But this is, clearly, not the whole story. The modern cult of beautyis not exclusively a function （in the mathematical sense） of wealthIf it were, then the personal appearance industries would have beenas hardly hit by the trade depression as any other business. But, aswe have seen, they have not suffered. Women are retrenching onother things than their faces. The cult of beauty must therefore besymptomatic of changes than have taken place outside the economicsphere. Of what changes？ Of the changes, I suggest, in the status Ofwomen; of the changes in our attitude towards "the merely physical.
Women, it is obvious, are freer than in the past. Freer not only toperform the generally unenviable social functions hitherto4 reservedto the male, but also freer to exercise the more pleasing, feminineprivilege of being attractive. They have the right, if not to be lessvirtuous than their grandmothers, at any rate5 to look less virtuous.The British Matron not long since a creature of austere and eventerrifying aspect, now does her best to achieve and perenniallypreserve the appearance of what her predecessor would have describedas a Lost Woman. She often succeeds. But we are not shocked——atany rate, not morally shocked.
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