"Heaven and earth are the associates of creation, as light and darkness are the passing guests of a hundred generations. Fleeting life is like a dream; how long do we enjoy it? It was this knowledge that made men in the old days trim the midnight lamp. And now Yang Chun invites us with smoke to illuminate the world with literature, to associate the fragrant gardens of the peach and the plum, and to talk of happiness. All graciously join me, and as they chant and sing, I alone am ashamed; they become vivacious, I in solitude rejoice. With loud talk they grow merry; a scholar's feast is spread, and sitting amid the flowers we pass the goblet quickly and drink till we are drunken. When the moon is not in its splendour, how can one expatiate on its ecstasy? But if my verses are not perfect I am fined the customary gold and the embarrassing wine." Here is the Chinese potter--almost Viking-like in his song of the wine-cup in place of the wassail-bowl. Or shall it be the Persian astronomer-poet Omar Khayyám with his-- The Grape that can with Logic absolute The Two-and-seventy jarring Sects confute: The subtle Alchemist that in a Trice Life's leaden Metal into Gold transmute. The Staffordshire potters to a man loved a rhymed couplet on a jug or mug or punch-bowl, and their crude efforts amuse the latter-day collector. Their subjects were varied in character--loyalty, naval victories, courtship, and conviviality, with a smack of religion, as, for instance:-- Drink to live and live to die That you may live eternally. [Illustration: TRAY. With oval panel with landscape painted in deep green. Wreaths around panel in purple. Finely gilded at borders. Painted by Elias Meyer. Given by Frederik VI to Pastor Mandal, Sörum, Norway, 1790. (_At the Kunstindustri Museum_, _Copenhagen_.)] There are many pretty sentiments found on Müller's ware. We have already quoted one (p. 87), and there are many mottoes inscribed in Danish on the porcelain of his period. There is the long inscription on the cup with his portrait (see p. 69), and there are others which we have translated as follows:-- Art bends nature to herself that clay By magic is transformed to gold alway; and an inscription on another example, translated runs:-- Long live the King, and glorious be his reign; Long live ourselves to drink this toast again. In the collection at Rosenborg Castle there is a cup and saucer upon which the letter F is painted in forget-me-nots. It is dated November 22, 1797, with this inscription:-- _Uforglemmelige ungdomsaar for mig!_ (Years of youth, unforgettable for me!)