Thursday, July 05, 2012

Of Beauty

One of the most brilliantly perceptive statements I have ever read regarding natural things is from Sir Francis Bacon's essay, "Of Beauty":

"There is no excellent beauty, that hath not some strangeness in the proportion."

Think back through the fascinatingly beautiful faces you have seen in your life. Not just beautiful - fascinatingly beautiful. Not just beauty, but excellent beauty. Bacon was exactly right: in every beautiful face that seems to mesmerize us, there is something that grabs our attention: the eyes just a tad off center, the nose a little too large or too small, some irregularity in the shape of the mouth. Whatever it is, it is a "strangeness in the proportion." It catches the eye, engages the mind. It is the strangeness that creates the excellence.


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