The Art of Gardening 
of the moment as best he may. He will 
conceive his general idea in deference to the 
local commands of Nature ; develop his gen- 
eral scheme as artistic fitness counsels ; dis- 
cover the special features which are needed 
to complete it (considering which Nature 
will permit among those he might desire) ; 
and then, half unconsciously perhaps, search 
for memories of natural results which may 
teach him how to achieve his own. In edu- 
cating himself he will have tried less to re- 
member definitely this and that particular 
natural result than to understand how Nat- 
ure goes to work to produce beautiful re- 
sults. He will have tried to permeate -him- 
self with her spirit, to comprehend her aims, 
to learn what she means by variety in unity, 
by effective simplicity, by harmonious con- 
trasts, by fitnes-s of feature and detail, by 
beauty of line and color, by distinctness of 
expression^ — in a word, by composition. 
He will have tried to train his memory for 
general rather than for particular truths, and 
chiefly to purify his taste and stimulate his 
imagination ; for he will have known that 
while, in some ways, he is Nature’s favorite 
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