MEN have, in all ages, thought to honour the objects of their regard, or of their worship, by endeavouring to embellish them. But the means which they have employed, whilst they do honour to their zeal, have often given a proof of their bad taste. Because gold is so much valued among us, we thought for a long time, that nothing else could be truly ornamental. Luxury and devotion have both displayed it with profusion; but riches do not constitute beauty. What was intended to be decorated is in fact debased. This abuse, which reigned particularly in the times of ignorance, has even exercised its power over the beard. Oriental pomp presents us at once with an example of this mistaken pride. Several potentates of those countries interwove the hair on their chin with gold thread and spangles. It is not without indignation that St. Chrysostom tells us of a king of Persia, who, in his time, followed this ridiculous custom. After reproaching the extravagant luxury of the fair-sex of Antioch, this evangelical doctor says: “If I should give you an account of a sort of luxury still more absurd than that of those women, who wear gold in their hair, load their lips and eye-brows with it, who, in short, are covered all over with this precious metal; don’t think I want to raise a laugh: what I am going to relate to you exists at this day; it is the king of Persia I mean to speak of. This monarch is not ashamed to wear a golden beard; all the hair of his chin is covered or interwoven with little plates of gold or threads of the same metal. This prince, with his face thus adorned, looks more like a monster than a man.”[45] Footnote 45: _Johannis Chrysostomi, in Epistolam ad Collossenses, Comment._ cap. iii. Homilia 8. This is not the sole example of this ridiculous ostentation: France, which, as all the world knows, has furnished models of extravagance in so many different lines, has not passed over this; it appears even that it had a tolerable long run. Several historians agree in saying, that the kings of the first race prided themselves in wearing a long beard all interwoven and set off with ribbands, and enriched with spangles and gold and silver threads. Whether this mode subsisted from the time of the first race of kings, or was brought from Asia during the crusades, it is certain, that, in the reign of Lewis XI. there is another example of it, which was followed only in imitation of a more ancient mode. The continuator of Monstrelet relates, that, at the funeral of the duke of Burgundy, who was killed at the battle of Nancy in 1476, the duke of Lorrain, his vanquisher, appeared with a false golden beard, in the same manner as the ancient knights. “He was,” says the historian, “dressed in mourning, and had a long, golden beard that reached down to his middle, _in commemoration of the ancient worthies_, and of the victory which he had gained over him.”