Marilyn Monroe

Multitudes of do-gooders will endeavor to restrain your latent superiority by claiming looks are only skin deep. Some years ago during a debate over the importance of hereditary intelligence someone showed me a photograph of Dostoevsky next to one of Claudia Schiffer and asked who would have the easier life. At any juncture on the timeline, anywhere on Earth, Claudia takes the citadel and Fyodor gets the hovel.

Throughout history there have been myriad examples of beauty overcoming astounding odds: poverty left behind, scandals overwhelmed, every deficiency overlooked. And there is nothing more beautiful than a woman in her bloom.

So do not listen to the overweight or subpar criticize you for relying on appearance to get an edge. Especially do not take advice from the insecure about dieting or the elderly about chopping your lovely locks into a Dutch-boy cut.

Even quintessential capitalist Coco Chanel began her career as a courtesan. Comeliness and cleverness are by no means mutually exclusive, even as sloth and superciliousness seem eternally linked.

Bearing this in mind, expand yourself in every other way: artistically, intellectually, and spiritually, though do not fall into the trap of disregarding your inherent gifts. All the skill or wit in the world cannot open entrances as easily as natural prettiness. For every Amantine Dupin there are ten thousand of Marie Duplessis. Everyone remembers Camille while few can name a single novel by George Sand.

There is no specific definition of the beautiful. Some have been on the fuller side while others on the waifish, but all maintained at least a semblance of a svelte stomach.

Young ladies’ attributes are theirs to do with what they choose. But no important woman has ever neglected her charms, even if she was so much more than ever met the eye.

It is not a disgrace to be beautiful; it is only a disgrace for the slovenly and sluggish to denigrate those who are or otherwise undermine their efforts to maintain that sublime mystique.

For some of you the height of grace and glory will be a brief window in time while for others it will be a lengthy one. Yet for the vast majority of women there will be some interval when you can radically alter your circumstances beyond any expectation with a come-hither stare cast in the right direction. But you need to be able to fit through the window in question.