Page:Woman in Art.djvu/82

WOMAN IN ART of its glistening petals almost pulses in the sunlight, so dazzling is its purity. The distilled drop of honey in the corolla, the gold dust of the stamens, the graceful curve and droop of the petals—a moment ago all were a sealed bud e'er the magic of light unclasped it, so softly, you would not have seen it had your eyes been diverted a moment, if you had not been watching and considering. They toil not, neither do they spin—not for their beauty, they are as God made them.

The masterpiece of the Creator is the human body—but that is only part of it—the everlasting spirit within, made in His likeness, to be worked and polished in earth's lapidary; that is the marvel and objective of creation.

Why? Because "Ye are the temple of the living God."

Your body is sacred. Treat it accordingly. In art, in literature, in life.

A babe is a bud of beauty. Form, flesh, curves, dimples, moist wisps and glint of curls, skin like a rose petal, witchery and sparkle of eyes, sensitive lips that speak without words, hands and feet that make their way into the sanctuary of your heart before they know how to use them, motions that are grace itself, with a heart and mind pure and guileless, for a baby's heart is new.

Your own thought of a lovely figure is, perhaps, more lovely than any developed figure you ever saw in marble or on canvas, for your thought lends an ethereal atmosphere though you may not be able to express it in art.

The tender blending of light and shade, curves and color-tones of flesh, pulsing warmth and glow radiating from the spirit within, chaste in idea, in subject—such a nude has a charm and conveys a sacredness of the body as the work of the Creator.

The very illusiveness of spirit gives the greatest difficulty in painting the nude, and has caused that branch of delineation to be the high-water mark of excellence among painters. When they cannot reach it, the public has the opportunity to see poor or bad art. But there is no excuse for exhibiting bad art, bad painting, or indecent and suggestive subjects.

A critic who has the courage of his convictions has said that "the women of America should refuse to patronize any art exhibit in the future at which is shown a suggestive nude." Again: "The cornerstone of civilization is Woman, because she is the cornerstone of the ; hence note the responsibility."

The moulding of thought, appreciation of values, of character, is within the mother's power and privilege even more than in the power of the man.

A graduate from one of the largest art schools in this country was being commiserated because her marriage had seemingly put a quietus on the very promising work of her student days. 60