SOME THOUGHTS ON BEAUTY

 

SOME THOUGHTS ON BEAUTY                       

            Beauty is defined as the quality of being pleasing to the senses or to the mind.

            Some synonyms of beauty are: loveliness, attractiveness, prettiness, handsomeness, allurement, charm, grace and glamour.  

             Accordingly, flowers are beautiful, thorns are not; truth is beautiful, falsehood is not; love is beautiful, hatred is not; justice is beautiful, injustice is not; sweetness is beautiful, bitterness is not; kindness is beautiful, cruelty is not; nectar is beautiful, poison is not;  and to conclude this list impressively life is beautiful, death is not. In passing, recall the words of the English playwright  Ben Jonson (1572-1837) : Death be not proud, because those whom you think you kill die not.

 

            Beauty is the natural attraction for all human beings. It provides unique pleasure to their senses. Be its colour, symmetry, overall attractiveness or an indefinable feast for the eyes or the ears, the heart or the mind, the body or the soul, it is as the English poet John Keats (1795-1821) says an eternal source of joy.

           

            Greek philosophical writers like Plato(428/427Bc—348/347 Bc)  called beauty a privilege of nature; Aristotle (384-322 BCE) better than all the letters of recommendation in the world; Homer (lived around the 8t century BCE) a glorious gift of nature, and Ovid (died 20 March 43 BC) a favour bestowed by gods.  

           

                In Book 1 of his poem Endymion,  the English poet John Keats (1795-1821) wrote the following evergreen  lines about beauty:

 

“A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:

Its loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness; but still will keep

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep

Full of  sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

Therefore, on every morrow, we are wreathing

A flowery band to bind us to the earth,

Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth

Of noble nature, of the gloomy days,

Of all the unhealthy and o’er-darkened ways

Made for our searching; yes, in spite of all,

Some shape of beauty moves away the pall

From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,

Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon

For simple sheep; and such are daffodils

With the green world they live in; and clear rills

That for themselves a cooling covert make

Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest brake,

Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms;

And such too is the grandeur of the dooms

We have imagined for the mighty dead;

All lovely tales that we have heard or read:

An endless fountain of immortal drink

Pouring unto us from the heaven’s brink.

 

            Finally, the following French saying:

Beauty, unaccompanied by virtue, is as a flower without perfume.

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G.R.Kanwal

6^th June 2025