Facial expression

“ The interpretation of a smile, or of any sort of facial expression, is apparently learned much as other things are. By constant study of the face from the first month the child comes, in time, to associate the wrinkles that form a smile with pleasant experiences—fondling, coaxing, offering of playthings or of the bottle, and so on. ”

“ Even in so obvious a point as facial expression the same relation may be traced. It is a matter of constant observation that women's faces are more expressive than men's, showing greater mobility, through the instinctive response to suggestions from without and within. ”

“ More especially in plastic art the facial expression is insipid with a repose which does not so much express spirituality in its essential penetration as a purely animal emptiness, or conversely is remorseless and exaggerated in its emphasis on characteristic traits. ”

“ The first step in the transition from the generic figure to the gradual individualization of personality occurs in connection with the facial expression. It is surprising to note the uniformity with which, in all the civilizations of the Old World, the images of the gods, as well as those of the heroes and rulers, acquire an expression of kindliness and gentleness. ”

“ The mouth is not the seat of expression in the face. Not that there is no expression to the mouth, but its changes are limited. The eyes are much more thoroughly the seat of expression, and through them the pharynx can be reached. Let the eyes smile. Let the whole face take position as if one saw something irresistibly funny, at which he must laugh. Practice with the eyes in this way will brighten the whole voice. It will relieve strain upon all the facial muscles and will render the organs of speech more pliable, too. ”

“ Equally true is it that the face should be free from that incessant smiling which overspreads the countenances of so many. The face should possess neither one of these expressions, but present a set, firm appearance, conveying no idea of the thoughts of the mind. Outward causes are exceptions to the changes of facial expressions. ”

“ Passivity and absence of facial expression, both implying rest of the muscles, are held to show that there is being experienced neither much sensation nor much emotion, while the degree of external demonstration, be it in movements that rise finally to spasms and contortions, or be it in sounds that end in laughter, and shrieks, and groans, is habitually accepted as a measure of the pleasure or pain, sensational or emotional. ”

“ The value of the study of the nerve-muscular conditions of the face is finely illustrated in the case of the passive, expressionless face which may be woke up, "lighted up," made to express the whole soul in the face simply by conditions of the tension of the facial muscles resulting from the mental state. Thus, often, great and pleasing beauty is seen in faces unattractive when at rest. Conversely, some faces are beautiful in their passive condition, but lack expression and interest when in action from mental work; women having such faces talk but little. ”

“ Nothing is more certain than that our individual lives form, if not our faces, the expression of them. Our eyes and all the facial muscles are at the command of our natural inherited dispositions as modified by the circumstances of our lives. ”

“ Those who do not admit the relationship between mental and facial beauty, usually remark that the true connexion is between character and expression. While they doubt, or rather deny, that the permanent forms of the features are {388} in any way indices of the forms of the mind, they assert that the transitory forms of the features are such indices. ”

“ Was there ever seen a smile on the lip, with which the upper part of the face agrees not in expression, that was not evidently feigned and forced, [7] to be the disguise of a mind ill at ease, and of a sick spirit? The mind looks through the eyes, and the brow should smile in unison with the lip, to show the joy sincere. ”

“ Walk along a crowded street and watch the different faces of the men and women as they pass by—grey faces, drab faces, white faces, yellow faces, faces sad and cross, and lined and dull, faces by the thousand blank of any expression at all, and then here and there, at rare, rare intervals, a live face that speaks. ”

“ The face is as ‘a book where men may read strange matters:’ it is open to every one: the language of expression is as it were a kind of mother-tongue, in which every one acquires more or less tact, so that his own practical judgment forms a test to confirm or contradict the interpretation which is given of it. ”

“ Are you growing more attractive as you advance in life? Is your eye softer and deeper, is your mouth kinder, your expression more sympathetic, or are you screwing up your face in tense knots of worry? Are your eyes growing hopeless and dull, is your mouth drooping at the corners, and becoming a set thin line in the centre, and is your skin dry, and sallow, and parched? ”

“ But more than these details did the stranger's face strike the novice; a face almost as perfect as the masks of the gods found in the temples; the rounded and curved features were over-full for a man, and the expression was too indifferent, troubled, almost weak, to be attractive, but taken in itself the face was noticeably beautiful. ”

“ Of all parts of the body, the face is most considered and regarded, as is natural from its being the chief seat of expression and the source of the voice. It is also the chief seat of beauty and of ugliness, and throughout the world is the most ornamented. ”

“ The face indeed will bear a constant view, yet always entertain and keep our curiosity awake, without the assistance either of a mask, or veil; because vast variety of changing circumstances keeps the eye and the mind in constant play, in following the numberless turns of expression it is capable of. How soon does a face that wants expression grow insipid, tho' it be ever so pretty?—The rest of the body, not having these advantages in common with the face, would soon satiate the eye, were it to be as constantly exposed, nor would it have more effect than a marble statue. ”

“ No doubt, an emotion which is deprived of its discharge by words has lost a strong element, and yet gestures, actions, and facial play are so interwoven with the psychical process of an intense emotion that every shade can find its characteristic delivery. The face alone with its tensions around the mouth, with its play of the eye, with its cast of the forehead, and even with the motions of the nostrils and the setting of the jaw, may bring numberless shades into the feeling tone. ”

“ If it is a merely vulgar picture, we shall get the man’s dress and shape of his face, but little or no expression: if it is a pathetic portrait, or picture of passion, we shall get one particular temporary expression of his face—perhaps joy, sorrow, anger, disgust—but still one which may have passed any moment, and left his face quite different ”

“ They have finely-chiselled features, deep, rather large and expressive eyes, slightly bronzed complexions, and in every curious look, gaze, or expression, there is an easy, modest dignity, such as I have never before seen, even among the rarest few. In every face there is a deep and real joy ”

“ And we may even tire of its beauty; while a face, less perfect in features, may win us more and more and hold our interest by the charm of its continually varying expression. The more we think of it, the more do we realise that beauty depends upon expression. It is the same with nature as with the human face. Its beauty is affected by expression and this is produced by the varieties in the lighted atmosphere. ”

“ The face was a face for which some men would die a hundred deaths and dream all beauty in dying, while other men, blind fools, and many women, of the envious sort, would protest it to be not even passable; a face small, thin, clear, and very dark; the chin obstinate; the mouth full, somewhat large, sorrowful, mocking, maddening, unforgettably scarlet; the nose whimsical, dainty; the eyes of a strange green radiance, very large and trustfully wide open, frank as a child's, yet unfathomable; a face to trust, to adore, yet not to understand. ”

“ While there is doubtless something admirable in the motionless purity of forms, in proportion, and in the perfect adaptation of the organs to their functions which constitute plastic beauty, supreme and really poetic beauty, nevertheless, lies pre-eminently in expression and movement. To the modern age, the face is still the most beautiful part of the man, and that is constantly tending, by the development of the nervous system, of intelligence and morality, to become more expressive. ”

“ Now it is within the knowledge of every one who has turned a curious inward eye upon his feelings that certain emotions which deeply stir the inner man, and which may make us glow or shudder to the finger tips, do not cause any facial changes, except, perhaps, a slight difference in the hue of the brow or cheeks, and a glistening or darkening of the eye. ”

“ Uprightness responds to the perpendicular profile; chastity, to the concave; sensualism, to the convex.
Let it be understood that we derogate in no way from the liberty of the man who remains always master of his will, his emotions and his inclinations.
A criterion of the face is indispensable to the intelligent physiognomist, and as the lips and nose have much to do with the expression of the face, we offer an unerring diagnosis in the three following charts:
Criterion of the Profile of the Lips. ”

“ However, although no dumb trait, considered in an isolated point of view, can be an expression of the mind, a face composed entirely of these kinds of features can be characterized in its entireness by precisely the same reason as a face which is speaking only as an expression of sensuous nature can be nevertheless characteristic. ”

“ The ordinary eye might see nothing in a face that was winsome, if not handsome; yet, let the dainty mouth curve in speech, and at once a subtle attraction, lit up by lustrous eyes, permeated the face. ”

“ If you do recall the features, and say that an eye is blue, a chin sharp, a nose short, or a cheek sunken, I fancy that you do not succeed well in giving the impression of the person,—not so well as when you interpret at once to the heart the essential moral qualities of the face—its humor, gravity, sadness, spirituality. ”

“ Always look for the predominant factor—the feature, or features, which give personality to the face. In your case they are undoubtedly the eyebrows and the curve of the upper lip. A few judicious touches to these will alter the whole expression to a surprising extent. A few more lines will give age. The wig and spectacles are the refuges of the amateur. In themselves they can do little, but with the touches I suggest, and a deep-toned powder to darken the skin, your disguise will be complete. ”

“ Thus their eye, rather than the features of the face, is the moveable picture which is differently sketched at every instant by the various feelings of anger, hatred, jealousy, &c. The wrinkles of the human face contribute very much to the expression of the countenance, they compose in part the physiognomy, and mark its different shades. ”

“ The expression of the face is all human, but wrought to the very limit of celestial enthusiasm. The wonderful richness of the coloring, the exquisite ripe fulness of the limbs, the passionate devotion of the kindling features, combine to make it the faultless ideal of a perfect human being in youth. ”

“ There was the same delicate modelling of lines, the same breadth between the eyes, the long, flowing locks, the full, sensitive lips, and in the eyes the same look of deep melancholy—touched with a subtle, changing, human smile that drew the beholder. It disarmed criticism and provoked it. Except for the halo of mocking and piercing thorns, the living face might have been the pictured one below it. The look of suffering in one was shadowed in the other. ”

“ For a facial manner is simply just this appearance on the surface of an individual idiosyncrasy and some particular aspect of emotion, idea, and volition. A man by his chance expressions of countenance expresses the feelings he has as some particular person, whether it be in his exclusive relation to his own life, or in his self-relation to exterior objects, or other persons. ”

“ Possibly it will be urged, in reply, that changes of expression affect only the muscles and skin of the face; that the permanent marks they produce can extend but to these; that, nevertheless, the beauty of a face is mainly dependent upon the form of its bony framework ”

“ The face is singular, one that strikes at a first sight and grows upon the observer; a brilliant eager, old face, keen and gentle, with a preponderance of brow and head; clear bird-like eyes, eloquent excitable mouth, with a look of nervous and fluent power; the whole lighted through as it were from behind with a strange and pure kind of smile, touched too with something of an impatient prospective rapture. ”

“ While one eye was gazing intently in your face, the other was fixed in another direction—immovable, the more hideous because at first you mistook it for a natural eye. A smile may over spread the face, animate the lip, and lighten up the natural eye ”

“ It vexes me to hear people talk so glibly of “feeling,” “expression,” “tone,” and those other easily acquired and inexpensive technicalities of art that make such a fine show in conversations concerning pictures. There is not one man in seventy-five hundred that can tell what a pictured face is intended to express. ”

“ These last are people whose features are well balanced and proportioned, but who are not generally considered beautiful. Faces dependent for beauty on their mobility and expression suffer most, and are indeed, in their finer moods, almost untranslatable by this process. ”