heerfulness, as the
dignity;--in a true sense, the _becomingness_ and decorousness of the
ornament. Among the ruins of the dead city, and the worse desolation of the
work of its modern rebuilders, here was one element at least of honour, and
order;--and, in these, of delight.

And these are the real significances of the flower itself. It is the utmost
purification of the plant, and the utmost discipline. Where its tissue is
blanched fairest, dyed purest, set in strictest rank, appointed to most
chosen office, {65} there--and created by the fact of this purity and
function--is the flower.

2. But created, observe, by the purity and order, more than by the
function. The flower exists for its own sake,--not for the fruit's sake.
The production of the fruit is an added honour to it--is a granted
consolation to us for its death. But the flower is the end of the
seed,--not the seed of the flower. You are fond of cherries, perhaps; and
think that the use of cherry blossom is to produce cherries. Not at all.
The use of cherries is to produce cherry blossoms; just as the use of bulbs
is to produce hyacinths,--not of hyacinths to produce bulbs. Nay, that the
flower can multiply by bulb, or root, or slip, as well as by seed, may show
you at once how immaterial the seed-forming function is to the flower's
existence. A flower is to the vegetable substance what a crystal is to the
mineral. "Dust of sapphire," writes my friend Dr. John Brown to me, of the
wood hyacinths of Scotland in the spring. Yes, that is so,--each bud more
beautiful, itself, than perfectest jewel--_this_, indeed, jewel "of purest
ray serene;" but, observe you, the glory is in the purity, the serenity,
the radiance,--not in the mere continuance of the creature.

3. It is because of its beauty that its continuance is worth Heaven's
while. The glory of it is in being,--not in begetting; and in the spirit
and substance,--not the change. For the earth also has its flesh and
spirit. Every day of spring is the earth's Whit Sunday--Fire {66} Sunday.
The falling fire of the rainbow, with the order of its zones, and the
gladness of its covenant,--you may eat of it, like Esdras; but you feed
upon it only that you may see it. Do you think that flowers were born to
nourish the blind?

Fasten well in your mind, then, the conception of order, and purity, as the
essence of the flower's being, no less than of the crystal's. A ruby is not
made bright to scatter round it child-r