20 



while he sounded the depths of divine and human philos- 

 ophy ; of Addison, the regenerator of a more manly taste 

 in gardening as well as literature; of Locke, the child- 

 like philosopher, exchanging his researches amongst the 

 labyrinths of the human mind for studies on a fairer page, 

 the open book of Nature, in her 



hues, 

 Her forms, and in the spirit of her forms, 



and who, unlike that illustrious Roman, to whom 1 have 

 referred, loved the society of children rather than perfect 

 solitude ; of Cowley and Pope, Walpole, Shenstone and 

 Cowper, and a hundred others, who have illustrated this 

 subject by their genius, and who are dear to us by every 

 kindred tie which connects us with the memorials of the 

 mind ; of Newton, conceiving, from a natural phenome- 

 non in his garden, of the mighty law which balances this 

 solid earth amidst the unshaken spheres ; or of Fox, turn- 

 ing without a sigh from that great assembly which he 

 had so often controlled by his sagacious eloquence, and 

 finding amidst his flowers and trees, at St. Anne's Hill, a 

 happiness far more real, than during the long years, when 

 he had been the idol of popular supremacy, or for the 

 brief but dazzling hour, when, having finally grasped the 

 prize of a life-long ambition, he directed the destinies of 

 millions of his fellow men. 



And oh, what glory and delight have the poets flung 

 around these delicious resting-places of the soul ! from 

 the time of the wise and royal poet of Israel, who tells us, 

 " I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted in them 

 trees of all kind of fruits :"* from the father of Grecian 

 minstrelsy, revelling in fancy in the gardens of Alcinous, 

 and the master of the Roman lyre, learned in all the sci- 



* Ecclesiastcs. 



