60 MORAL OF FLOWERS. 



Do they not also admonish us of the insta- 

 bility of earthly grandeur and beauty, by their 

 fragility and shortness of duration ? saying in 

 the language of the Psalmist : As for man, 

 his days are as grass, as a flower of the field, so 

 he flourisheth ; for the wind passeth over it and 

 it is gone ; and the place thereof shall know it 

 no more." They teach us the utter foolishness 

 of that pride, which delighteth in personal 

 adornments and gaudy trappings ; for be our 

 dress ever so rich, the simplest flowers of the 

 field, that neither toil nor spin, are arrayed 

 much more sumptuously : 



"Along the sunny bank or watery mead, 

 Ten thousand stalks their various blossoms spread: 

 Peaceful and lowly, in their native soil, 

 They neither know to spin, nor care to toil, 

 Yet, with confessed magnificene, deride 

 Our vile attire and impotence of pride." PRIOR. 



It is thus they admonish the prosperous, the 

 proud, the uplifted in spirit ; but to the poor, 

 the lowly, and the fallen, they are as sympa- 

 thizing friends, whispering words of comfort 

 and hope, sharing their sorrows, and thus ren- 



