Rensselaer Union, Volume 9, Number 31, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 April 1877 — Youths’ Department. [ARTICLE]

Youths’ Department.

a Talk about beauty. “ Amur, do you think it Is wrong to wish to be beautiful f” Something in the earnest look and tone, recalled another question asked by this sAme niece of (nine, years before when she was a wfic girl of seven." • > Then she had broken a long silence with, "Aunty, do you think the heatheh will be saved r* •■■< > j < .Evidently the years which made her almost a woman, had not settled every doubtful subject to her satisfaction.” . I looked into-tho face no longer childish,, but .childlike, and thought within myself that there was small peed for youth, and health, and innocence, to wish anything of the kind; but like a wise woman I kept such thoughts to myself, apd answered (after the manner Of my Nation) with another question. “ Why, May, do you wish to be beauttfhl?”

"Yes, Ido,” frankly, and with a kind of defiant shrug of the shodlders—“ and do you think It is wrong?” "• Here wAs an opportunity; and theretipon I 1 "made a small talk,” As an Indian Would say, Boinethlng 1 after this fhshion:’ 7 t ' ,! "No, I do not think it is wrong; hut there are so many other things so much better worth wishing for. I would a great deal rather be what is called 4 a fine-look-ing’ woman r thaa a beautiful woman. .1 would rather* have beauty of mind and of heart, than of person. "As a rule, which has few exceptions, a beauty is conscious, and vain, and empty-headed r the last as a matter of course, since she relies on her face rather than'on her brains. I have known, personally, only ope beautiful woman who was not spoiled by her own charms, and she had the rare grace of unconsciousness. She honestly thought herself plain-lookjng. “ Then, too, by one of the laws of compensation, beautiful people witi no more real true love thstn homely ■ -people win. Think over the persons you csire the most for, and you will'he stn*prtsMi ; to find Jiow little your liking aepends upon their looks; or rather how fair Mxeir faces have come to seem, because oPthe good hearts Which have expression there. We always see our loved ones through Love’s spectacles. As far back as l ean remember, that old saying was dinned in my ears; 1 < Handsome is that handsome does,’ and, I' used to woa~ der what it meant; now, thinking of many lovely lives which have illumined very plain features, I knave. i , 44 It is a common experience for persons going into strange places to think, ‘ How homely all the people attkf hut kindly fellowship nearly always changes , the opinion.:. v nh ui "Wouldyou like to know, my dear, where is the best -description of a truly noble woman I have ever, read ?—the one I would most like to. have you resemble ?” . May brightened up with a new interest, and her eyes said "yes,” though she did not interrupt with a word; and 1 continued: . - "Youwill flnd.it in the thirty-first chapter pf Proverbs, and you will dee there is pot one word said. about beauty except that it is vain; yet I am very sure such a woman .would have a beauty of the soul lasting bej oud the bloom of youth; all down through, years, and Into the. great hereafter.” , . There Was a moment’s 1 silence; whien my niece drew a long breath, (I'could not make it out if it was relief at the end of my sermon, jbir home deeper feeling,) and said: ~ ■ “Well, Aunty, you have your wish. You are not a beautiful woman, but yon are a very fine-looking worpan.” “I looked half indignantly into the upturned face. Could it be May was making fun of me ? But no; faintly discernible perched upon her nose, (that nose which would turn up a little, and on whose tip rested a tiny freckle, which last I had occasion to know, was May’s private "thorn in the flesh,”) were a pair pf the very 44 Love’s spectacles” I had been talking about, and through them I stood transfigured in her eyes Wide-Awake.