On the Portraits of English Authors on Gardening,: with Biographical Notices of Them, 2nd edition, with considerable additionsFelton, Samuel
History
On the Portraits of English Authors on Gardening,: with Biographical Notices of Them, 2nd edition, with considerable additions
Felton, Samuel
Gardening -- Bibliography; Horticulturists -- England
TIMOTHY NOURSE, whose "Campania Foelix," 8vo. 1700, has prefixed to
it, a very neat engraving by Vander Gucht, of rural life. He has
chapters on Fruit Trees; on the several kinds of Apple Trees, and on
Cyder and Perry. In page 262 he, with great humanity, strongly pleads to
acquit Lord Chancellor Bacon from the charge against him of corruption
in his high office. His Essay "Of a Country House," in this work, is
curious; particularly to those who wish to see the style of building,
and the decorations of a country seat at that period. Mr. Nourse also
published "A Discourse upon the Nature and Faculties of Man, with some
Considerations upon the Occurrences of Humane Life." Printed for Jacob
Tonson, at the Judge's Head, in Chancery-lane, 1686, 8vo. His chapter on
Solitude, wherein he descants on the delights of rural scenery and
gardens; and his conclusion, directing every man towards the attainment
of his own felicity, are worth perusing. That on Death is forcibly
written; he calls it "no more than for a man to close up all the
travails, pains, and misfortunes of life, with one sweet and eternal
sleep; he is now at everlasting rest; the fears and misery of poverty,
the anxieties of riches, the vexations of a process, do not devour him.
He does not fear the calumnies of the base, nor the frowns of the great.
'Tis death which delivers the prisoner from his fetters, and the slave
and captive from his chain; 'tis death which rescues the servant from
the endless toils of a laborious life, the poor from oppression, and
makes the beggar equal with princes. Here desperation finds a remedy,
all the languors of disease, all the frustrations and tediousness of
life, all the infirmities of age, all the disquiets of the passions, and
all the calamities of fortune, with whatever can make a man miserable,
vanish in these shades." In his very curious "Essay of a Country House,"
he thus moralizes:--"The variety of flowers, beautiful and fragrant,
with which his gardens are adorned, opening themselves, and dying one
after another, must admonish him of the fading state of earthly
pleasures, of the frailty of life, and of the succeeding generations to
which he must give place. The constant current of a fountain, or a
rivulet, must remind of the flux of time, which never returns."
SAMUEL COLLINS, ESQ. of Archeton, Northamptonshire, author of "Paradise
Retrieved; 1717, 8vo. In the Preface to the Lady's Recreation, by
Charles Evelyn, Esq. he is extremely severe on this "Squire Collins,"
whom he accuses of ignorance and arrogance.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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