks and the
Romans had no sentimental beauties,
! or at least that they were but slightly
admired. The Greeks were too robust
| and the Romans too strong to be able
to admire in their women anything
that would appear defective or I'M
sound.
The great fascination exerted by sem
timental beauty is due to two princi-
pal elements: To the admiration which
everything fragile eXcites as something
precious, and to the compassion which
creature apparently in suffering or
accustomed to pain inspires. This form
of beauty is absolutely wanting in in
IL
savage life destroys in their first years
all frail and delicate creatures, who,
thanks to the charity of civilized peo-
pies, can resist and prove victorious in
the struggle for existence.
The capricious or piquant beauty is
difficult to define, but each person in
his own mind has a confused idea of
it. In this type there is no need for
perfect symmetry in the lines, but, on
the contrary, a certain light asym
metry with incongruities and imperti-
nences which seem to defy the most
elemental laws of esthetics, captivate
the eye, amuse and pleas us. The in
terest attaching to this beauty carries
us to the loftier fields of thought and
sentiment: it is to this order of emo
tons that those excited by capricious
beauty belong. The want of symmetry
and harmony in the capricious type of
beauty must be slight under pain of
passing from beauty to LONELINESS.
Nothing so contributes to the |
piquancy of the capricious type as the |
tip of the nose being slightly retrousse. |
There may be, besides, a contrast in |
the colorings of the eye and the hair |
blond hair and black eyes, black hair |
and blue eyes. There are also choice |
peculiarities, like dimples in the cheeks |
or chin. The ancients said they were |
imprints of the fingers of love. Even /
the savages are not insensible to the |
charms of this variety of beauty. The
dimples on the hand belong to an
other category, but they always ex-
press harmonious division of the adj
pose matter of the body over its sur
face.
One sub-variety of the oapricious
style of beauty is the shadowy, latent,
or hidden type. Here beauty does not
strike US at first sight, but is discov-
cred progressively by observation. The
admiration is excited slowly and it
persists. To our esthetic pleasure is
added the satisfaction to our pride
On making the discovery of an I'M
known beauty.
All varieties of beauty are not to be
'ound in single Individual although
this miracle is accomplished
-one woman join to classic beauty a
beauty. the beauty of grace,
md the sentimental beauty even the
'apricious beauty but with the latter
t is through the art of coquetry, which
transforms her figure and represents
alternately every form of feminine
beauty.
Some women are so terribly beauti-
ul that they have ten physiognomies
n a day. Whoever loves them and
Possesses them may be said to have
90 women in one.
Such beauties are as rare as geniuses.