
THE FLOWER. pel 
Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing, 
Then beauty is its own excuse for being. 
Why thou wert here, O rival of the rose! 
I never thought to ask—I never knew : 
But, in my simple ignorance, suppose 
The self-same power that brought me there, brought you. 
The Flower. 
George Herbert. 
‘OW fresh, O Lord, how sweet and clean 
Are thy returns, e’en as the flowers in Spring; 
To which, besides their own demean, - 
The late-past frosts tributes of pleasure bring. 
Grief melts away 
Like snow in May ; 
As if there were no such cold thing. 
Who would have thought my shrivéll’d heart 
Could have recovered greenness? It was gone 
Quite underground, as flowers depart 
To see their Mother-root when they have blown ; 
Where they together 
All the hard weather 
Dead to the world, keep house unknown, 
These are thy wonders, Lord of power, 
Killing and quickening, bringing down to hell 
And up to heaven in an hour ; 









