Moral Pitfalls to be Shunned.
By Editor
Some time since an article on the subject of dress, from a stated correspondent, found its way to our columns, and elicited sundry responses, good, just and timely, but too numerous to publish. We have not dismissed the subject from thought, or deemed it of small moment, but the question, How can existing evils in this regard best be counteracted? is still unmet. It cannot be expected or desired that the taste of all classes should conform to one style or color, but we hope the time may yet come when women of good sense and correct principles, will observe plainness and simplicity of dress, ignoring all fashions that pander only to a love of vanity, display and extravagance. The thoughtful mind is made sad and sorrowful by the observations of an evening hour in the parlor of any fashionable hotel, at most of our summer resorts. To look for a moment at the evolutions of the execrable round dance—a gentleman, perhaps a libertine, lifting the dress of a young lady and holding it with scrupulous care, lest it impede the motion of the light, fantastic toe; while his attitude and that of his fair partner are as offensive to true delicacy as some of the pen-pictures of Eugene Sue! Mothers, and their young, innocent daughters, if not participants, are lookers on. Similar scenes are enacted and re-enacted before the gaze of thousands, night after night, and the amount of dressing and decoration required for these occasions is sufficient to engross the thought and time needed for higher aims, to the utter exclusion of whatsoever things are true, lovely and of good report. The views expressed in the following well-written article, in the Evangelist, are timely. We are glad to see the facts alluded to, duly noticed by the press generally, both secular and religious.—Advocate and Guardian. REBUKE FROM THE RIGHT QUARTER.—One of the most demoralizing things of the present day, is the style of female dress, adopted by people who consider themselves the very “pinks of fashion.” It is demoralizing both from its extravagance and its immodesty. It costs a fortune to pay for the toilet of one of these exquisites, which is got up regardless of expense. The laces and jewelry, and fripperies of every kind that a fashionable lady puts on her person to go to a ball or a grand party, would support a poor family for a year. This is a very moderate estimate. Indeed, nine-tenths of the ministers of the gospel in this country preach from one year’s end to the other for less than is thrown away on the gaudy wings of one of those butterflies of society. The effect, as might be supposed, is terrible. Many a man is ruined—is made a bankrupt and a beggar, by trying to support the extravagance of his wife and daughters. Ah, worse than this—many of those daughters, bred to elegance and soft effeminacy, are brought to shame by this education of folly. They cannot toil, neither do they spin, and not a few, at last, after feebly struggling against temptation, sell their souls to keep up a little longer a life of idleness and luxury. But we forbear—we shut our eyes to that gulf of infamy in which so many daughters of beauty and fashion sink, and are lost forever. But many of these new styles of dress are demoralizing—not only from their costliness, but their indecency. Women appear in public with bare arms and necks, exposing themselves to the stare of vulgar men, in a way that, to say the least, is extremely indelicate. In Paris the thing has run riot, and women that call themselves respectable appear in fashionable drawing107rooms in a costume that would better become Fanny Ellsler on the stage. We are glad to see that some of the ladies of high rank in Paris feel proper disgust at such exhibitions. We read in the foreign papers that at a late entertainment, given by Madam Troplong, wife of one of the Ministers of the Emperor, a lady appeared in a costume so grossly indecent that Madam Troplong felt it due to her own self-respect to resent it as an insult, and at once ordered the servant to show her to her carriage! These disgusting fashions have not made as much progress in England, but they are beginning to appear there, and we are glad to see that they are promptly rebuked by the highest lady in the land. It is reported that the Queen has expressed herself very strongly respecting that style of female attire which appears to have been copied from the frequenters of the lowest Parisian theaters. The story is, that a person was recently presented in a costume so unusually indecent, that her Majesty, with that true genuine taste that has always characterized her, gave evident indications of her disgust at such an exhibition; and at once directed that the person should never be received again.