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a certain smile as a conventional part of their make-up."

All this is very true, and much more might be said. The finest things, however, those that are most natural, most beautiful, have been most perverted, and the very fact that the perversion of the smile is one of the worst things in human expression, only proves its importance. The fact that the smile must be spontaneous and free, that it cannot be affected nor arranged by rule nor adjusted by imitation, is true of all modes of natural expression.

In these very objections is found the typical character of the smile and the necessity that its nature and qualities should be observed.

The fact that we can get at it only indirectly, for the most part, brings up one of the greatest problems in human education. Perhaps we might learn from a study of the smile certain great lessons in human development which are often overlooked.

It is not true that the smile is superficial. It reveals most definitely and adequately the attitude of a human being. The greater the man, the greater and more wonderful his smile. The deeper, the broader the human sympathy, the more it is shown by the human countenance. Another objector speaks up and says, "The smile is vague and indefinite. You can smile a thousand different ways; not one of them has any distinct meaning.'

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It will be granted that there are innumerable smiles,-the sarcastic smile, the sneering smile, the incredulous smile, the approving smile, the critical smile; but the meaning of the smile is not vague or accidental.

Everyone can at once recognize the difference between a sarcastic smile and a genuine smile; between the smile of love and the smile of hate; the smile of incredulity and the smile of confidence; the patronizing smile and the affected smile; and a hundred other species. Under them all, human instinct recognizes a normal smile and measures others by this ideal. The very perversion of the smile depends for its meaning upon a universal conception of a true smile.

There is a normal smile and we know it as we know that truth is truth.

Some critics say we do not know a truth when we meet it, but we do know a truth as we know light from darkness. Among the innumerable perversions of beauty, love, and truth it is astonishing how universal is the fundamental conception of right and beauty, and this is still more true of the realization of the fundamental smile, a smile that really is unperverted, uncontaminated by any mixture, a smile that expresses joy and love.

The smile of everyone in the universe is different from that of everyone else, and yet all have the same fundamental, distinctive elements in common, and everyone recognizes a true smile and its meaning.

"Oh," you say, "the smile is such a small, such an insignificant thing."

It may be small but it is not insignificant. What do you mean by significance? The word comes from "sign.' sign." A thing is significant in proportion as it stands for something beyond itself, as it suggests some meaning.

Significance is almost synonymous with expression. A word, an action, or a voice modulation is expressive in proportion as it is significant. An

act is expressive in proportion as it signifies something.

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There can be no worse mistake than making the word "insignificant " synonymous with small," or confusing significance with bigness. A turn of the palm upward may mean heaven; a turn of it downward may mean the other place. The simplest expansion of the body may mean courage; the shrinking of the chest may mean surrender.

"The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation." No great art work, no great truth, no great deed comes with show. The real significant things are all small. It is the big things, the showy things that are insignificant.

One man went up to the top of a hill to pray for rain and another went up to eat and drink. It is of very little consequence, you say, that one man went up to dinner and the other went up to pray, but all their lives Elijah and Ahab were doing these two things.

In all history the smallest act, that which seemed to most people the least significant, has caused a great war or ended one or prevented one. A statesman's word to the ambassador of a foreign country, "Among friends there is no last word," may or may not have prevented a war, but in the history of the race, such kindly remarks, simple as they may seem, have warded off the greatest catastrophes.

The mistake of considering little things as unimportant is close to the universal mistake regarding the lack of importance of the simpler acts of expression in general. "We are too apt to assume," says Ex-President Taft, "that manners are nothing but the surface of life, that they really

don't enter into what constitutes the real things of existence. In this we make a profound error. We forget that life is not made up of great crises, and that the sterner virtues are not constantly called into operation. Home life is not full of grandstand plays. The happiness of those with whom we have to do is very seldom affected by events of capital importance. Our day-to-day pursuit of happiness is colored and influenced and crowned by the little things, by the smaller amenities or the absence of them in dealing with our fellowbeings.'

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What is it that makes significance? The primary question is whether an act is accidental or fundamental. Fundamentals are few, while accidental things are practically innumerable.

The hand became such from the necessity of executing a few primary movements, yet it can perform a thousand actions of secondary impor

tance.

There are a few movements of the foot which are fundamental and necessary to expression, yet a man can move his feet in a thousand ways which have no real significance.

The human head can roll around in a great number of ways, yet very few of these movements have necessary significance; but when they are under his control, then the man has power.

Therefore a few fundamental actions are the basis of all bodily expression.

If these are right the innumerable accidental or secondary actions will be right. If the elementals are wrong or weak the accidentals will necessarily be perverted. The true method of improving expression depends upon an understanding of these elemental actions and their development.

An expansion of the torso when properly coordinated with certain contractions of the balls of the feet, is a part of the expression of uprightness. This is a fundamental characteristic of man. "Man," said Sir William Turner, "is the only animal with a vertical spine." If this is true, then the counterpoise curves of the spine must be of fundamental importance.

A great many gymnastic exercises, instead of developing these curves, actually destroy them. Games throw the man into a thousand different attitudes. He may work for years to master something that is merely accidental to human nature, some exhibitional feat which actually destroys the grace of his movements and may even tend to shorten his life.

On the other hand, he who studies the few fundamental normal actions of the human body and develops them will not only secure grace and power of expression, but may add years to his life.

When a man's courage wakens, when he becomes conscious that he is really an expression of infinite life, his body straightens in obedience to the active will. Then the smile follows as the ultimate expression of dignity, power and selfcontrol.

The smile, simple as it is, is a fundamental human expression, revealing a person's motives and his attitude toward life.

Let no man, therefore, sneer at the smile because it is apparently commonplace and seemingly insignificant.

A smile indicates the incipient loss of faith in extravagance and mere feats of exhibition. When we begin to see things in their proper perspective, when we begin to recognize ourselves as we really

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