_Prior._ "The beauty of flowers never fails to inspire us with joy; and when we have sufficiently examined the fairest, we are sensible they are only proper to refresh the sight; and, indeed, the prospect they afford is so touching, and we experience their power to be so effectual, that the generality of those arts which are ambitious to please, seem most successful when they borrow their assistance. Sculpture imitates them in its softest ornaments; architecture bestows the embellishments of leaves and festoons on those columns and fronts, which would otherwise be too naked. The richest embroideries are little more than foliage and flowers; the most magnificent silks are almost covered with these charming forms, and are thought beautiful, in proportion as they resemble the lively tinge of natural flowers. "These have always been the symbols, or representations of joy; they were formerly the inseparable ornaments of feasts, and are still introduced with applause, toward the close of our entertainments, when they are brought in with the fruit, to enliven the festival that begins to languish. And they are so peculiarly adapted to scenes of pleasure, that they are always considered as inconsistent with mourning. Decency, informed by nature, never admits them into those places where tears and affliction are predominant. _Countess._ "The festivals in the country are never celebrated without garlands, and the entertainments of the polite are ushered in by a flower. If the winter denies them that gratification, they have recourse to art. A young bride, in all the magnificence of her nuptial array, would imagine she wanted a necessary part of her ornaments, if she did not improve them with a sprig of flowers. A queen, amidst the greatest solemnities, though she is covered with the jewels of the crown, has an inclination to this rural ornament; she is not satisfied with mere grandeur and majesty, but is desirous of assuming an air of softness and gaiety, by the mediation of flowers. _Prior._ "Religion itself, with all its simplicity and abstraction, and amidst the abhorrence it professes to theatrical pomp, which rather tends to dissipate the heart, than to inspire it with a due reverence for sacred mysteries, and a sensibility of human wants, permits some of its festivals to be celebrated with boughs, and chaplets of flowers." [66] In his Diary is the following entry:--"1658, 27 Jan. After six fits of an ague, died my son Richard, five years and three days old onely, but, at that tender age, a prodigy for witt and understanding; for beauty of body, a very angel; for endowment of mind, of incredible and rare hopes. He was all life, all prettinesse. What shall I say of his frequent pathetical ejaculations uttered of himselfe: _Sweete Jesus, save me, deliver me, pardon my sins, let thine angels receive me!_ So early knowledge, so much piety and perfection! Such a child I never saw! for such a child I blesse God in whose bosome he is!"