These are the teachings of the learned in the Science of Man; they are constantly supported by the experience of history. Beauty is and ever has been the Desire of all Nations. For it, in all time, men have counted as nought their honor, their gold, and their hopes of heaven. For it, they have poured their heart’s blood on a thousand stricken fields, and laughed at death and hell. Think you that the noblest of the race would have thus reckoned the world well lost, and paid all that, wisdom holds precious for a smile from the lips of loveliness, were there not some strange and wondrous compensation, some immortal and unearthly significance, in Beauty itself? There is such significance, and nowhere is it so visible as in the perfect female face and form. This is the most beautiful of all objects in nature or art. To it we turn to gaze, forgetting the works of the greatest masters which may be spread before us; unmindful of the sublimest scenes which mountain and lake may combine to show us. Nearer than anything else does it bring us to that Ideal World whose margin forever recedes as we approach it; louder in its presence sound the tinkling bells of that Fairyland which guards the fruition of our sweetest hopes and dreams. The beauty of woman has been the incentive of physical progress in the race and the inspiration of its noblest arts. It shadows forth the embodied ideal of humanity, and in its resistless strength binds men as slaves to its chariot. But does it confer happiness on the possessor? Sad and faithful is the reply of the poet,―― “In every land I saw, wherever light illumineth, Beauty and Anguish walking hand in hand The downward slope to death.” _La fatale donna di bellezza_, “the fatal gift of beauty,” says the proverb of the Italians. Perilous is the path of mortals who walk too near the gods. The brightest beacons are those which most attract the foul birds of night. The men or the women who shine beyond their fellows through the bounteous gifts of nature are the chosen targets for envy and hatred and calumny and all their ugly crew. In the clash of violent emotions excited by the radiance of fair faces, in the contention of love and jealousy, despair and passion, it is rare that the cause of it all escapes scot free. Her wisdom is also weakened by the adoration she receives; she assumes that it is for herself, forgetful that a passing disease or the accident of a moment may rob her of her charms forever. She has yet to learn that those alone are worthy of admiration to whom it is not a necessity.