Sweetness and Kindness

not the cloying, sticky, kittenish sweetnessHoney sweetie pie! Sweetness! Baby sweetie darling! Here are some words on this lovely subject from volume one of Frances Dare’s Lovely Ladies: The Art of Being a Woman. Hope you enjoy it, sweetheart.

1929: Sweetness and Kindness

Every real woman must be sweet, and she must express her sweetness in kindness.

The real sweetness that is the essence distilled from a lovely soul is not the cloying, sticky, kittenish sweetness that all too inadequately conceals its owner’s claws, but the deep, real loveliness that shines from the depths of the lovely soul, and often produces an effect of actual physical beauty.

True sweetness is ‘as rare as a day in June’ ~ and I mean ‘rare’ in the sense that it was used by the author of this quotation. Rare meaning ‘choice, priceless, and seldom found’ applies to sweetness on all three counts.

A naturally sweet disposition is often an inherited quality or the product of an environment where one is constantly surrounded by others who are so pricelessly blessed. Yet, even though it may be latent, the germ of sweetness abides in each of us.

Sweetness is founded upon many things. Often it is based upon a philosophical outlook which is sometimes called understanding ~ at other times tolerance. For one with a sweet personality may, at times, be rather easily hurt, but realizing and having the intelligence to analyze this hurt, that person never retaliates. And also, upon such a one, the cares and irritations of life seem not to weigh too heavily, despite the fact that usually she is not the type of moron who is always happy because she cannot feel sorrow.

Life being what it is, it appears to me that the sooner one cultivates a philosophical attitude tinct with humor, the sooner will one be equipped to go through it with a minimum of discomfort to one’s self and to others.

Source: Dare, Frances. Lovely Ladies: The Art of Being a Woman, Vol. I. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Doran & Company, 1929.
~ pp. 30-31 ~