Flowers
A. Macrae, B. A. Songs 2:10-13 My beloved spoke, and said to me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away.… What object do flowers serve in the Economy in Nature and in the purposes of God? Every one admits that the flowers are beautiful — strikingly and prominently beautiful, even among the choicest beauties of God's most perfect works. Now, philosophers tell us that the useful is the beautiful — that things are beautiful in proportion to their usefulness in supplying the material wants of men. According to this theory, an ear of corn ought to be more beautiful than a rose or a lily, and yet there is probably not a sound-minded man in the whole world who would not consider the useless rose more beautiful than the useful ear of corn. In fact, the flowers that men have always agreed to regard as the most beautiful are in most cases absolutely useless for man, from a utilitarian point of view. This proves, then, that beauty is something very different from mere usefulness. In reality the great characteristic of beauty is to lift up our minds from mere worldly usefulness to the contemplation of the perfect and the Divine: to lift our hearts and minds to God. For example, we might speak of beautiful conduct, and what is it that constitutes beauty of conduct? Conduct is beautiful in proportion as it approaches the conduct of Christ. Again, what is it that constitutes beauty in literature? Literature is beautiful in proportion as it reveals by means of suitable language the soul of man in its Godward aspirations. In everything, then, which we call beautiful, we find that this principle holds good, and the more powerful to lift up our hearts unto God, the more beautiful. Beauty is the manifestation of God in His works. Why, then, do we regard the flowers as beautiful? We regard the flowers as beautiful because they direct our thoughts to God. God is the natural destiny of man. God is the one thing that every man either consciously or unconsciously longs for. Whatever helps to satisfy your longing is pleasurable, and when the longing is of an elevating nature — when it is Godward — the pleasurable is also the beautiful. Art is elevating and ennobling only when its votary has learned to cultivate the beautiful as a means of approach to God. This was the spirit in which the greatest architects, the greatest sculptors, the greatest painters and the greatest poets did their work, and so no atheist, however great his natural talent, has ever yet produced a master work, either in art or in literature. The first condition of true art is to recognize the beautiful as an expression of the Divine. To the sound and healthy and pure mind everything beautiful in man or in the world around him points towards God. And so the flowers are beautiful, not because they are useful, but because they lift up our hearts to God. There are many ways in which they do this, many lessons which they teach us in their silent eloquence with more force and more clearness than the words of our greatest and our wisest teachers. Our Lord Himself taught some of His most important lessons from such ordinary things as the lilies of the field, and the grass, and each one of those lessons had for its aim the lifting up of our hearts to God. Christ made use of the humble beauty of the flowers to attain that end. One of the first conditions of realizing the presence of God is to learn the lesson of humility. This is taught by the flowers. Most men are vain of something — appearance, attainments, position, and so on — but Jesus rebukes such vanity by telling us to "consider the lilies of the field." I say unto you that even Solomon, in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of these. Christ makes use of the flowers to teach us the lesson of faith — also one of the conditions of any real knowledge of God or communion with Him. The flowers prove that God is just as careful of small things as He is of large things. Again, the flowers teach us the shortness and the uncertainty of human life. Out of the dull-looking stem springs forth mysteriously and silently, the flagrant blossom of loveliest hue. It spreads itself out in smiling gladness, to the light and warmth of the sun. It gladdens the eye of the beholder with its beauteous presence, but no sooner does it attain its highest perfection than it fades away in a breath of wind and vanishes quite as mysteriously as it came. And so the earthly life of man passeth away as mysteriously as it came, and the place that knew him shall know him no more. And once more, do not the flowers teach the great and comforting lesson of the resurrection from the dead and the immortality of the soul? Complete indeed is the withering of a flower. The beauty, the colour, the fragrance, the delight of it vanish away, leaving no trace or vestige behind, even as the life of man does. But, in spite of the cold and frost of winter, the dead stump will awake to life after many days. The summer sun will shine upon it. The bud will appear, the flower will bloom once more in its pristine beauty, a perfect and a never-failing emblem of the resurrection and the life. (A. Macrae, B. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away. WEB: My beloved spoke, and said to me, "Rise up, my love, my beautiful one, and come away.