How fitting to have every day, in a vase of water on your table, the wild flowers of the season which are just blossoming. Can any house be said to be furnished without them? Shall we be so forward to pluck the fruits of Nature and neglect her flowers? These are surely her finest influences. So may the season suggest the thoughts it is fitted to suggest. ..... Let me know what pictures Nature is painting, what poetry she is writing, what ode composing now. -Thoreau. DAFFODILS. I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, A host of golden daffodils Continuous as the stars that shine The waves beside them danced, but they In such a jocund company: I gazed-and gazed-but little thought For oft, when on my couch I lie, Which is the bliss of solitude; And then my heart with pleasure fills, --dsworth. I hold it the duty of one who is gifted, Fully up to the great gift's height. Great gifts should be worn like a crown befitting, I am one who holds a treasure Oh for some heavenly token, Then spoke the angel of mothers To me in gentle tone, "Be kind to the children of others, And thus deserve thine own." -Julia Ward Howe. Children have more need of models than of critics. -Joubert. That which is not for the interest of the whole swarm is not for the interest of a single bee. -Marcus Aurelius. After every storm the sun will smile, for every problem there is a solution, and the soul's indefeasible duty is to be of good cheer.. -William R. Alger. At last to be identified! At last, the lamps upon thy side, The rest of life to see! Past midnight, past the morning star! Between our feet and day! -Emily Dickinson. You will find it less easy to uproot faults than to choke them by gaining virtues. Do not think of your faults; still less of others' faults. In every person who comes near you look for what is good and strong; honor that; rejoice in it; as you can, try to imitate it, and your faults will drop off, like dead leaves, when their time comes. -Ruskin. Why make we moan For loss that doth enrich us yet With upward yearnings of regret. -Lowell. Oh world, as God has made it! All is beauty: Age is opportunity no less Than youth itself, though in another dress; To enjoy a thing exclusively is commonly to exclude yourself from the true enjoyment of it. -Thoreau. Belief in compensation, or, that nothing is got for nothing,-characterizes all valuable minds. -Emerson. Heed how thou livest. Do no act by day Shall still be happy. (Translation.) -Whittier, |