The bloom of opening flowers, unsullied beauty,
Softness and sweetest innocence she wears,
And looks like Nature in the world's first Spring.
--_Rowe._
Bad complexions cause more heartaches than crushed ambitions and cases
of sudden poverty. The reason is plain. Ordinary troubles roll away
from the mind of a cheery, energetic woman like water from a duck's
back, but beauty worries--well! they have the most amazingly insistent
way of sticking to one. You may say you won't think of them, but you do
just the same.
It was always thus, and thus it always will be.
Diogenes searched untiringly for an honest man--so they say. Woman,
bless her dear, ambitious heart, seeks with unabating energy the ways
and means of becoming beautiful.
After all, they're not so hard to find when once the secret of it is
known. Like the keys and things rattling about in her undiscoverable
pocket, they're right with her. If she will but stop her fretting for a
moment, sit down and think, then gird on her armor and begin the
task--why, that's all that's needed.
There are three great rules for beauty. The first is diet, the second
bathing, and the third exercise. All can be combined in the one word
health. But, alas! how few of us have come into the understanding of
correct living! It is woman's impulse--so I have found--to buy a jar of
cream and expect a miracle to be worked on a bad complexion in one
brief night. How absurd, when the cause of the worry may be a bad
digestion, impure blood or general lack of vitality! One might just as
well expect a corn plaster to cure a bad case of pneumonia, or an eye
lotion to remedy locomotor ataxia. The cream may struggle bravely and
heal the little eruptions for a day or so, but how can it possibly
effect a permanent cure when the cause flourishes like a blizzard at
Medicine Hat or a steam radiator in the first warm days of April?
Cold cream, pure powders and certain harmless face washes are godsends
to womankind, but they can't do everything! They have their
limitations, just like any other good thing. You may have a perfect
paragon of a kitchen lady, whose angel food is more heavenly than
frapped snowflakes, but you can't really expect her to build you a
four-story house with little dofunnies on the cupolas. Of course not.
Angel cake is her limit! And that's the way with those lovely liquids
and things on your pretty spindle-legged dressing table. They can do a
good deal in the beautifying line, but they can't do everything. Give
them the help of perfect health and scrupulous cleanliness of the skin,
and lo! what wonders they will work!
There is but one way--and it's so simple--of making oneself good to
look upon. Resolve to live hygienically. There is nothing in the world
which works swifter toward a clear, glowing, fine-textured and
beautiful complexion than a simple, natural diet of grains and nuts and
fruits. But you women--oh! it positively pains me to think of the
broiled lobsters, the deviled crabs with tartar sauce, the pickles, and
the conglomerate nightmare-lunches that you consume. And yet you're
forever fussing over leathery skins, dark-circled eyes and a lack of
rosy pink cheeks. Oh, woman! woman! why aren't you wise?
Here are some rules. They're golden, too:
Eat with wisdom and good sense. That means to pension off the pie and
its companion workers of physical woe.
Take a tepid sponge bath every day, either upon arising in the morning
or just before going to bed.
Limit the hot scrubbings to one a week.
Exercise with regularity, and dress as a rational human being should.
Drink three pints of pure, distilled water every day.
See that the bedroom is well ventilated, and don't heap up the pillows
until you have a mountain range upon which to rest your poor, tired
head. A flat bed and a low pillow help toward a fine, straight figure
and a good carriage.
Keep your feet warm. Give those pretty round yellow silk garters to the
girl you hate, and invest in sensible hose supporters. If your
circulation is defective, wear wool stockings.
Don't fret. Bear in mind what Sheridan said:
"A night of fretful passion may consume
All that thou hast of beauty's gentle bloom;
And one distempered hour of sordid fear
Prints on thy brow the wrinkles of a year."
Then rest. Don't, I beg of you, live on the ragged edge of your nerve
force. You need quiet, and all you can get of it. We victims of
civilization go through life at a breakneck gallop, and it's an immense
mistake. Anyhow, those who know say so. And it sounds reasonable.
But, after all, the complexion is only a small part toward the making
of a beautiful woman. The hair must be kept sweet and clean and
healthy, and the teeth should be white and lovely. It was Rousseau, you
know, who said that no woman with good teeth could be ugly. Then the
hands and nails must have proper attention. Deep breathing should be
practiced daily and the body properly exercised. The carriage must be
graceful, the walk easy and without effort, the eyes bright, the
expression of the face cheerful and animated, the shoulders and head
well poised--but all these are different stories. There's a chapter in
each one of them.
Above all, remember this one rule: Don't fret. Don't wear a look of
trouble and worry. Above everything else, remember those delicious
lines of the immortal bard:
"You have such a February face,
So full of frost, of storm, of cloudiness."
And after remembering, refrain.