14 BRECK'S BOOK OF FLOWERS. 



Flower-gardens were ever held in high estimation by persons 

 of taste. Emperors and kings have been delighted with the 

 expansion of flowers ; and a more exalted personage than the 

 highest on earth, called the attention of his followers to the 

 beauty of flowers, when he said, " Consider the lilies of the 

 field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin, and 

 yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not 

 arrayed like one of these." Nature, in her gay attire, unfolds 

 a vast variety which is pleasing to the human mind, and, con- 

 sequently, has a tendency to tranquillize the agitated passions, 

 and exhilarate the man, nerve the imagination, and render 

 all around him delightful. Who, that has been confined to the 

 business of the day, toiling and laboring in the " sweat of his 

 brow," does not feel invigorated and refreshed, as he takes 

 his walk in the cool of the evening, with the happy family 

 group about him, and marks the progress of his fruits and 

 flowers ? Or who, that breathes the delicious fragrance of the 

 morning flowers, glittering with dew, but can look up with 

 greater confidence to Him who has strewed, with such liberal 

 profusion, in every direction, the evidences of his goodness to 

 the children of men ? 



" The cultivation of flowers is an employment adapted to 

 every grade, the high and the low, the rich and the poor; and 

 especially to those who have retired from the busy scenes of 

 active life. Man was never made to rust out in idleness. A 

 degree of exercise is as necessary for the preservation of health, 

 both of body and mind, as food. And what exercise is more 

 fit for him, who is in the decline of life, than that of superin- 

 tending a well-ordered garden ? What more enlivens the 

 sinking mind ? What more invigorates the feeble frame ? 

 What is more conducive to a long life ? 



" The pleasure derived from a fine collection of flowers 

 requires no comment, only that the more varied and perpetual 

 the flowering, the greater is the gratification to the observer. 

 The moral lesson that can be obtained from flowers also forms 

 another fine characteristic in the flower-garden ; for flowers not 



