Flower

“ The humblest flower that grows is visited by our messengers, and often blooms in fragrant beauty, unknown, unloved by all save Fairy friends, who seek to fill the spirits with all sweet and gentle virtues, that they may not be useless on the earth; for the noblest mortals stoop to learn of flowers. ”

“ I forsook human life for floral, and in my renouncing I gained much. In my garden there grew a single fragile flower, orchid-like in glory, but of a species quite different to any I had ever chanced upon before. ”

“ Nature’s gems sparkle lavishly on glossy leaf and swaying branch, on bursting bud and flower; while the bow of peace melts gently and imperceptibly away, like the dying saint into the light of heaven. ”

“ Long, long, long ago seems it to be indeed, when we now remember it, the Time we first pulled the primroses on the sunny braes, wondering in our first blissful emotions of beauty at the leaves with a softness all their own—a yellowness nowhere else so vivid—"the bright consummate flower" so starlike to our awakened imagination among the lowly grass—lovely indeed to our admiring eyes as any one of all the stars that, in their turn, did seem themselves like flowers in the blue fields of heaven! ”

“ Every leaf that falls is pushed from its hold by a bud awaiting the mystic order to unfold itself in spring; every flower lives but to form its seeds. All through the centuries the spirits of the flowers and the wild things have been growing more beautiful in the knowledge of their service. ”

“ The flower struggles up from seed-pod, draws the sweet sap from the ground, folds its petals each night, and sleeps. Then love comes to it in a strange form, and it longs to mingle its pollen with the pollen of some other flower. ”

“ Your pardon! The majestic flower that spreads Its beauties to the open eye of day All may admire, and quaff its bounteous fragrance. But love we less some gentle, shrinking bud, That blooms but for our gaze? ”

“ Every flower show has some new and more beautiful rose or chrysanthemum; every new spring seed catalogue its new colorings of sweet peas and nasturtiums. Any little boy or girl with a tiny garden, can watch for some flower with a poet's gift for size, color or perfume, and help it "come up higher." ”

“ The flowers of every hue,
Some shy, half-opened bud will holds
Its drop of morning's dew.
Sweeter with every sunlit hour
The trembling sphere has grown,
Till all the fragrance of the flower
Becomes at last its own. ”

“ You have seen a fair flower growing in the fields, have you not?--Well, you have plucked it, and putting it in your bonnet, have borne it in the mid-day sun and the evening chill; and when you have looked for the flower at nightfall, you have found but a withered, formless, beautiless thing, that perforce you have given back to the earth from which it sprang. ”

“ Not a scowling, sullen endurance, not a despairing, hand-dropping resignation, but a heart cheerfulness that holds on to every leaf, and twig, and flower, and bravely smiles and keeps green when frozen to the very heart, knowing that the winter is but for a season, and that the sunshine and bird singings shall return, and the last year's dry flower stalk give place to the risen, glorified flower. ”

“ As the perfectly formed flower, blushing in its wealth of color, is called beautiful, so we would designate these symmetrical spirit-creatures, moving in the glory of their higher endowment and shaded with the living tints of Heaven. ”

“ When viewed through a powerful lens, the heart of the flower, which, to the naked eye, lies flooded in a warm, colorless light, assumes the most exquisite iridescent hues, far more beautiful than the defined tints of the passion-flower. ”

“ With ray-like florets round a disk-like face.
Men nobly call by many a name the Mount,
As over many a land of theirs its large
Calm steadfast front, like a triumphal targe
Is reared, and still with old names, fresh names vie,
Each to its proper praise and own account:
Men call the Flower, the Sunflower, sportively. ”

“ You'll get a' the flowers in my garden,
To be to you a weed.
'The lily white shall be your smock;
Becomes your body neat;
And your head shall be deckd with jelly-flower,
And the primrose in your breast. ”

“ Some of them watch above the flower-roots, and keep them fresh and strong; others gather the clear drops that trickle from the damp rocks, and form a little spring, which, growing ever larger, rises to the light above, and gushes forth in some green field or lonely forest; where the wild-birds come to drink, and wood-flowers spread their thirsty leaves above the clear, cool waves, as they go dancing away, carrying joy and freshness wherever they go. Others shape the bright jewels into lovely forms, and make the good-luck pennies which we give to mortals whom we love. ”

“ Every flower, my beloved, speaks to thee in a voice distinct and clear; every plant announces to thee plainly the eternal laws of life; but these sacred hieroglyphics of the goddess which thou decipherest upon their perfumed foreheads, thou wilt find everywhere hidden under other emblems. ”

“ Do you not know how pleasant it is to watch the shrubs we plant, and water, and rear ourselves?—to see the little green shoots peep out, and the leaves unfold, and then the flower blossom and expand, diffusing its delicious odour around,—all, as it were, created by oneself, by one's own nursing, out of a bit of stick or an ugly bulb? ”

“ It is a pleasant pastime, when wearied with toil you go forth for a time among your flowers and search for the buds, or examine the newly-opened flower. How it rests you!
It is a pleasant pastime, when the labors of the day are over, and the sun is throwing long shadows from the west, you take watering-pot in hand, and shower the refreshing spray upon your plants, cleansing them from the dust, and cooling them after the heat. How they thrive, and bud and bloom! ”

“ The many-colored shadows of the fairest flowers played on the pure white walls, and fountains sparkled in the sunlight, making music as the cool waves rose and fell, while to and fro, with waving wings and joyous voices, went the smiling Elves, bearing fruit and honey, or fragrant garlands for each other's hair. ”

“ Through the dreary months, when they might have dwelt among fair Southern flowers, beneath a smiling sky, they toiled in the dark and silent earth, filling the hearts of the gentle Flower Spirits with grateful love, seeking no reward but the knowledge of their own good deeds, and the joy they always bring. ”

“ Yet we are all free to guess—and what flower—at least in the early year, before it has gained that touch of confidence which it acquires later—is so bashful, so pretty, so flushed with rosy shame, so eager to defend its modesty by closing its blushing petals when carried off by the despoiler—as the spring beauty? ”

“ A flower was offered to me,
Such a flower as May never bore;
But I said, ‘I’ve a pretty rose tree,’
And I passed the sweet flower o’er.
Then I went to my pretty rose tree,
To tend her by day and by night ”

“ Thou becomest distracted whenever thou seest a flower, O my Heart! Thou thinkest that the flowers that look on all men can resemble her eye!
1113. Her arm is as the bamboo; her body is as the tender leaf; her smile is a very pearl; the sweetest of odours is in her breath ”

“ Whether manifesting itself in the inconspicuous flower upon the tree or in the equally unassuming inflorescence of the vegetable, or unfurling petals of satin or gauze of brilliant hue and marvelous beauty, the blossom is the origin of most that is useful or beautiful in the organic world about us. Strip the world of its blossoms, and the higher forms of life must come to a speedy termination. ”

“ When I bring a flower out of the darkness and set it in the sun, and let the sunlight come streaming down upon it, and the flower knows the sunlight for which it was made and opens its fragrance and beauty ”

“ The bright- hued blossoms seemed to make her oblivious for a moment of the darkness and corruption to which she was so soon to consign her priceless treasure. The child's sweet face, even in death, reminded me that the flowers of the field and garden, however lovely, are all outshone by human beauty. What floral glory of the wild-wood, or what queen of the parterre, in all the pride of bloom, laughing in the sun-light or dancing in the breeze, hath a charm that could vie for a single moment with the soft and holy lustre of that motionless and faded human lily? ”

“ These are the spirits of the flowers, and this the Fairy Home where those whose hearts were pure and loving on the earth come to bloom in fadeless beauty here, when their earthly life is past. The humblest flower that blooms has a home with us, for outward beauty is a worthless thing if all be not fair and sweet within. ”

“ II. Rude gods in brass or gold enchant an untaught devotee-- Fair marble shapes, rich paintings old, are Art's idolatry; But nought e'er charmed a human breast like this small tremulous flower, Minute and delicate work divine of world-creative power! III. This flower's the Queen of all earth's flowers, and loveliest things appear Linked by some secret sympathy, in this mysterious sphere; The giver and the gift seem one, and thou thyself art nigh When this glory of the garden greets thy lover's raptured eye. ”

“ For every flower I had a name,—
⁠My friends were woodchucks, toads, and bees;
I knew where thrived in yonder glen
⁠What plants would soothe a stone-bruised toe—
Oh, I was very learned then,
⁠But that was very long ago. ”

“ To the thoughtless a flower is often a trivial thing—beautiful perhaps, and worthy of a passing glance—but that is all. But to the mind open to the great truths of the universe, it takes on a deeper significance. ”

“ The flower itself consists of one leaf of the funnel-fashioned kind, spreads, and, when in its full perfection, folds back at the lips, though it has in some flowers marks or depressions which might appear like segments, yet they are not such, but merely accidental, and the edge of most of the flowers perfectly even, without any mark of separation. ”

“ A flower, for instance, is taken, and, in simple terms, intelligible to nearly every capacity, attention is called to its thousand fibres, its construction, growth, perfume, colour, delicacy of texture, loveliness, and to the wonders associated with its birth, death, and resurrection to life. ”

“ Thus we see the flower playing a wonderfully important part in the cosmos around us. It becomes henceforth not only a thing of beauty for the gratification of the æsthetic sense, but the instrument by which Nature brings about the fullness of her perfection in her own good season. ”

“ And first, in the security bred of many harmless marriages, it had been forgotten that Love is no hot-house flower, but a wild plant, born of a wet night, born of an hour of sunshine; sprung from wild seed, blown along the road by a wild wind. A wild plant that, when it blooms by chance within the hedge of our gardens, we call a flower; and when it blooms outside we call a weed; but, flower or weed, whose scent and colour are always, wild! ”

“ When they had passed all those troubled ways, The Garden sweet spread forth her green to shew; The moving crystal from the fountains plays; Fair trees, high plants, strange herbs and flowerets new, Sunshiny hills, vales hid from Phoebus' rays, Groves, arbours, mossie caves at once they view, And that which beauty most, most wonder brought, No where appear'd the Art which all this wrought. ”

“ By and by a day came when the little plant was covered with many tiny blossoms. The [255] other flowers rejoiced to see them. “We’ve guessed your secret. What beautiful flower children—blue, like the sky. It makes the sky seem very near.”
“That is my secret,” answered the little plant. “When I told it to the Angel I said, ‘My flowers must be just the colour of the sky.’ And she whispered, ‘Then always look up, for your flowers will be like that which you love most.’ Then she went away.” ”

“ Most justly, then, may we call the Christian religion a garden of flowers, that are delightful to the sight and most salutary to those who breathe the air impregnated by their fragrance. Our Lady herself was a flower distinguished for beauty and excellence above all other flowers—a flower of incomparable fragrance, possessed of the power of producing many other flowers: Hortus conclusus, soror mea, sponsa—'Thou,' says the sacred Spouse in the Canticles, 'art a garden enclosed:' a garden all studded with the most magnificent flowers that can be produced. ”

“ Here's flowers for you, Hot lavender, mint, savory, majoram, The marigold, that goes to bed with the sun, And with him rises weeping these are flowers Of middle summer, and I think they are given To men of middle age. ”

“ The wind-flower and the violet, they perished long ago,
And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the summer glow;
But on the hill the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood,
And the yellow sun-flower by the brook in autumn beauty stood,
Till fell the frost from the clear cold heaven, as falls the plague on men,
And the brightness of their smile was gone, from upland, glade, and glen. ”

“ The Greeks called flowers the Festival of the eye: and so they are: but they are something else, and something better.
A flower is not a flower alone, A thousand sanctities invest it.
Flowers not only touch the heart; they also elevate the soul. They bind us not entirely to earth; though they make earth delightful. They attract our thoughts downward to the richly embroidered ground only to raise them up again to heaven. If the stars are the scriptures of the sky, the flowers are the scriptures of the earth. ”

“ The purple heath and golden broom, On moory mountains catch the gale, O'er lawns the lily sheds perfume, The violet in the vale. But this bold floweret climbs the hill, Hides in the forest, haunts the glen, Plays on the margin of the rill, Peeps round the fox's den. Within the garden's cultured round It shares the sweet carnation's bed; And blooms on consecrated ground In honour of the dead. The lambkin crops its crimson gem, The wild-bee murmurs on its breast, The blue-fly bends its pensile stem, Light o'er the sky-lark's nest. ”

“ Like the flowers of the field and the garden, they are “all rooted and grounded” in the soil of the same earth; they are warmed by the same sun, refreshed by the same air, and watered by the same dews. They each derive nourishment, growth, and increase from the same life-giving Source. As the flower puts forth its leaves and petals, adorns the place which it inhabits with its beauty, and possesses an internal system of qualities, whereby it is enabled to bring forth its seed or fruit in the appointed season; so does the Christian. ”