FLOWERS AND FOLKS. 221 



upon the quality, of the service they render 

 us. We could get along without poets more 

 comfortably than without cobblers, for the 

 lower use is often first, in order both of time 

 and of necessity ; but we are never in doubt 

 as to their relative place in our esteem. One 

 serves the body, the other the soul; and we 

 reward the one with money, the other with 

 affection and reverence. And our estimation 

 of plants is according to the same rule. 

 Such of them as nourish the body are good, 

 good even to the point of being indispens- 

 able ; but as we make a difference between 

 the barnyard fowl and the nightingale, and 

 between the common run of humanity and a 

 Beethoven or a Milton, so maize and potatoes 

 are never put into the same category with 

 lilies and violets. It must be so, because 

 man is more than an animal, and "the life 

 is more than meat." 



Again we say, let each fulfill its own 

 function. One is made for utility, another 

 for beauty. For plants, too, are specialists. 

 They know as well as men how to make the 

 most of inherited capacities and aptitudes, 

 achieving distinction at last by the simple 

 process of sticking to one thing, whether 



