Page 464

           PARIS FASHIONS AND AMERICAN WOMEN
another period of slavery,-slavery to the cause it rests upon the great p
spirit of the age embodied in the machine, human work and human broth
Now freedom is again at hand, and all the   We can only see the gro'
vast complex organizations of our present- influences which are tendir
day commercialism will ultimately be at   direction, but things move so r
the command of the man who works with  adays we may live to see thes
his hands. The responsibility will be his. strengthen until they embody
He may use his opportunity well or ill. in a happier and more reasoi
If he fail to rise to it, it will simply mean  order. It is toward this end
that he is not yet ready to enter into his all working, and it is our coi
                                          that the close of the year wt
inheritance, but if he be sufficiently devel-  beginning will bring renewed
oped to grasp it and use it rightly, he will vigor to us all through the
real
lay the foundation stones for a new civili-  we are drawing nearer and ne
zation which shall be real and lasting be- goal.
rinciples ofi
erhood.    
wth of the
ig in this,
apidly now.,'f
e influence..
themselves,
nable social '
that we are"
mmon hope,,
hich is just,
  hope and
ization that
earer to the
PARIS FASHIONS AND AMERICAN WOMEN
        OTHING in fashion is right until
     the Paris leaders say cachet."
         This is the point of view of one
         of the largest department stores
in New York, and in showy type it re-
cently headed a page of winter advertis-
ing. In substance thousands of American
women, unquestionably many intelligent
women, were told that they had neither
judgment nor taste, that the only clothes
suitable for them to wear were those de-
signed by and adapted to the taste or whim
of the French modiste. The American
woman's knowledge of her own environ-
ment, her work or play, the customs of
her country, the needs of her own per-
sonality, were apparently regarded as less
than nothing. And it was impressed upon
her that the only stamp of approval which
she should regard as significant for her
dress must come from Paris; that appar-
ently she could not hope to be contented
or happy or charming unless she studied
the ways of French women and imitated
them, regardless of the needs of her own
.life.
  When once our minds are opened to the
absolute absurdity of such a statement;
when we stop to think how pretentious it
is, how supercilious, how untrue, we mar-
vel not a little at the apparent hypnotic
power of the dictum of fashion, and we
464
wonder how it is that women can acceptf
such statements as in any way bearing,
upon a rational, well-conducted life. Wl'gt
can it possibly matter to an intelligenf"
American woman that a French womanai,
either belonging to the "high world" orý
the "half world," should select certaity
novelties of dressing as delightful? It'.
is of importance to the French womani
how she dresses, to what extent her clothes
meet the kind of life she is living, but it
cannot mean anything, not the smallest
thing in the world, to the American
woman, who should, by all natural laws
of supply and demand, plan such clothes
as she wishes, for her home, her kind of
pleasure or her 'condition as a working
woman.
  And yet we are forced to believe that
an established, well - managed business
house, such as the one presenting the
advertisement in question, would not pay
the price of a whole page of cleverly
written advertising unless it were abso-
lutely confident of an enthusiastic re-
sponse from the readers. For the object
of modern advertising is to create a state
of mind, to awaken a desire which the
material advertised is to supposed to sat-
isfy. Naturally, it is the purpose of the
firm advertising to employ such methods
as it has found by experience to be