Page:Personal beauty how to cultivate and preserve it in accordance with the laws of health (1870).djvu/279

 wisdom of both Jews and Greeks, was clearly of this opinion when he said (1 Corinthians xi. 14):—

"Doth not even nature itself teach you that if a man have long hair it is a shame unto him?" Meaning, evidently, that nature had reserved for the other sex superior strength and durability of the hair.

If this is so, then the argument against cutting does not find support here. Moreover, a wide and carefully noted experience shows that the hair is strengthened, and its growth is more rapid, if frequently clipped. One of those pains-taking Germans, whose patience is only equalled by their accuracy, tells us that if a man shaves every twelve hours, his beard will grow from six to twelve inches a year, but if he shaves only once in thirty-six hours, it will grow but from four to six inches in the same time. This is true in principle for the hair elsewhere.

We shall commence our precepts with childhood. It is known that there is a feeble circulation in a hair. It is not dead, but living, and constantly draws nourishment from the fluids with which its root is surrounded. The longer it is, the more it demands from its root. Therefore, in children, while it is well always to give the root enough to do, it is not well to overwork it. Their hair should be kept at a medium length, say from three to six inches, by monthly clippings, until they are fourteen or fifteen years of age. Then it may be allowed to grow.