Sunshine

“ Forth marches Sunshine gorgeously through earth,
By health attended, and life-giving mirth,
And heralded by Spring.
Light through the untrack'd air,
Pursues its course authentic; hill and dale
Rejoice, and Nature cries, "All hail!"
As if a king were there. [14]
The elevated lawns,
Where first the day comes, and where last retires,
Rejoicing seem; their light the mind inspires,
And thought, like morning, dawns.
The wild, yet artless breeze,
Now, in the ear of Nature, sings its song,
Wandering green fields and flowery banks among,
And over shadowy seas. ”

“ It is perpetual sunshine, so that you may lie out in the fields all day without catching cold; and yet it is not too hot, the sunshine being a sort of twilight, in which you see everything, quite clearly, but softly, and with beautiful colours, as if you were in a delightful dream. ”

“ It is there that he gazes upon the gorgeous sunset,—the evening star following with silvery lamp the fading day, or the moon showering her pale lustre through the balmy night air, with a fancy that kindles and soars into the heavens before him,—there, that we have all felt the charm of woods and green fields, and solitary boughs waving in the golden sunshine, or darkening in the melancholy beauty of evening shadows. ”

“ Never again would she see the light of the golden sunshine—never again see the green, waving grass and the budding flowerets—never see the blue sky, with its fleecy clouds, or the heavens at night blazing with the soft, pale light of the twinkling stars—never again look upon a human face. ”

“ The play of cloud and sunshine is left in the background, while the murmurs of joy and sorrow occupy the mind. It is our gaze which gives to the blue of the autumn sky its wistful tinge and human yearning which gives poignancy to the breath of its breezes. ”

“ No longer mindful of the earth, Nature is then expectantly listening to heaven, and the breath of the Almighty stirs harmonious melodies upon the golden strings of mellow sunshine.
The sky has become so trustworthy, that it more than fulfils through the day that which it promises in the morning with its sad and misty eyes. ”

“ To the lover of the sights and sounds of Nature, life has few better things to offer than a quiet hour, some bright spring morning, under the shadow of a green arch of blossomed boughs, in company with gentle, beautiful, sweet-voiced poets of the air, glad, like him, in the sunshine and the fragrance. ”

“ Days of spring and of mere pleasure in existence have alternated with days of gloom and loneliness, of melancholy, of resignation. Our mental pictures of the place are tinged by many moods, as the landscape is beheld in shower and sunshine, in frost, and in the colourless drizzling weather. ”

“ The sunshine is entirely untamed. Where it rages most freely it tends to evoke the brilliancy rather than the harmonious satisfactions of nature. The monstrous growths and the flaming colors of the tropics contrast with our more subdued loveliness of foliage and bloom. ”

“ The sun is shining just as golden and as genial this moment as it did when we sat on the beams of the mill-race and felt on our faces the spray of tumbling waters sun-warmed in the air.
We need only open our hearts and let the sunshine in! ”

“ Either from the pure atmosphere, the healthy life we lead, or the accordant tone of our spirits, we find ourselves unusually sensitive to all the slightest touches, the most minute rays of that grace and harmony which bathes every landscape in cloudless sunshine. ”

“ The sunshine of the morning
Is abroad upon the hills,
With the singing of the green-wood leaves,
And of a thousand rills. ”

“ Yes, Heaven is thine; but this 40
Is a world of sweets and sours;
Our flowers are merely—flowers,
And the shadow of thy perfect bliss
Is the sunshine of ours. ”

“ The flowers which played then among the grass, the water which rippled past in the sunshine, the whole landscape which served as environment to their apparition lingers around the memory of them still with its unconscious or unheeding air; ”

“ How beautiful, buoyant, and glad is morning! The first sunshine on the leaves; the first wind, laden with the first breath of the flowers—that deep sigh with which they seem to waken from sleep; the first dew, untouched even by the light foot of the early hare; the first chirping of the rousing birds, as if eager to begin song and flight: all is redolent of the strength given by rest, and the joy of conscious life. ”

“ This shows an astonishing contrariety of disposition on the part of persons of refined sensations, so completely does it reverse the order of nature, which gives us the early sunshine for our enjoyment. Sunrise is the only beautiful natural spectacle that we modern English do not care about, except once or twice in our lives, when we get a shivering glimpse of it from an altitude of many thousand feet above the level of the sea. ”

“ Heretofore my life has been calm as a summer’s day; but who knows when winter storms may rise, and often I have thought that I was born to know wind and rain and lightning as well as peace and sunshine. ”

“ White clouds, whose shadows haunt the deep, Light mists, whose soft embraces keep The sunshine on the hills asleep! ”

“ After many frowns fortune has treated us to the kindest smile—for twenty-four hours we have had a calm with brilliant sunshine. Such weather in such a place comes nearer to satisfying my ideal of perfection than any condition that I have ever experienced. The warm glow of the sun with the keen invigorating cold of the air forms a combination which is inexpressibly health-giving and satisfying to me, whilst the golden light on this wonderful scene of mountain and ice satisfies every claim of scenic magnificence. ”

“ he was sunshine most always—I mean he made it seem like good weather. ”

“ Beautiful with the truest sort of beauty, for nobility of character lent its subtle charm to the bloom of youth, the freshness of health, the innocence of a nature whose sweet maidenliness Mac felt but could not describe. Gentle yet full of spirit, and all aglow with the earnestness that suggests lovely possibilities and makes one hope that such human flowers may have heaven's purest air and warmest sunshine to blossom in. ”

“ There have been no tempestuous rains, even no sultry days, but a constant breath of southern winds, with now a day of kindly sunshine, and now a no less kindly mist or a soft descent of showers, in which a smile and a blessing seemed to have been steeped. The snow has vanished as if by magic; whatever heaps may be hidden in the woods and deep gorges of the hills, only two solitary specks remain in the landscape; and those I shall almost regret to miss when to-morrow I look for them in vain. Never before, methinks, has spring pressed so closely on the footsteps of retreating winter. ”

“ I find no reason why I should be of the few favoured. I believe in some blending of hope and sunshine sweetening the worst lots. I believe that this life is not all; neither the beginning nor the end. I believe while I tremble; I trust while I weep. ”

“ The blue sky overhead flecked with the lightest of summer clouds, the buoyant air, the sun-steeped landscape, the general brightness and cheerfulness of the day, impressed us with an indefinable but very real joyousness and light-heartedness. ”

“ There are so many miracles every day, if we but knew them,—the scent of flowers, the webs of spiders, the subtle fragrance of the earth, a wayside weed, and, most beautiful of all, the sunrise and the moon. For sunsets, though they may fill a grey world with rose and gold, and though they are always so magnificent that words are pallid pictures and artists' colours impotent, never have the beauty of the dawn. A sunset may turn our joy to melancholy, so tender is it, so pregnant with regret for the vanished day, so full of splendours. But we are always happy in the dawn. ”

“ Perchance in sunset's golden pale
He listens to the nightingale,
Amid the perfumed air.
Come, he has fled; you are not you,
And I no more am I;
Delight is changeful as the hue
Of heaven, that is no longer blue
In yonder sunset sky.
ELLE.
Nay, if we seek we shall not find,
If we knock none openeth;
Nay, see, the sunset fades behind
The mountains, and the cold night wind
Blows from the house of Death.
ROMANCE.
My Love dwelt in a Northern land. ”

“ How gratefully comes the evening to us,—with its violet glooms and promises of coolness!
All this sensuous blending of warmth and force in winds and waters more and more suggests an idea of the spiritualism of elements,—a sense of world-life. In all these soft sleepy swayings, these caresses of wind and sobbing of waters, Nature seems to confess some passional mood. ”

“ Thus sunset was described as the sun growing old, decaying, dying; the sunrise as night giving birth to a brilliant, beautiful child. Spring was Sol greeting the happy earth with a warm embrace, and showering his treasures into the lap of nature. Rivers, fountains, grottoes, forests, mountains, rain, storm, the ocean, fire, thunder clouds and the heavenly bodies were all clothed with the attributes of living beings, and all descriptions of them were myths. ”

“ When the sun rises in splendour above the eastern horizon, tinting the sky with varied colours, lighting up the clouds which till then have been but dark patches on the heavens, bringing out the colours of hill and dale, rock and river, fields and woods, the heart gladdens at the spectacle. A pleasing melancholy falls on us as the light fades away at eventide, tint after tint vanishing, until at length the gloom of night enshrouds all. ”

“ In the blazing heat and dazzling light of noonday he can cover the heavens with the darkness of night. When the sky is one even blue, without assistance of wind or clouds, he can draw rain from a barren heaven. ”

“ The sunset has passed through every stage of beauty, through every glory of colour, through riot and triumph, through pathos and tenderness, into a long, dreamy, painless rest, succeeded by the profound solemnity of the moonlight, and a stillness broken only by the night cries of beasts in the aromatic forests. ”

“ These are only little summer showers, that make the earth greener and the flowers more beautiful. The sky is of a more heavenly azure when they pass away, and the sun shines more gloriously than before. ”

“ Or the clouds driven by the breeze
Floating everywhere.
[223]
LIGHT AND SHADOW.
Shine down, fair sun, on vale and hill,
And light each height and hollow;—
No shade rests in the air, but still
On earth the shadows follow.
Grow green, old trees, where'er you may
Your festival be keeping;—
On branch and stem, on leaf and spray,
Decay is slowly creeping.
Bloom bright, fair flowers, in wild or mead,
Around you all perfuming;—
The blight that mingles with each seed,
The blossom is consuming. ”

“ Here Nature runs the whole gamut of beauty—through the laughing loveliness of spring mornings, the capricious sweetness of summer days, when the landscape hides itself, like a sulky beauty, in white mists and silvery rains, to the cold glory of the winter nights ”

“ I have seen the spectacle of morning from the hill-top over against my house, from day-break to sun-rise, with emotions which an angel might share. The long slender bars of cloud float like fishes in the sea of crimson light. ”

“ Looking upon the world as a mere spectacle of beauty, I find its attractions increasing. I notice more than I ever did the gorgeous phantasmagoria of sunsets, the magical changes of clouds, the endless varieties of form and color in the flowers of garden and field, and the shell-flowers of the sea. Something of tenderness mingles with the admiration excited by all this fair array of earth, like the lingering, farewell gaze we bestow on scenes from which we are soon to part. ”

“ Should it assist you to while away some rainy morning of life, and at the same time lead you to remember that, above the clouds which lour so heavily, the blue heaven lies in its deep tranquillity, and the glorious sun still shines brightly, able, when it shall be God’s good pleasure, to dispel the darkness that oppresses you, and again shed its light and warmth into your spirit—the end for which this sketch has been traced will be answered. ”

“ Morn breaketh in the east. The purple clouds
Are putting on their gold and violet,
To look the meeter for the sun’s bright coming.
Sleep is upon the waters and the wind;
And nature, from the tremulous forest leaf
To her majestic master, sleeps. As yet
There is no mist upon the deep blue sky,
And the clear dew is on the blushing bosoms
Of crimson roses, in a holy rest. ”

“ Will night ever come?
Yes, it comes at last, as God’s good gifts always come, to refresh and sweeten our lives. The sky flushes with sunset light. Shadows creep up from the east; a cool breeze touches the fevered faces. ”

“ But, if the eye is not allowed to behold a perpetual spring, it is permitted, during our fleeting summers, to enjoy a beautiful variety of flowers, that spring up in rapid succession, and pass like a shifting scene before it; filling the heart with joy and gladness, and the imagination with a thousand forms of grace and beauty, on which it may love to linger when the charming reality has passed away. ”

“ And the season of shadows, beclouds the bright skies,
The heart becomes tinged with pensive emotions
As Nature, in mourning, thus withers and dies.
We recall the sweet hours of retrospect pleasure,
Of green haunts of happiness—lately our own—
Of gay, joyous scenes, and sweet summer fancies,
Engendered by beauty and brightness alone.
Adieu to the charms of summer and autumn,
That each, in their turn, fill life with delight;
[88] We love Nature, budding or blooming or ripened,
We cherish its beauties—regretting their flight. ”

“ The colours with which he paints seem yet wet and breathing, like those of the living statue in the Winter’s Tale. Nature in his descriptions is seen growing around us, fresh and lusty as in itself. We feel the effect of the atmosphere, its humidity or clearness, its heat or cold, the glow of summer, the gloom of winter, the tender promise of the spring, the full overshadowing foliage, the declining pomp and deepening tints of autumn. ”