The essence of taste is suitability. Divest the word of its prim and priggish implications, and see how it expresses the mysterious demand of eye and mind for symmetry, harmony, and order.

Wharton argues that “taste” is not mere social snobbery or fussy rule-following (“prim and priggish implications”), but an intuitive fitness between parts and whole—what she calls suitability. In this view, good taste is a disciplined responsiveness to proportion and coherence: the eye and mind “demand” symmetry, harmony, and order because these qualities make environments intelligible and satisfying. The quote also implies a moral or intellectual dimension to aesthetics: taste is a form of judgment that resists both vulgar display and empty minimalism by asking what is appropriate to purpose, setting, and scale. Wharton’s phrasing links private perception to shared standards, suggesting that taste is personal yet not purely subjective.