Your ShelfYour Projects

Becoming Attire

13%

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jan 23, 1908

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 85, No. 4.

Read the full edition

Becoming Attire

By MRS. D. A. FITCH

MRS. D. A. FITCH
The master of fashions will never consent that its votaries be attired in modest garb, for should such be the case, much of his power over them would be ineffectual or lost entirely. Appetite has a strong hold on all, yet there are many who are willing to eat simply and inexpensively, if by so doing some means may be retained with which to purchase a few more ornaments to adorn the person.
Since the character must shine out through face and action, how much more important the forming of right character than the spending of time in needless adornment and ornamentation. “Beauty unadorned is most adorned.”
One who had recently found the Saviour, as he reveals himself to the children of men in these later times, was asked what had become of her jewelry. The answer came, sweetly, “I have no need for it since I put on the Lord Jesus; he is ornament enough.” When the heart is really in love with the Saviour, the joy of dispensing dimes and dollars to help others to become acquainted with him, will greatly overbalance the satisfaction of appearing like the world, and therefore showing who is king of the life and soul.
Do we feel as great burden for the welfare of souls, and as much willingness to work for them when we are fashionably attired, as when we are consistently dressed? In the days gone by, when many yards of cloth were cut into ruffling, a pastor asked a dress-making member, “Do you feel as much like talking the truth when putting twenty yards of goods into a dress as when you were using only half as much?” The answer was frankly given: “No.” If this is true of the seamstress, what about the wearer?
A father said: “Daughter, if you are as careful of your character as you are of your house, you will be a noble woman.” As character is more important than house or dress, shall we not devote our time to its formation, and permit furnishings and adornments to be incidental and secondary? “In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broidered hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array; but . . . with good works.” 1 Tim. 2:9, 10.
Glendale, Cal.