Wharton, Edith — The Age of Innocence [76]

Few things seemed to Newland Archer more awful than an offense against “Taste,” that far-off divinity of whom “Form” was the mere visible representative and vicegerent. Madame Olenska’s pale and serious face appealed to his fancy as suited to the occasion and to her unhappy situation; but the way her dress (which had no tucker) sloped away from her thin shoulders shocked and troubled him. He hated to think of May Welland being exposed to the influence of a young woman so careless of the dictates of Taste. — Wharton, Edith, The Age of Innocence, 76

Note

The theological vocabulary (‘divinity,’ ‘vicegerent’) makes Taste a remote god and Form its earthly deputy — the whole sanctioning apparatus cast as religion. The offending detail is precisely the missing tucker, the code made garment.