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Quotations about Appearance
Appearances are not held to be a clue to the truth... But we seem to have no other. ~Ivy Compton-Burnett, Manservant and Maidservant, 1947
I have always a sacred veneration for any one I observe to be a little out of repair in his person, as supposing him either a poet or a philosopher; because the richest minerals are ever found under the most ragged and withered surface of the earth. ~Jonathan Swift
...and even polished brass will pass upon more people than rough gold. ~Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield, 1747
Mankind... is more governed by appearances than by realities... ~Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield, 1751
It is only when mind and character slumber that the dress can be seen. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson
Let us be grateful to the mirror for revealing to us our appearance only. ~Samuel Butler
It is hard that a man's exterior should tally so little sometimes with his soul. ~W. Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence, 1919 ["Dirk Stroeve had the passion of Romeo in the body of Sir Toby Belch... What a cruel practical joke old Nature played when she flung so many contradictory elements together, and left the man face to face with the perplexing callousness of the universe."
The soul of Antony was fastidious, and he disdained a slovenly appearance. ~Florence Bone (1875–1971), The Morning of To‑Day, 1907
All that is false in this world below
Betrays itself in a love of show;
Indignant Nature hides her lash
In the purple-black of a dyed mustache;
The shallowest fop will trip in French,
The would-be critic will misquote Trench;
In short, you're always sure to detect
A sham in the things folks most affect;
Bean-pods are noisiest when dry,
And you always wink with your weakest eye...
~Bret Harte, "The Tale of a Pony," 1860s
Of all the organs of sense, the eye is the most liable to make a person superficial. ~James Lendall Basford (1845–1915), Sparks from the Philosopher's Stone, 1882
There is no actual law that says that a person of inner beauty cannot also maintain an appearance. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com
You need not think
It's vanity that makes me prink,
And take much care
To keep myself both fit and fair.
'Tis not false pride or vain conceit
That keeps me trying to be neat,
But just the plain and simple truth
That I have held to since my youth
That this old frame in which I dwell
Is nothing more than the hotel
In which my Soul and Hopes must stay
Until I'm called to move away,
And for their dwelling-place I plan
To give them quite the best I can,
And keep the place up spick and span.
~John Kendrick Bangs (1862–1922), The Cheery Way: A Bit of Verse For Every Day, 1920
The care that we bestow on our person is a species of politeness towards others... ~Charles Blanc, Art in Ornament and Dress, 1875
She doesn't neglect her outside looks, though, just because her mind is so full of great thoughts. No indeed! Her fountain pen jostles against her looking-glass in her
Slogan of a plastic surgeon: "We maim to please." ~Leesburg Commercial, Florida, 1926
If thou stoodest outside the door, thy hand upon the handle, hast thou ever paused to arrange thy curls, and to pull up thy collar, and to inspect first thy wristbands, and then thy boots? If so, thou hast loved, ay, and madly too. ~"If, !!!And???," The Comic Almanack for 1848, by William Makepeace Thackeray, Albert Smith, Gilbert à Beckett, Henry Mayhew, Augustus Mayhew, and Horace Mayhew
Think of living up to the ideal Charlie has of me. My hair would turn a hydrogen yellow in a week... I could never venture to be natural in case I shocked him. And notwithstanding all my efforts I should see the illusions tumbling about his ears one by one till he realised I was no ethereal goddess, but a very ordinary human woman... ~W. Somerset Maugham, Lady Frederick, 1907
D'you suppose I don't know that behind that very artificial complexion there's a dear little woman called Betsy who's genuine to the bottom of her soul? ~W. Somerset Maugham, Lady Frederick, 1907
We should be thankful that we are all good-looking. Ain't we?... it's none of our personal business if a man has carroty hair, eyes like a new moon, nose like a split pear, mouth like a pair of waffle-irons, chin like a Dutch churn, neck like a gander's, and a body like a crowbar; comparatively, he is good-looking; that is, there are homelier men and animals than he; so everybody is good-looking and has a right to put on airs.
A pair of powerful spectacles has sometimes sufficed to cure a person in love... ~Friedrich Nietzsche
Sometimes I wonder — if I were drop-dead handsome, and every woman I met actually dropped dead, would I ever get tired of it? ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com
Question: What do you dislike most about your appearance?
Walter Cronkite: Quadruple chin.
~Proust questionnaire, in Vanity Fair, 1997
You gotta learn to take it on the chin, and when you get older you get more troubles, so you get more chins. ~The Life of Riley, radio program, 1945, written by Alan Lipscott and Reuben Ship, created by Irving Brecher
The world is governed more by appearance than reality, and therefore it is fully as necessary to seem to know something, as to know it in reality. ~Daniel Webster
I have the making of a beauty already, and a dainty walk. Likely to be dangerous. ~Barbra Ring, Før kulden kommer, 1915, translated from the Norwegian by
APPEARANCE. — Spiffiness, splendaciousness, splendiferousness, swellishness, gorgitude, shine, splash, dazzler, looker, humdinger, prize exhibit, spanker, stunner, big wow, curvaciousness, good make, heavenly body, mean chassis, well-upholstered, plenty of here and there, plenty of these and those, what it takes, knock dead, knock one's eyes out, stack up nice, knock the dames over, be built like a brick outhouse,
Things do not pass for what they are, but for what they seem. Most things are judged by their jackets. ~Baltasar Gracián, translated from Spanish
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