Nothing,
in my view, is half so delightful as a library set off with these
beautiful productions of the earth during summer, or indeed, any other
season of the year. A library or study, opening on green turf, and
having the view of a distant rugged country, with a peep at the ocean
between hills, a small fertile space forming the nearest ground, and an
easy chair and books, is just as much of local enjoyment as a thinking
man can desire--I reck not if under a thatched or slated roof, to me it
is the same thing. A favourite author on my table, in the midst of my
bouquets, and I speedily forget how the rest of the world wags. I fancy
I am enjoying nature and art together, a consummation of luxury that
never palls upon the appetite--a dessert of uncloying sweets.
Madame Roland seems to have felt very strongly the union of mental
pleasure with that afforded to the senses by flowers. She somewhere
says, "La vue d'une fleur carresse mon imagination et flatte mes sens a
un point inexprimable; elle reveille avec volupte le sentiment de mon
existence.
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