ells him,
and he sets out for the farthest continent to search. It was his
listening, his search for the lesser beauty that brought him to the news
of the higher. It is always so. We find our greater task in the
performance of the lesser ones.... But roses--so many by-paths, because
roses are the last and highest words in flowers, and the story they tell
is so significant with meanings vital to ourselves and all Nature.

"First I want to divulge a theory of colour, beginning with the greens
which are at the bottom. There are good greens--the green of young elms
and birches and beeches. Green may be evil too, as the lower shades of
yellow may be--and certain blends of green and yellow are baleful. The
greens are first to appear. They are Nature's nearest emerging--the
water-colours--the green of the water-courses and the lowlands. Nature
brings forth first the green and then the sun does his part. Between the
rose-gold and the green of a lichen, there seems to be something like
ninety degrees of evolution--the full quarter of the circle that is
similarly expressed between the prone spine of the serpent and the erect
spine of man.

"Reds are complementary to the greens and appear next, refining more or
less in accord with the refinement of the texture upon which they are
laid; a third refinement taking place, too, that of form. These
improvements of value are not exactly concurrent. There are roses, for
instance, to represent all stages--roses that are specialising in their
present growth, one might say, in form _or_ colour _or_ texture; but in
the longer line of growth, the refinement is general. We look from our
window at the Other Shore and a similar analogy is there. From this
distance it seems but one grand sweep to the point of the breakers, but
when we walk along the beach, we are often lost to the main curve in
little indentations, which correspond to the minor specialisations of
evolving things. It is the same in man's case. We first build a body,
then a mind, then a soul--and growth in the dimension of soul unifies
and beautifies the entire fabric. All Nature reveals to those who
see--that the plan is one....

"The first roses were doubtless of a watery red. Their colour evolved
according to association of the particular plants, some into the deeper
reds, others paling to the white. It was the latter that fell into the
path of truer progress. Reaching white, with a greatly refined texture,
the sun began to pa