102 
CHILDREN AND FLOWERS. 
trees ? For our part, we think that the life of 
an idiot, is one of perpetual childhood ; that he 
is gifted with a double portion of simple and 
innocent enjoyments, to compensate for the loss 
of those which result from a right employment 
of man’s intellectual and moral powers: Oh, 
tell us not that the idiot is deprived of a share 
in the poetry of existence !” Is he not the 
companion of the bird, and the bee, and the 
butterfly ? Does he not lie about in the green 
meads, basking in the sunshine ? Does he not 
plait rushes by the streamlet’s brim, and talk to 
his own image reflected on its glassy surface ? 
Does he not hide him in flowery nooks and 
dingles, laughing like a very incarnation of 
gladness, and murmuring snatches of sweet old 
ballads ? Even in his melancholy moods,— 
save during those periods when he is possessed 
by fears, the more terrible from their vague¬ 
ness—and they are not generally of long dura¬ 
tion,—his state seems to be that of passive en¬ 
joyment. 
And who shall say that he is unhappy ? 
The tears he shed flow not from disappointment 
