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the brazen aureola painters have thrown around the 

 head of Christ and the Virgin, but it is appreciable, 

 and actively impresses the beholder. How was that 

 wonderful face obtained ? The handsome youth of 

 twenty has no such attraction his is all physical it 

 cost no effort it is what time effaces ; but that- 

 scholarly and cultivated countenance exhibited by the 

 man of fifty or sixty, or even seventy, is a work of 

 art. It is worthy of study; and the more it is ob- 

 served the more it is admired. In that maturity of 

 manly beauty are peace, plenty, and assurance. The 

 student in science or morals may show premature 

 wrinkles, but these lines are not repulsive they 

 seem to be the etchings of elves engaged in the por- 

 trayal of expression. The face as a whole may ex- 

 hibit the marks of care and sorrow, but they do not 

 detract from the interest centering there. The man 

 of fifty who has not passed through solemnizing 

 scenes, who has not been chastened by untoward 

 events, is a phenomenon, and not representative. 



I will not depict a face of fifty, wrung with mis- 

 fortune, pinched with selfishness, and warped by 

 avarice. Such visages are common as clods, and need 

 no delineation. Cultivated faces alone are worthy of 

 study, for they show a subjugation of the lower in- 

 stincts, and a forcing to the front of the higher in- 

 tellectual and moral qualities. A fine face costs a 

 lifetime of good thinking and well-doing; bad feat- 

 ures are the result of passive negligence. Every in- 

 dividual is largely responsible for facial expression. 

 The juvenile feature is the sport of time, but the 

 beauty of the mature face is a work of artistic elabora- 

 tion, the soul officiating as the divine limner. 



