Care of the Face

Spasmodic attention [to the skin] is of no value. Don't expect that the careful night toilet attended to every other night, or just when you feel like it, will result in any special good. Every time it is omitted there is danger from the resulting obstruction of the pores, and irregularity of diet or baths, or want of exercise, will undo the good accomplished. Like seeks like, and evils have wondrous affinity for each other. The poisonous wastes, clogging earthy substances, cooperate actively with external irritants, and create that blight of so many complexions, comedones and acne, commonly called "worms." They are accumulations of oily secretions from the ducts of the sebaceous glands, which from some of the unfavorable influences already enumerated are not expelled. The chemical action of the air, and often of some powder or lotion applied to the face, turns the matter at the minute opening black.

"When examined under the microscope, each of these little masses, technically called comedo, is found to contain a pair, and often a numerous progeny, of minute parasitic worms. These cause no annoyance or irritation unless they become very numerous and active, in which case an ordinary pimple [acne punctata] results." Any attempt to expel them by force irritates and often bruises the skin, and they are sure to return unless the cause is removed. The healthful action of all internal excretory organs must be attended to, and that of the skin ensured by cleanliness. For this condition the complexion brush is needed and hot water and soap or emollient paste to relax the pores and encourage them to yield their clogging contents; and the operation should be assisted by cold creams of a special sort, containing no spermaceti or white wax, but only penetrating oils which will dissolve the hardened secretions, and at the same time strengthen and feed the skin. Pure, sweet cream is sometimes the best thing that can be used, and milk baths—one part milk to one and a half of water—are efficacious.

-- Fletcher, The Woman Beautiful