FAULTS.

AND though thou seest a fault, right at thine eye,
Excuse it blith, and gloss it prettily.

Chaucer, Court of Love.

ROYAL FERN (CSMUNDA REGALIS).

FAIR ferns and flowers, and chiefly that tall fern
So stately, of the queen Osmunda named ;
Plant lovelier, in its own retired abode
On Grasmere's beach than Naiad by the side
Of Grecian brook, or Lady of the Mere,
Sole-sitting by the shores of old romance.

Wordsworth, Poems on the Naming of Places.

'A verse describing that stately plant, which is perhaps (as a separate line) the most exquisite that the poetry of earth can show. . . . It is this last line and a half, which some have held to ascend in beauty as much beyond any single line known in literature, as the Osmunda ascends in luxury and splendour above other ferns.' De Quincy.

FICTION.

SWEET pliability of man's spirit, that can at once surrender itself to illusions which cheat expectation and sorrow of their weary moments! Long, long since had they numbered out my days, had I not trod so great a part of them upon this enchanted ground. When my way is too rough for my feet, or too steep for my strength, I get off to some smooth velvet path which fancy has scattered over with rosebuds of delight; and, having taken a few turns in it, come back strengthened and refreshed.

Sterne, Sentimental Journey.

FICTION.

A GRACIOUS Spirit o'er this earth presides,
And o'er the heart of man; invisibly
It comes, to works of unreproved delight,
And tendency benign, directing those

Who care not, know not, think not what they do.
The tales that charm away the wakeful night
In Araby, romances; legends penned
For solace by dim light of monkish lamps;
Fictions, for ladies of their love, devised
By youthful squires; adventures endless, spun
By the dismantled warrior in old age,
Out of the bowels of those very schemes
In which his youth did first extravagate ;
These spread like day, and something in the shape
Of these will live till man shall be no more.
Dumb yearnings, hidden appetites, are ours,
And they must have their food. Our childhood sits,
Our simple childhood, sits upon a throne

That hath more power than all the elements.

I guess not what this tells of Being past,

Nor what it augurs of the life to come;

But so it is.

FICTION.

Wordsworth, Prelude.

THE beings of the mind are not of clay;
Essentially immortal, they create

And multiply in us a brighter ray

And more beloved existence that which Fate
Prohibits to dull life, in this our state

Of mortal bondage, by these spirits supplied,
First exiles, then replaces what we hate;
Watering the heart whose early flowers have died,
And with a fresher growth replenishing the void.
Byron, Childe Harold, c. iv. st. 5.

FICTION.

CRITICS may talk what they will of Truth and Nature, and abuse the Italian poets as they will, for transgressing both in their incredible fictions. But, believe it, my friend, these fictions with which they have studied to delude the world, are of that kind of creditable deceits, of which a wise ancient pronounced with assurance, 'That they who deceive are honester than they who do not deceive; and they who are deceived, wiser than they who are not deceived?

Hurd, Lectures on Chivalry.

FLATTERY.

FLATTERY-delicious essence! how refreshing art thou to nature! how strongly are all its powers and all its weaknesses on thy side! how sweetly dost thou mix with the blood, and help it through the most difficult and tortuous passages to the heart!

FLATTERY.

Sterne, Sentimental Journey.

THE reason that there is such a general outcry among us against flatterers is, that there are so very few good ones. It is the nicest art in this life, and is a part of eloquence which does not want the preparation that is necessary to all other parts of it, that your audience should be your wellwishers; for praise from an enemy is the most pleasing of all commendations. Steele, Tatler, No. 208.

FLATTERY.

WHAT a strange bewitchery is there in flattery! How, like a spiritual opium, does it intoxicate and abuse the understanding, even sometimes of men wise and judicious! So that they have knowingly, with their reason awake, and their senses about them, suffered themselves to be cheated

I

and ruined by a sycophantical parasite, and even to be tickled to death, only for love of the pleasure of being tickled Nay, I have known men, grossly injured in their affairs, depart pleased, at least silent, only because they were injured in good language, ruined in caresses, and kissed while they were struck under the fifth rib.

South, Sermon on 1 Peter ii. 23.

FLATTERY.

POISON has frequently destroyed kings, but none has been so efficaciously mortal as that drunk in by the ear.

South, Sermons, xxxvi.

FLATTERY.

SOFT through the ear the pleasing bane distils;
Delicious poison, in perfumes it kills.

Broome, Epistle to Fenton.

FLOWERS.

THE recreation of the mind which is taken thereby cannot but be very good and honest, for they admonish and stir up a man to do that which is comely and honest; for flowers through their beauty and variety of colour and exquisite form, do bring to a liberal and gentle mind the remembrance of honesty, comeliness, and all kinds of virtues; for it would be an unseemly thing (as a certain wise man saith) for him that doth look upon and handle fair and beautiful things, and who frequenteth and is conversant in fair and beautiful places, to have his mind not fair also.

Gerarde.

FLOWERS.

OFTEN a nosegay of wild flowers, which was to us, as village children, a grove of pleasure, has in after years of manhood, and in the town, given us by its old perfume an

indescribable transport back into the godlike childhood ; and how, like a flower goddess, it has raised us into the first embracing Aurora-clouds of our first dim feelings.

Richter.

FLOWERS.

AND over all that lovely glade there grew

All wholesome roots and plants of healing power;
The herb of grace, the medicinal rue,

The poppy rich in worth as gay in flower;
The heart's-ease that delighteth every eye,
And sage divine, and virtuous euphrasy.

Unwounded here Judæa's balm distilled

Its precious juice; the snowy jasmine here
Spread its luxuriant tresses wide, and filled
With fragrance the delicious atmosphere;
More piercing still did orange flowers dispense
From golden groves the purest joys of sense.

As low it lurked the tufted moss between,
The violet there its modest perfume shed,
Like humble virtue, rather felt than seen;
And here the Rose of Sharon reared its head,
The glory of all flowers, to sense and sight
Yielding their full contentment of delight.

Southey, Pilgrimage to Waterloo.

FLOWERS.

FLOWERS fresh in hue, and many in their class,
Implore the pausing step, and with their dyes
Dance in the soft breeze in a fairy mass;
The sweetness of the violet's deep blue eyes,

Kissed by the breath of heaven, seems coloured by its skies.
Byron, Childe Harold, iv. 117.