Formed by a combination in equal proportions of the three primitive
colors in equal intensity, is the color of despair. As mourning, it is
only suitable for those who despair of the future of their friends; but
it is preëminently unsuitable to be worn for those who die in Christian
faith with a Christian hope. Despite its gloomy hue, it has almost
become a sacred color among Christian nations, being worn as the dress
of the priest in his ministerial office, and doubly hallowed from its
association with the dead.
Black, as an ornamental color, should be below all others, for artistic
effect. An artistic dressmaker places the dark or black plaids or
stripes beneath the others. This natural correspondence is almost
universally recognized among enlightened nations in clothing for the
feet. They not only look smaller and more tasteful in black shoes than
in colored, but economy also sanctions them as more useful. The
universal tendency of the nineteenth century is to utilitarianism; the
one question asked is: What is the use? and in use is beauty ever found.
Ethnological investigation shows that black or dark-colored races have
invariably preceded settlement by the whites. This is in accordance with
the law of color above laid down, viz., that, _artistically_, black is
below the other colors (and now, in order that I may not be
misunderstood, I explicitly say that because, _artistically_, black is
the lowest color, it by no means follows that I deem black or olive or
yellow races subjects for slavery, or unworthy of social and political
rights). In accordance with the above axiom, savage and half-civilized
races are found to be at the present day black haired and black eyed. I
will also venture the assertion that nine tenths of all the people in
the world have black hair.
The Hindoo legend of the eighth incarnation of Vishnu under the name of
Crishna, makes him then of a bluish-black color, which the name Crishna
signifies. His supposititious father, Wanda, said:
'When I named him Crishna, on account of his color, the priest told
me he must be the god who had taken different bodies, red, white,
yellow, and black, in his various incarnations, and now he had
assumed a black color again, since in black all colors are
absorbed.'
Although among Caucasian nations, and especially in cosmopolitan
America, we do not adduce intellectual superiority from the shades or
degrees of whiteness, yet it is said of the Moors that the more the
color approaches the _black_, the handsomer and of more decisive
character are the men.
It is a physiological fact brought to light partially through the
census, that black-eyed races and black-eyed people are more subject to
blindness than others. It has also been shown that black-eyed men are
not as good marksmen as blue-eyed or light-eyed men.
Not only are different races of men subject to different diseases, but
statistics prove that among Caucasian nations, complexion and disease
are in some way connected, as for instance, consumption is more rife
among dark-haired and dark-eyed people than others, and more rapid with
those dark-haired and dark-eyed people who have very fair complexion. As
the difference between golden and black hair lies in that there is in
the one case an excess of sulphur and oxygen with a deficiency of
carbon, and in the other an excess of carbon and a deficiency of sulphur
and oxygen, it can easily be seen why such deficiency or excess, if
arising from idiosyncrasy of the system, should predispose to dissimilar
diseases. But here a wide field yet lies open for experimental and
physiological research.