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That attention to dress and personal decoration is natural to woman, is obvious from an observation of the customs of every nation in every age. The Apostle Peter must not be understood as in this place censuring such attention, but as pointing out that there is apparel, that there is ornament, far preferable to any bodily costume and jewelry that taste can devise and wealth can purchase. Christian women of every position in life are exhorted to provide themselves with these precious and incomparable recommendations; to cultivate, above all things, "a meek and quiet spirit."

I. SUCH APPAREL AND ORNAMENTATION COMMAND THE ADMIRATION OF ALL WHOSE ADMIRATION IS DESIRABLE. Empty fools may admire as supremely admirable in woman the outward display of riches and of fashion, with which the worldly sometimes seek to dazzle and captivate those who are as worldly as themselves. To men of sense such things are utterly indifferent; to men of discernment and character gentle and virtuous dispositions and habits are in a woman beyond all price. Such qualities as Jesus found in the sisters of the home at Bethany won his friendship, and similar qualities will never cease to elicit the approval and appreciation of the upright and the pure.

II. SUCH APPAREL AND ORNAMENTATION ARE INSEPARABLE FROM THE CHARACTER THEY ADORN, AND ARE IMPERISHABLE. Poverty may deprive a woman of the power to dress with expensiveness; advancing years may make the adventitious attractions excused in youth unseemly and ridiculous. But "the meek and quiet spirit" remains unchanged with changing time. Often does it happen that the feminine character, refined and sweetened by the experience of life and by ministrations of pity and of self-denial, shines with a fairer luster with advancing years.

III. SUCH APPAREL AND ORNAMENTATION ARE ACCEPTABLE AND PRECIOUS IN THE SIGHT OF GOD HIMSELF. The approval of our fellow-creatures may be sought with too earnest diligence, and their attachment may be valued beyond its true value. But the qualities which are commended by him who alone judgeth with perfect justice are qualities which cannot be cultivated with too great assiduity and care. Our Lord has spoken with severity of those who seek honor from men in preference to that honor which cometh from God. Of the "meek and quiet spirit" we are told that it is "of great price in the sight of God." What greater inducement than this could be offered to Christian women to look with comparative unconcern upon all those social and external recommendations which are so often over-estimated, and to cultivate with all diligence and devotedness the graces of the Christian character and the charities of the Christian life? - J.R.T.

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KJV: Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel;

WEB: Let your beauty be not just the outward adorning of braiding the hair, and of wearing jewels of gold, or of putting on fine clothing;