We know that man can reach the consciousness of his real 'I' by working on his underdeveloped and unbalanced personality. The same kind of work can also act in the opposite direction, enabling him to beautify his body. It is important to understand how this can be done in practice, since the improvement of the human race, which is the object of our study, depends on this possibility. We will therefore discuss it briefly.
The real 'I,' the monad of Christ, is so beautiful that it defies all description. When the human personality, which is dull by nature, becomes an Individuality by uniting with the real 'I,' it begins to shine with the light communicated to it by the latter, and it then transmits the beauty it has gained to the physical body. This, in a few words, is the process of improving the human race and it can lead to what the Tradition calls the glorification of the body.
Is there any need to say that we are still far from this? For the moment, let us see what modern man can do to move towards this goal.
To sum up, we can say that in order to become an Individuality, that is, in order to identify itself with the real 'I,' the personality should have already acquired a minimum degree of beauty; and the hylic body should be should be prepared for the establishment within it of the Individuality that is born of this union. In order to give our bodies this indispensible minimum of beauty, we must work on our Personality, for we know what an influence the psychic exercises over the physical; and we must do this without further delay, as very little time remains.
Man has an instinctive feeling which pushes him in this direction, only he confuses the idea of beingwith that of appearing, so that while exerting himself on the plane of appearance, he makes no deliberate effort on the plane of being, not daring to believe that it may be possible to obtain tangible results in this, so much is he the slave of his skepticism. This is why, in spite of his ingenuity, imagination, and energy, there are no lasting results, and hardly any contribution is made to the improvement of the race. This is because these efforts are applied rightly in detail, where their aim is to aid nature, but are badly conceived in terms of the essential, where they too often run counter to the divine call by substituting fantastic stylization for the culture of true and healthy beauty. Indeed, the problem in the improvement of the human race, both adamic and preadamic, is precisely that of the cultivation of beauty: physical beauty and beauty of the psyche, which are closely interdependent.
Everybody generally agrees that, in animated and visual form, the highest expression of divine Beauty on Earth is the human body, especially that of woman, for nothing can equal the harmony of perfect feminine forms. The male form cannot equal it, as we can see in even the most beautiful masculine forms left us by ancient Greek art: those of Apollo and Narcsissus, which have never been surpassed but which are nevertheless effeminate. This is normal. It is a question of balance in the polarity of the sexes: Woman's strength lines in her beauty, whereas Man's beauty lies in his strength.
A beautiful mother who gives birth to beautiful children: this is the natural and feasible way in which we can improve the human race. If we leave aside the spiritual, pneumatic factor, which is not within everybody's reach, we can say that the solution of the problem we are examining here demands a synergy of properly oriented, conscious efforts, psychic and physical. Later, we will talk more fully about these psychic efforts, but here we will confine ourselves to saying only what is necessary about the participation of the motor center in this aspect of culture.
It is no exaggeration to say that the question of pure physical beauty, which occupied an important place in ancient Greece, was later gradually relegated to the background until it was finally lost in the recesses of human consciousness. There is no doubt that for ancient peoples, especially the Greeks, physical beauty was of burning topical interest: we need no better proof than the penalty to which the civic oath of the Chersonese condemned traitors and perjurers, namely: No longer to have beautiful children. The desire to impart divine beauty to the human body made the Greeks give birth to an artistic expression whose proof today is in their unparalleled marble structures. Of course attempts were also made elsewhere, and Egyptian, Grecco-Buddhic, medieval Christian, and Renaissance art-to name only a few-give us admirable examples; but these marvels are different from the Greek models because of their stylization, which happened because the intellect intervened, imposing its own 'considerations' onto the realism of pure objective Art. The realism of Greek art, which created such beautiful immages of the human body, with such a perfect knowledge of its harmony and its anatomy, has never been surpassed or even equaled. We must consider these images as proofs of a divine revelation of a very high degree, which placed those artists who were blessed with it on the same level as the prophets. Works like this, made by the hands of the epoptes, such as Praxiteles, Phidias, and other great masters, will forever remain the subject of study and admiration.
The divine nature of these revelations may also be recognized by the fact that these ancient Greek masters generally represented perfect human beauty in the form of nude of semi-nude bodies. This nudity did not shock them, neither did it offend those who contemplated these masterpieces later, whether they were men or women, initiates or non-initiates, for they were all impregnated with the very high religious spirit that reigned at the time.
To be ashamed of nudity is a logical consequence of the Fall. It is a result of comparing the ugliness that has been acquired with the beauty that has been lost because of it. This shame was effaced before the classical nudity of the marble gods and goddesses, which were images of divine perfection and, as such, were objects of chaste contemplation and sacred veneration. These nude bodies were very real expressions of perfect Beauty, and thus of the divine essence, and this meant that they were free of the stylization which comes from intellectual interference.
The divine purity of masculine and feminine forms really depicts adamic humanity before the Fall. It presents us with the original types and subtypes of sinless men and women, without vices and without karmic burden. From this point of view, the pantheon of Greek gods and goddesses gives each of us a practical means of recognizing our original type or subtype and thus discovering our own physical deformation and, through this, learning the nature of our psychic deformation.
The attentive study and regular contemplation of these images, exposed in the temples and public squares of Greece, explains to a great extent what is called the 'Greek Miracle.' And if people in our cities today could admire the statues of the gods and goddesses of the Greek pantheon, perhaps it would be easier for them to understand the oracle of the Pythia of Delphi which Socrates transmitted to posterity, but which is so little understood in its true sense;
KNOW THYSELF!
External contemplation of this kind, accompanied by simultaneous introspection, and pursued in a spirit that we might properly call religious, would be a powerful factor in the improvement of the human race which is the object of our study. And the higher the degree of contemplation, the greater the influence of this factor.
We must make it clear that we are not advocating naturism or nudism. It is obvious that to constantly look at imperfect flabby bodies could only augment the ugliness of future generations. But if it is true that the majority of human beings have imperfect bodies, it is still possible to favor the regeneration of the human race, and we are going to propose at least one way this can be done.
'One nail drives out another,' they say. It is this that we are suggesting, but the nail we insert must be up to standard! We are, indeed, spectators of a terrifying show which is the result of the deformation of our degenerated mind: the pathological taste which is spreading through the Arts, and which deforms faces and bodies until they become monstrosities which are a veritable offense to God and a blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Not only do we come to terms with ugliness, but we even admire it as long as it is 'in style.' The general quest is not towards the Beautiful and the True, but towards the new at any cost, so great is our fear of being left behind! In ancient times, was it not this frantic search for the 'sensational' that urged Erostrates to burn the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, one of the Seven Wonders of the World.
What else could replace this enormous nail? The framework of the present chapter does not allow us to examine in great detail the effects of this illness of the psyche from which our civilization suffers; we must limit ourselves to consider one aspect of the vast question which is at the center of our interest: that of feminine beauty. We will try to show that women's clothing, conceived in an appropriate manner, could play a significant role in (solving) the problem of improvement of the human race.
This faces us with a new principle which is at first sight paradoxical: if it is not possible to rely on obtaining this improvement by means of individual beauty, which is rare and never complete, then this could be obtained on the basis of what might be called a 'collective' beauty, wisely applied to each individual case, to hide the ugliness and emphasize the partial physical beauty which each woman and girl possesses. This question undoubtedly deserves the attention of the masters of couture.
We will digress here to make it clear that, because chromosomes and their genes are perpetuated, ugliness never completely supplants beauty in the human body. The proportion of beauty and ugliness which are the lot of every newborn person are the expression of the integral content of that human being, who comes into the world with a certain total of physical and psychic predispositions and also with a karmic tare. In each case this proportion is strictly determined by the Principle of Equilibrium as it applies to human nature, so that it is possible for he who knows how to judge, according to the observed deformations of its beginning, the original value of any personality.
Let us close this thought without taking it any further, and return to the question of what could be asked from artists and fashion-designers. For the latter haute-couture and its ready-to-wear imitations, designs should be created not only appropriate to the situations the designers have in view: for daily activity in the office or store, travel by car, sports, socializing, celebrations, etc, but also, above all, based on the different partial expressions of feminine physical beauty. If we leave out particular cases, we can say that the proportion of beauty that is retained by the feminine body is in general from 25% to 50%, it is rare that it reaches 75%. In no case does it reach 100%. Thus it is a question of increasing the percentage of beauty and reducing the proportion of ugliness.
The beauty which enters the feminine body has a limited number of expressions: beautiful shoulders, beautiful arms, beautiful legs, beautiful feet, pretty neck, lovely hands, pretty throat, pretty waist etc. If what is ugly is cleverly hidden, the distinctive elements of each human type can be made prominent, together forming an integral expression of the sought after feminine beauty, no longer expressed in marble, but in flesh and bone.
The realization of this objective would naturally require the creation, for each category of clothing, of a whole series of designs carefully studied for the precise aim of revealing the case types of partial beauty. The spectacle of the collective beauty of women and girls thus dressed, to which each would bring her part of the divine heritage, can only be imagined, so that in this way clothing would again find its authentic aesthetic role, which is precisely to emphasize the femininity of the weak sex.
We can only suspect that over time the impressions produced on pregnant women by the collective beauty thus offered to their eyes would have an effect on their children which would spread the artistic effort that we have just described.
Let us repeat, so as to clarify our thought, that women's clothing, studied from this angle, should be conceived in a manner corresponding to each case type of partial manifestation of the perfect Beauty in the imperfect human body. It is thus-a second paradox-that 'appearance' put to the service of 'being' could effectively contribute to the general enhancement of the beauty of the human species, and that in the exceptional circumstances of the Time of Transition, the art of dressing women would take on the character of an esoteric mission.
However, in the accomplishment of this mission, which requires a synergy of science and talent, the artists and designers of women's clothing should not lose sight of what should be emphasized, and not concealed, femininity. This is a constant aesthetic imperative, which, moreover, the national costumes of all peoples have obeyed throughout the centuries. In the general framework of a new fashion, whose characteristic would be precisely-divine reflection-the issue today is to create a unity of femininity in the varied interpretation of types.
One could object that if, in applying the proposed method with the design of putting partial beauty into evidence, we would achieve a total exposure of the integral beauty of the feminine body, it would have to be the same for faces, of which nothing could be hidden. That is true, but the beauty of the face and the beauty of the body arise from different planes: whereas the body is the principal expression of the divine beauty on the physical plane, the face essentially reflects the interior content of the individual. The beauty of the body is affirmed by the beauty of its members, by the harmony of proportions and lines, all things which are exterior, while the face is the expression of interior things. And when the psychic and spiritual content of an individual is really beautiful, thus beauty is translated by the captivating charm which emanates from the face.
