Throw hither all your quaint enamell'd eyes That on the green turf suck the honied showers, And purple all the ground with vernal flowers. Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies, The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine, The white pink, and the pansy freakt with jet, The glowing violet, The musk-rose, and the well-attir'd woodbine, With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head, And every flower that sad embroidery wears.
You can cut all the flowers but you cannot keep Spring from coming.
Hearts are flowers; they remain open to the softly falling dew, but shut up in the violent downpour of rain.
It is the same with any life. Imagine one selected day struck out of it, and think how different its course would have been. Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day.
Call for the robin-redbreast and the wren, Since o'er shady groves they hover, And with leaves and flowers do cover The friendless bodies of unburied men.
Its brightness, mighty divinity! has a fleeting empire over the day, giving gladness to the fields, color to the flowers, the season of the loves, harmonious hour of wakening birds.--_Calderon._
For, lo! the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.
It wouldn't be my move," Jace agreed. "First the candy and flowers, then the apology letters, then the ravenous demon hordes. In that order.
Too late I stayed,--forgive the crime! Unheeded flew the hours; How noiseless falls the foot of time That only treads on flowers.
When Nature gives a gorgeous rose, Or yields the simplest fern, She writes this motto on the leaves, — "To whom it may concern!" And so it is the poet comes And revels in her bowers, And, — though another hold the land, Is owner of the flowers.
This is a haunted world. It hath no breeze But is the echo of some voice beloved: Its pines have human tones; its billows wear The color and the sparkle of dear eyes. Its flowers are sweet with touch of tender hands That once clasped ours. All things are beautiful Because of something lovelier than themselves, Which breathes within them, and will never die.\x97 Haunted,\x97but not with any spectral gloom; Earth is suffused, inhabited by heaven.
~Flowers.~--Luther always kept a flower in a glass on his writing-table; and when he was waging his great public controversy with Eckius he kept a flower in his hand. Lord Bacon has a beautiful passage about flowers. As to Shakspeare, he is a perfect Alpine valley,--he is full of flowers; they spring, and blossom, and wave in every cleft of his mind. Even Milton, cold, serene, and stately as he is, breaks forth into exquisite gushes of tenderness and fancy when he marshals the flowers.--_Mrs. Stowe._
We can safely say that those people are under a delusion who call that painter a good master who can only draw well a head or a figure. Certainly there is no great merit if, after studying a single thing during a whole lifetime, you attain to a certain degree of perfection in it. But knowing, as we do, that painting includes and comprehends all the works produced by nature, or brought about by the fortuitous action of man, and in fact everything that the eye can see, he seems to me to be a poor master who can only do one thing well. Now seest thou not how many and diverse acts are performed by men? Seest thou not how many various animals there are, and likewise trees, plants and flowers; what a variety of mountainous or level places, fountains, rivers, cities, public and private buildings, {92} instruments suitable for human use; how many diverse costumes and ornaments and arts? All these things should be considered of equal effect and value when used by the man who can be called a good painter.
To nurse the flowers, to root up the weeds, is the business of the gardener.
Grau' Haare sind Kirchhofsblumen=--Gray hairs are churchyard flowers.
If you despise painting, which is the only imitator of the visible works of nature, you will certainly despise a subtle invention which with philosophy and subtle speculation apprehends the qualities of forms, backgrounds, places, plants, animals, herbs and flowers, which are surrounded by light and shade. And truly this is knowledge and the legitimate offspring of nature, because painting is begotten by nature. But to be correct, we will say that it is the grandchild of nature, because all visible things are begotten by nature, and these her children have begotten painting. Therefore we shall rightly say that painting is the grandchild of nature and related to God.
If you made up a city like this, no one would have believed you. It seemed more like myth than reality- a whole metropolis built up around an industry that recorded dreams on giant screens, a city bordered by an ocean and a desert and snowcapped mountains. And right through the urban sprawl were canyons full of flowers, wild animals and secrets.
We waste our best years in distilling the sweetest flowers of life into potions which, after all, do not immortalise, but only intoxicate.
My days are in the yellow leaf; / The flowers and fruits of love are gone; / The worm, the canker, and the grief / Are mine alone.
Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal frost.
And the heart that is soonest awake to the flowers Is always the first to be touch'd by the thorns.
sent him his list of dreamy-eyed ideals along with the birthday card she’d hand made with pressed flowers and a reminder to come home for the weekend to celebrate his milestone birthday. Thirty-five. Evan strode across the marble lobby leading to his law firm’s offices like a man in a hurry. In fact, he had ten minutes to spare before his next client meeting. A lot of people might use those minutes to grab a coffee, chat with a colleague or relax. Evan
Life is a stream upon which drift flowers in spring and blocks of ice in winter.
O Proserpina, For the flowers now, that frighted thou let'st fall From Dis's waggon! daffodils, That come before the swallow dares, and take The winds of March with beauty; violets dim, But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes Or Cytherea's breath; pale primroses, That die unmarried, ere they can behold Bright Phoebus in his strength,--a malady Most incident to maids; bold oxlips and The crown imperial; lilies of all kinds, The flower-de-luce being one.
Many flowers open to the sun, but only one follows him constantly. Heart, be thou the sunflower, not only open to receive God's blessing, but constant in looking to Him.
It is with our thoughts as with flowers. Those whose expression is simple carry their seed with them; those that are double, by their richness and pomp charm the mind, but produce nothing.
Alieni temporis flores=--Flowers of other days.
The best things in life are nearest: Breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of right just before you. Then do not grasp at the stars, but do life's plain, common work as it comes, certain that daily duties and daily bread are the sweetest things in life.
Fair flowers don't remain lying by the highway.
Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.
Aucun chemin de fleurs ne conduit a la gloire=--No path of flowers conducts to glory.
I have here only made a nosegay of culled flowers, and have brought nothing of my own but the thread that ties them together.
What prompts thee, O man, to abandon thy habitations in the city, to leave thy parents and friends, and to seek rural spots in the mountains and valleys, if it be not the natural beauty of the world, which, if thou reflectest, thou dost enjoy solely by means of the sense of sight? And if the poet wishes to be called a painter in this connection also, why didst thou not take the descriptions of places made by the poet and remain at home without exposing thyself to the heat of the sun? Oh! would not this have been more profitable and less fatiguing to thee, since this can be done in the cool without motion and danger of illness? But the soul could not enjoy the benefit of the eyes, the windows of its dwelling, and it could not note the character of joyous {76} places; it could not see the shady valleys watered by the sportiveness of the winding rivers; it could not see the various flowers, which with their colours make a harmony for the eye, and all the other objects which the eye can apprehend. But if the painter in the cold and rigorous season of winter can evoke for thee the landscapes, variegated and otherwise, in which thou didst experience thy happiness; if near some fountain thou canst see thyself, a lover with thy beloved, in the flowery fields, under the soft shadow of the budding boughs, wilt thou not experience a greater pleasure than in hearing the same effect described by the poet?
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams Beside a pumice isle in Bai?'s bay, And saw in sleep old palaces and towers Quivering within the wave's intenser day, All overgrown with azure moss and flowers So sweet, the sense faints picturing them.
Spring is a time to make up a big bouquet of flowers for someone you love, or are trying to love, or are in love with.
Schone Blumen stehen nicht lange am Wege=--Fair flowers are not left standing long by the wayside.
Feelings, like flowers and butterflies, last longer the later they are delayed.
It seems that scientists are often attracted to beautiful theories in the way that insects are attracted to flowers — not by logical deduction, but by something like a sense of smell.
Repining love is the stillest; the shady flowers in this spring as in the other, shun sunlight.--_Richter._
So soon as one's heart is tender it is weak. When it is beating so warmly against the breast, and the throat is, as it were, tied tightly, and one strives to press the tears from one's eyes and feels an incomprehensible joy as they begin to flow, then we are so weak that we are fettered by chains of flowers, not because they have become strong through any magic chain, but because we tremble lest we should tear them asunder.
Charms which, like flowers, lie on the surface and always glitter, easily produce vanity; whereas other excellences, which lie deep like gold and are discovered with difficulty, leave their possessors modest and proud.
The blossoms of passion, gay and luxuriant flowers, are brighter and fuller of fragrance, but they beguile us and lead us astray, and their odor is deadly.--_Longfellow._
Pretty women without religion are like flowers without perfume.--_Heinrich Heine._
Read my little fable: He that runs may read. Most can raise the flowers now, For all have got the seed.
And sighs to find them in the wood and by the stream no more.
Beneath the Winter's snow lie germs of summer flowers.--_Whittier._
Envy offends with false infamy, that is to say, by detraction which frightens virtue. Envy must be represented with the hands raised to heaven in contempt, because if she could she would use her power against God. Make her face covered with a goodly mark; show her as wounded in the eye by a palm-branch, and wounded in the ear by laurel and myrtle, to signify that victory and truth offend her. Draw many thunderbolts proceeding from her as a symbol of her evil-speaking. Make her lean and shrivelled up, because she is continual dissolution. Make her heart gnawed by a swelling serpent. Make her a quiver full of tongues for arrows, because she often offends with these. Make her a leopard's skin, because the leopard kills the lion through envy and by deceit. Place a vase in her hand full of flowers, and let it be full also of scorpions, toads and other reptiles. Let her ride Death, because Envy, which is undying, never wearies of sovereignty. {134} Make her a bridle loaded with divers arms, because her weapons are all deadly. As soon as virtue is born it begets envy which attacks it; and sooner will there exist a body without a shadow than virtue unaccompanied by envy.
There is one story and one story only. Dwell on her graciousness, dwell on her smiling, Do not forget what flowers The great boar trampled down in ivy time. Her brow was creamy as the long ninth wave, Her sea-blue eyes were wild. But nothing promised that is not performed.
With freedom, books, flowers, and the moon, who could not be happy?
In the study of natural causes and reasons light affords the greatest pleasure to the student; among the great facts of mathematics the certainty of demonstration most signally elevates the mind of the student. Perspective must therefore be {108} placed at the head of all human study and discipline, in the field of which the radiant line is rendered complex by the methods of demonstration; in it resides the glory of physics as well as of mathematics, and it is adorned with flowers of both these sciences.
Leaves have their time to fall, / And flowers to wither at the north wind's breath, / And stars to set; but all, / Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O death!
Proserpine gathering flowers, Herself a fairer flower.
The primal duties shine aloft, like stars; / The charities that soothe, and heal, and bless, / Are scattered at the feet of man, like flowers.
What a desolate place would be a world without a flower! It would be a face without a smile,--a feast without a welcome! Are not flowers the stars of the earth? and are not our stars the flowers of heaven?--_Mrs. Balfour._
A man takes contradiction much more easily than people think, only he will not bear it when violently given, even though it be well-founded. Hearts are flowers; they remain open to the softly-falling dew, but shut up in the violent down-pour of rain.--_Richter._
Your voiceless lips, O flowers, are living preachers,--each cup a pulpit, and each leaf a book.
_Cornelia._ What flowers are these? _Gazetta._ The pansy this. _Cor._ Oh, that 's for lovers' thoughts.
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; Conspiring with him how to load and bless With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run; To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees, And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core; To swell the ground, and plump the hazel shells With a sweet kernel; to set budding more, And still more, later flowers for the bees, Until they think warm days will never cease, For Summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells. Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
There is a reaper whose name is Death, And with his sickle keen He reaps the bearded grain at a breath, And the flowers that grow between.
Spake full well, in language quaint and olden, One who dwelleth by the castled Rhine, When he called the flowers, so blue and golden, Stars, that in earth's firmament do shine.
Francis de Sales, a sixteenth-century bishop in France, wrote, “Each of us has his own endowment from God, one to live in this way, another in that. It is an impertinence, then, to try to find out why St. Paul was not given St. Peter’s grace, or St. Peter given St. Paul’s. There is only one answer to such questions: the Church is a garden patterned with countless flowers, so there must be a variety of sizes, colors, scents — of perfections, after all. Each has its value, its charm, its joy; while the whole vast cluster of these variations makes for beauty in its most graceful form.
The feelings, like flowers and butterflies, last longer the later they are delayed.
Joy is the mainspring in the whole round of universal Nature; joy moves the wheels of the great timepiece of the world; she it is that loosens flowers from their buds, suns from their firmaments, rolling spheres in distant space not seen by the glass of the astronomer.
You don't value your peas for their roots or your carrots for their flowers. Now that's the way you should choose women.
All knowledge lies in Environment. When I want to know about minerals I go to minerals. When I want to know about flowers I go to flowers. And they tell me. In their own way they speak to me, each in its own way, and each for itself--not the mineral for the flower, which is impossible, nor the flower for the mineral, which is also impossible. So if I want to know about Man, I go to his part of the Environment. And he tells me about himself, not as the plant or the mineral, for he is neither, but in his own way. And if I want to know about God, I go to His part of the Environment. And He tells me about Himself, not as a Man, for He is not Man, but in His own way. Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 239.
Every human soul has the germ of some flowers within; and they would open if they could only find sunshine and free air to expand in. I always told you that not having enough of sunshine was what ailed the world. Make people happy, and there will not be half the quarreling, or a tenth part of the wickedness there is.--_Mrs. L. M. Child._
At shut of evening flowers.
God made the flowers to beautify / The earth and cheer man's careful mood; / And he is happiest who hath power / To gather wisdom from a flower, / And wake his heart in every hour / To pleasant gratitude.
The flowers of the forest are a' wide awae.
Hark, hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings, And Phoebus 'gins arise, His steeds to water at those springs On chaliced flowers that lies; And winking Mary-buds begin To ope their golden eyes: With everything that pretty is, My lady sweet, arise.
There are souls which fall from heaven like flowers; but ere the pure and fresh buds can open, they are trodden in the dust of the earth, and lie soiled and crushed under the foul tread of some brutal hoof.
The heart of God through his creation stirs, We thrill to feel it, trembling as the flowers That die to live again, — his messengers, To keep faith firm in these sad souls of ours. The waves of Time may devastate our lives, The frosts of age may check our failing breath, They shall not touch the spirit that survives Triumphant over doubt and pain and death.
The primal duties shine aloft, like stars; the charities that soothe, and heal, and bless, are scattered at the feet of man, like flowers.--_Wordsworth._
In the midst of the fountain of wit there arises something bitter, which stings in the very flowers.
Still from the fount of joy's delicious springs Some bitter o'er the flowers its bubbling venom flings.
~Dependence.~--The beautiful must ever rest in the arms of the sublime. The gentle needs the strong to sustain it, as much as the rock-flowers need rocks to grow on, or the ivy the rugged wall which it embraces.--_Mrs. Stowe._
Christians are like the several flowers in a garden, that have each of them the dew of heaven, which, being shaken with the wind, they let fall at each other's roots, whereby they are jointly nourished, and become nourishers of each other.--_Bunyan._
That swamp [of debt] which tempts men towards it with such a pretty covering of flowers and verdure. It is wonderful how soon a man gets up to his chin there,--in a condition in which, spite of himself, he is forced to think chiefly of release, though he had a scheme of the universe in his soul.--_George Eliot._
Fall on me like a silent dew, Or like those maiden showers Which, by the peep of day, do strew A baptism o'er the flowers.
If we feel that this life can only be a link in a chain without beginning and without end, in a circle which has its beginning and its end everywhere and nowhere, we learn to bear it, and to enjoy it too, in a new sense. What we achieve here assumes a new meaning--it will not altogether perish, whether for good or for evil. What is done in time is done for ever--what is done by one affects us all. Thus our love too is not lost--what is loved in time is loved for ever. The form changes, but that which changes, which undergoes change, remains itself unchanged. We seem to love the fleeting forms of life, and yet how can we truly love what is so faithless? No, we truly love what is, and was, and will be, hidden under the fleeting forms of life, but in itself more than those fleeting forms however fair. We love the fair appearance too, how could it be otherwise? but we should love it only as belonging to what we love--not as being what we love. So it is, or rather so it ought to be. Yet while we are what we are, we love the flower, not the sightless grain of seed, and when that flower fades and passes away, we mourn for it, and our only comfort is that we too fade and pass away. Then we follow there, wherever they go. Some flowers fade sooner, some later, but none is quite forgotten.
The primal duties shine aloft, like stars; The charities that soothe and heal and bless Are scattered at the feet of man like flowers.
I always think the flowers can see us and know what we are thinking about.--_George Eliot._
How different life might be, if in our daily intercourse and conversation we thought of our friends as lying before us on the last bed of flowers--how differently we should then judge, and how differently we should act. All that is of the earth is then forgotten, all the little failings inherent in human nature vanish from our minds, and we only see what was good, unselfish, and loving in that soul, and we think with regret of how much more we might have done to requite that love. It is curious how forgetful we are of death, how little we think that we are dying daily, and that what we call life is really death, and death the beginning of a higher life. Such a thought should not make our life less bright, but rather more--it should make us feel how unimportant many things are which we consider all-important: how much we could bear which we think unbearable, if only we thought that to-morrow we ourselves or our friends may be taken away, at least for a time. You should think of death, should feel that what you call your own is only lent to you, and that all that remains as a real comfort is the good work done in this short journey, the true unselfish love shown to those whom God has given us, has placed near to us, not without a high purpose.
The seed of knowledge ripens but slowly in the mind, but the flowers grow quickly.
We don't always care most for those flat-pattern flowers that press best in the herbarium.
Tho' lost to sight, to mem'ry dear Thou ever wilt remain; One only hope my heart can cheer,-- The hope to meet again. Oh fondly on the past I dwell, And oft recall those hours When, wand'ring down the shady dell, We gathered the wild-flowers. Yes, life then seem'd one pure delight, Tho' now each spot looks drear; Yet tho' thy smile be lost to sight, To mem'ry thou art dear. Oft in the tranquil hour of night, When stars illume the sky, I gaze upon each orb of light, And wish that thou wert by. I think upon that happy time, That time so fondly lov'd, When last we heard the sweet bells chime, As thro' the fields we rov'd. Yes, life then seem'd one pure delight, Tho' now each spot looks drear; Yet tho' thy smile be lost to sight, To mem'ry thou art dear.
As Jupiter On Juno smiles, when he impregns the clouds That shed May flowers.
The sweetest garland to the sweetest maid.
More than seven hundred years after these tragic events, William II., the present Emperor of Germany, who is a descendant of the Crusading Princes, and a Knight of the Brandenburg branch of the order of St. John, came to Damascus in 1898; and one of the first things he did there was to visit the tomb of Saladin, and lay on it a wreath of flowers. It was a generous and beautiful and well-deserved tribute to the memory of a truly great man, from whom the Christian nations of his times learned much of their chivalry and truthfulness to their pledged word.
Qui legitis flores et humi nascentia fragra, / Frigidus, O pueri fugite hinc, latet anguis in herba=--Ye youths that pluck flowers and strawberries on the ground, flee hence; a cold clammy snake lurks in the grass.