44 
LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS. 
drew the adoration of the angels from her looks, 
and the great masters flew to her expressive fea¬ 
tures ; then they shadowed forth the Virgin-mother 
bending over her Holy Child ; for there is no love 
without humility, no true affection unless it see 
in the object of its worship a divinity towards 
which it tremblingly aspires. 
“ Constancy,” says the poet, “ liveth in realms 
above: but kind Pity, who had long looked down 
with tender eyes, and beheld how cheerless and 
restless the wandering heart was, even though it 
fondly loved, sent her down upon the earth as a 
comforter, and she took up her abode within the 
blue-helled flowers of the wild. She gathered to¬ 
gether all the floating affections of true hearts, and 
formed for them many a sweet habitation, which 
they had sighed for in vain, to dwell in. She 
erected for them a new and pleasant home in the 
heart, — she assembled round them a thousand 
household virtues,— and what the eye had before 
sought for abroad in vain, it found within ; it be¬ 
came the resting-place of Love, and there alone 
was true beauty to be found. Man no longer sighed 
for the Paradise he had lost, for Constancy led him 
by the hand and brought him back ; and he sat 
enthroned amid a lovelier Eden in the beating 
heart of woman. 
Abroad he saw her image everywhere reflected. 
