Page:Caplin - Health and Beauty1864 - 018.png

18 course of our reading met with one single obser­vation on the true principle of a scientific adaptation of the dress to the body. Nature has taken care to suit the external envelope to the internal organs of the frame; has made even the bones of the chest so yielding that the soft and delicate organs which are encased in them may have a free develop­ment: but the designers of dress have ever been interfering with her method; and for this simple reason—because dressing has been an art in which the fashion and cost of the clothing have been the objects of display. Now, in our conception, there should be a science rather than an art of dressing, and that, too, founded upon certain principles of adaptation by which the external clothing shall dis­play the full beauty of the naturally well-formed figure; and, in cases where nature has not bestowed a perfect form, the defect should be repaired by supporting the weak organs, and restoring the figure according to our idea of what it was intended that that particular body should be. Every one, we sup­pose, will admit that this is desirable, and what we hope to accomplish in this work is a plain and practical exposition of those anatomical, physiolo­gical, artistic, and mechanical principles which must guide us in all successful efforts to attain this object.