60 MORAL OF FLOWERS. 
j 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 fleld, 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 he our 
: dress ever so rich, the simplest flowers of the 
fleld, that neither toil nor spin, are arrayed 
I much more sumptuously :— 
I 
: “Along the sunny hank 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- 
j thizing friends, whispering words of comfort 
I and hope, sharing their sorrows, and thus ren- 
