There is always a period when a man with a beard shaves it off. This period does not last. He returns headlong to his beard. – Jean Cocteau (1889–1963), translated from French

The care that we bestow on our person is a species of politeness towards others; thus it is that many persons shave some part of their beard, in order to unite freedom of toilette with an appearance of cleanliness and trimness. – Charles Blanc, Art in Ornament and Dress, 1875

To draw it to a fine point, as was done under the Empire… is to give the face of the wearer a factitious and evanescent expression, since the points cannot be kept stiff without the use of a cosmetic, easily detected and soon melted. – Charles Blanc, Art in Ornament and Dress, 1875

The discovery of a grey hair when you are brushing out your whiskers of a morning—first fallen flake of the coming snows of age—is a disagreeable thing…. – Alexander Smith, “An Essay on an Old Subject”