ABC Wednesday

The letter this week is the veritable V

V is for Vanity

One of the Seven Deadly Sins.

To paraphrase Wikipedia, Vanity is the conviction that one's own attractiveness to others exceeds reality.

This was not always the meaning of Vanity, - at one time before the 14th century it merely meant futility, and perhaps in the end that is what self idolatry is all about.

"The stories of Lucifer, Narcissus, and others attend to a pernicious aspect of vanity" - resulting in one becoming divorced from the graces of God(s).

Two famous painting depict the peculiar self-pride that is vanity, one by Frank Cadogan Cowper and the other by Titian.

Cowper

Titian

And poor Narcissus "As divine punishment he fell in love with his own reflection in a pool, not realizing it was merely an image, and he wasted away to death, not being able to leave the beauty of his own reflection."

But perhaps the picture that most morbidly depicts the reality of Vanity  is that of C. Allan Gilbert.

His picture is an optical illusion in which what appears to be a large grinning skull reveals itself to be a young woman gazing at her reflection in the mirror, reminding us that the passage of years will rob one of shallow vainglory.

An unsettling thought, but one that speaks to the virtues of humility and its comfort in old age.....

I am sure there are more cheerful aspects for the letter V at ABC Wednesday and you can visit them by clicking Here.