Tea at Trianon: Loretta Young: A Portrait

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Friday, January 18, 2013

Loretta Young: A Portrait

A true lady.

Discipline and poise are the essentials for the conservation of precious time and energy. Uncontrolled emotion is as undisciplined and needlessly destructive as starting a forest fire with a carelessly tossed match. There’s no forgivable time to spend on the things that are profitless, the emotions that undermine our vitality and leave us spent and dismal. (More here.)

May said...: What a beautiful woman. The photo is amazing.; January 18, 2013 at 1:31:00 PM EST
julygirl said...: A classy lady indeed! We can all take a lesson from her.

As I see it, what is currently happening in our society is "regression to the mean". Reminds me of one of the opening scenes in the Broadway show, "My Fair Lady", which is set in the market place where one hears the loud voices and course language of the sellers...the 'lower classes' who have not been taught proper manners and decorum or education of any sort. This is what is happening in our current culture...the more vulgar one can act the more power one thinks one wields against another. It seems these rude and intrusive people get all the attention and their behavior is modeled by the current crop of young people. Ugh!; January 18, 2013 at 7:17:00 PM EST