In The Winter's Tale, Act 1, Scene 2, the King of Bohemia is told that his suspicious host is plotting against him. He believes it because he recalls the look of enmity on his host's face. The king puts it like this: "I saw his heart in his face."

Gilbert Stuart took one look at Talleyrand, the French ambassador, and said, "If that man isn't a scoundrel, God doesn't write a legible hand."

A selfish prince once had a magician create a mask that would make him look kind so that he might win the heart of the sweet princess. The only requirement that the magician set on him was that he must live as the mask showed, or it would crack and be destroyed. Eventually the two were happily married, but then the prince felt he should tell his new wife of the deception.

But when he took the magic mas…