p. 8 | Modest Dress by F. M. W.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 11, 1913

Modest Dress

By F. M. W.

The apostle Peter considered it necessary in his day to sound a warning to the Christian believers against extravagant and extreme dress. He says:—

“Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives; while they behold your chaste conversation coupled with fear. Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel; but let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price. For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands.” 1 Peter 3:1-5.

This warning needs reiterating today. In fact, it was designed quite as much for this generation as for those living in the first century.

This is an age of excess and extravagance. On every side iniquity abounds. It is the evident purpose of Satan to lead men and women to depart from true standards in every department and phase of life's experiences, and to cause false standards of thought and practise to contribute as far and as fast as possible to the moral overthrow of the race.

Through the pride of life, the lust of the eyes, the love of the world, the human family are insidiously and oftentimes unconsciously led to pervert the way of purity and become a prey to Satan's snares in the end. The influence of dress is a powerful factor in the accomplishment of this purpose. That many of the extremes of fashion directly contribute to immodesty and impurity even men of the world admit. Low-necked dresses and gauze waists and hosiery have long been condemned by sober-minded persons.

Now comes the slit skirt and gauze skirt, still greater perversions of the modest standard of dress commended by the apostle. Justifiably the police in some cities have arrested the wearers of such costumes who appeared on the streets. That the styles are commended and adopted by some leaders of fashionable society shows the degeneracy of this superficial age.

Of the true source and character of

these immodest styles of apparel, Edward Bok, editor of the Ladies’ Home Journal, speaks in an article which he contributes to Collier’s of Aug. 30, 1913. Under the heading of “The Remedy for the Present Wave of Indecent Dressing,” Mr. Bok says, in part:—

Whatever may be the opinion of the present indecent styles in women's dress, or the impenetrable enigma of their adoption by even a portion of our heedless American women, we know where they come from, and in view of that fact the remedy lies in the hands of every decent American woman.

During the past five years in particular the Paris dressmakers have, step by step, shown the steady degeneration of their waning art in the so-called “Paris styles” which they have sent over here. Each year the tendency to lower the standards has become more strongly marked. But it must be said to the credit of the French gentlewoman that these “styles” are neither indorsed nor worn by her. She scorns them with contempt. They are the creations of the disordered minds of French dressmakers who have lost all sense of art and decency, have become pure commercialists, and who, laughing in their sleeves at the American women, are, as one of the greatest of them recently said, seeing how far they can go “in making fools of the American women.” No Frenchwoman of the slightest refinement wears these “styles:” they are the hall-mark of the women of the French underworld that frequent the Paris boulevards and the French race-courses. As Mme. Sarah Bernhardt said upon her last visit to America, it was a perfect amazement to her to see apparently decent American women dressed like the demi-monde of Paris.

Nor is this a matter of my own or any personal opinion: it is an incontrovertible fact known and acknowledged by every American buyer who goes to Paris and every one conversant with the French fashion situation. It is known to every woman of the underworld in America. As one of these recently said: “Here are a lot of girls and women who draw aside their skirts when they meet us, and yet are dressed exactly like us.” A walk along Fifth Avenue verifies this statement—that two classes of girls are today dressing exactly alike. A social service worker only a few days ago said that more decent girls had been approached during the last year by men in the streets of New York, under a misapprehension as to their standing, than ever before in her recollection.

Mr. Bok states that on the part of many clean-minded and clear-thinking women, in both Europe and America, there is a strong reaction of feeling against longer submitting to Parisian standards of dress. He urges that American women adopt a standard of their own, one consistent with good taste and becoming womanly modesty.

Whatever models of dress American women in general may adopt, the duty of the Christian woman is apparent. Her style of dress should be such as to commend to others the holy religion of purity and truth which she professes.

Especially should the women of the Seventh-day Adventist Church be examples of modesty and propriety. Those who are preparing for the coming of the Master and who expect to share the communion of his holy presence here as a prelude to an eternity of association in the world to come, should seek to conform their words, their dress, the motives and purposes of their lives, to the standard of purity enjoined in the Holy Word.

Till the Lord appears, we must live in a world of sin, surrounded by its evils and associating with those whose standards are lowering and demoralizing. We must hold up the standard of purity and truth. We must call our fellows to higher planes of thought and purpose. Failing to do this, we shall be recreant to our holy trust. Doing it, we shall have Heaven's approval, and our lives will bear testimony to God's saving grace. F. M. W.