220 FLOWERS AND FOLKS. 



how the matter stands. The autumnal 

 blooms are not belated, but precocious ; they 

 belong not to the season past, but to the 

 season coming. Who shall forbid us to 

 hope that what is true of the violet will 

 prove true also of the man? 



It speaks well for human nature that in 

 the long run the lowliest flowers are not 

 only the best loved, but the oftenest spoken 

 of. Men play the cynic : modest merit goes 

 to the wall, they say; whoever would suc- 

 ceed, let him put on a brazen face and 

 sharpen his elbows. But those who talk in 

 this strain deceive neither themselves nor 

 those who listen to them. They are com- 

 monly such as have themselves tried the 

 trumpet and elbow method, and have dis- 

 covered that, whatever may be true of tran- 

 sient notoriety, neither public fame nor pri- 

 vate regard is to be won by such means. We 

 do not retract what we have said in praise of 

 diversity, and about the right of each to live 

 according to its own nature, but we gladly 

 perceive that in the case of the flowers also 

 it is the meek that inherit the earth. 



Our appreciation of our fellow-men de- 

 pends in part upon the amount, but still more 



