On Flowers and Flower's Arrangements

Flowers are always associated with the outward surroundings and seasons of their bloom.  The roses naturally associated in our minds with a bright sunny spring day, lotus is naturally associated with a cool summer morning on a pond, the cassia is associated with the harvest moon and mid-autumn festivities, the chrysanthemum is associated with the eating of crabs in late autumn, the plum is naturally associated with snow and together with the narcissus it forms a definite part of our enjoyment of the New Year.

The peony, being rich in colors and its petals, is rather regarded as the symbol of the rich and happy man, whereas, the plum flower is the poets flower, and symbol of the quiet, poor scholar and therefore the latter is spiritual as the former is materialistic.

The orchid stands as the symbol of secluded charm because it is often found in a deserted shady valley.  The orchid was prized most among all the flowers because of its subdued fragrance and graceful charm, but it was difficult to obtain really good classic varieties.

The chrysanthemum is the flower of the poet.

Flowers have their moods of happiness and sorrow and their time of sleep.

Certain flowers go with certain other flowers as their minors or “maids” in a vase.  As personal maids who attended to a lady for life were an institution developed the notion that beautiful ladies looked perfect when they had pretty maids by their side as their necessary adjustments.  Both ladies and maids should be beautiful.

Each maid is exquisite in its own way, and they in their voluptuous or elegant charms like their mistresses.

I have found that all the people in the world who are dull in their conversation and hateful to look at in their faces are those who have no hobbies.

On What is Proper

It is necessary that flowers should have butterflies, hills should have springs, rocks should have moss, water should have water-cress, tall trees should have entwining creepers, and human being should have hobbies.

One should enjoy flowers in the company of beauties, get drunk under the moon in the company of charming friends and enjoy the light of snow in the company of high-minded scholars.

One always gets a different feeling when looking at hills from the top of a tower, looking at snow from a city wall, looking at moon in the lamp light, looking at coloured clouds in a boat, and looking at beautiful women in the room.

When the mirror meets with an ugly woman, when a rare ink-stone finds a vulgar owner and when a good sword is in the hands of a common general, there is utterly nothing to be done about it.

On Flowers & Women

One should not see flowers wither, see the moon decline below the horizon or see beautiful women die in their youth.  One should see flowers when they are in bloom, after planting the flowers.  Should see the moon, when it is full, after waiting for the moon.  Should see a book completed after starting to write it.  Should see a beautiful woman when they are gay and happy.  Otherwise our purpose is defeated.

Beautiful women are better than flowers because they understand human language and flowers are better than women because they give off fragrance. But if one cannot have both at the same time, he should forsake the fragrant ones and take the talking ones.

If a beauty should have the face of flower, the voice of a bird, the soul of the moon, the expression of the willow, the charm of the autumn lake, bones of the jade and skin of snow, and a heart of poetry.  I should be perfectly satisfied.

If there are no books in this world, then nothing need to be said but since there are books, they must be read.  If there is no wine, then nothing need be said, but since there is wine, it must be drunk, if there are no famous hills, then nothing need be said but since there are, they must be visited.  If there are no flowers and no moon, then nothing need to be said, but since they are, they must be enjoyed and played.  If there are no talented men and beautiful women, then nothing need be said, but since there are, they must be loved and protected.

The reason why a looking glass doesn’t become the enemy of ugly looking women is because it has no feeling if it had, it certainly would have been smashed to pieces.

Without wine and poetry, hills and water would exists for no purpose, without the company of beautiful ladies, flowers and the moon would be wasted.  Talented men who at the same time handsome and beautiful ladies who at the same time can write, can never live a long life.  This is not only because the Gods are jealous of them, but because this type of person is not only the treasure of one generation, but the treasure of all ages so that the creator dissent want to leave them in this world too long, for fear of sacrilege.

Two Indian Ladies

The enjoyment of nature is an art depending so much on one’s mood and personality, and like all art, it is difficult to explain its technique.  Everything must be spontaneous from an artistic temperament.  He who understands will know how to enjoy nature without being told.  They say that what is allowable and what is not allowable or what is good and what is bad taste in the art of love between husband and wife in the intimacy of their bedroom is not something that can be prescribed by rules.  The same thing is true of that art of enjoying nature.

Autobiographies of journalists and statement are usually full of reminiscences of past events, while the autobiographies of literary men should mainly concern themselves with reminiscences of a happy night or a visit with some of their friends to some valley.

No one should aim at writing immortal poetry.  One should learn the writing of poems merely as a way to record a meaningful moment, a personal mood, or to help the enjoyment of nature.

A man’s life lasts only a hundred years and of this hundred sleep and dream occupy one half, days of illness and sorrow occupy one half and the days of swaddling clothes and senile age again occupy one half. What we have got left is only a tenth or fifth part. Besides, we who are made of the stuff of willows can hardly expect to live a hundred years.

True it is that when the cup of happiness over flows, disaster follows, as the saying goes and this was also an omen that we should not be able to live together until old age.

The Enjoyment of Nature : On Bigness & On Trees

On Bigness

 

A mountain trip is supposed to have a cathartic effect, cleansing one’s breast of lot of foolish ambitions and unnecessary worries.

Man is liable to forget how small and how futile he is.  A man seeing a hundred story building often gets conceited, and the best way to cure that insufferable conceit is to transport that skyscraper in one’s imagination to a little contemptible hill and learn a truer sense of what may and what may not be called “enormous”?  What we like about the sea is its infiniteness, and what we like about the mountain is its enormity.

On the other hand, by association with nature’s enormities, a man’s heart may truly grow big also.

On Trees

Houses without trees around them are naked, like men and women without clothing.  The difference between trees and houses is that houses are built but trees grow and anything which grows is always more beautiful to look at than anything which is built.

The pine tree, the plum tree and the bamboo tree are associated with winter being known as the “Three friends of winter”, for the bamboo tree and the pine tree are evergreens, while the plum tree blossoms at the end of winter and the beginning of spring.  The plum tree symbolizes purity of character, the purity that we find in the crisp, cold winter air. Its splendor is a cold splendor, and like the recluse, the cooler the atmosphere it finds itself in, the better it prospers.

The bamboo tree is loved for its delicacy of trunk and leaves and being more delicate.  It is more enjoyed in the intimacy of a scholar’s home.  Its beauty is more of a kind of smiling beauty and the happiness it gives us is mild and temperate.  Bamboos are best enjoyed when they are thin and slender and sparse and for this reason two or three trees are as good as a whole bamboo grove, either in life or in painting.

Among all animals, the only one which belongs in the same category with pine tree and plum tree is the stork because he, too, is the symbol of the recluse.  As one sees a stork, or even a heron, standing motionless in the marshes of some secluded pond, dignified, elegant and white and pure, the scholar wishes that he were a stork himself.

The best way of keeping birds is to plant hundreds of trees around the house and let them find in their green shade a bird kingdom and bird homes. So then, at dawn, when we have waked up from sleep and are still tossing about in bed, we hear a chorus of chirping songs like a celestial symphony. The enjoyment of life generally should come from a view of regarding the universe as a park and the rivers and lakes as a pond, so that all beings can live according to their nature, and great indeed is such happiness.

 

The Enjoyment of Nature

Paradise Lost

It is a curious thing that among the myriad creators on this planet, while the entire plant life is deprived from taking any attitude towards nature and practically all animals can also have no “attitude” to speak of, there should be a creature called man who is both self-conscious and conscious of his surroundings and who can therefore take an attitude towards it.  Man’s intelligence begins to question the universe, to explore its secrets and to find out its meaning.  There are both scientific and moral attitude towards the universe.  The scientific man in interested in finding out the chemical composition of the inside and crust of the earth upon which he lives, the thickness of the atmosphere surrounding it, the quantity of nature of cosmic rays dashing about on the top layers of the atmosphere, the formation of its hills and rocks and the law governing life in general.

The moral attitude, on the other hand, varies with nature, sometimes one of conquest and subjugation, or one of control and utilization and sometimes one of supercilious contempt.

It is amazing that no one ever question the truth of the story of a lost paradise.  How beautiful, after all, was the Garden of Eden, and how ugly, after all is the present physical world? Have flowers ceased to bloom since Eve and Adam sinned? Has God cursed the apple tree and forbidden it to bear fruit because one man sinned, or has he decided that the blossoms should be made of duller or paler colors?  Have orioles and nightingales and skylark ceased to sing? Is there no snow upon the mountain tops and there are no reflections in the lakes?  Are there are no rosy sunsets today and no rainbows and no haze nestling over villages, and there are no falling cataracts and grudling streams and shady trees?  Who therefore invented the myth that the “Paradise” was “lost” and that today we are living in a ugly universe? We are indeed ungrateful spoiled children of God.

No one can say that life on this planet is stale and monotonous.  If a man cannot be satisfied with the variety of weather and the changing colors of the sky, the exquisite flavors of fruits appearing by rotation in the different seasons and flowers blooming by rotation in the different months, that man had better commit suicide and not try to go on a futile chase after an impossible heaven that may satisfy God himself and never satisfy man.

There is a perfect and almost a mystic, co-ordination between the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of nature and our organs of seeing, hearing, smelling and eating.

Our planet is a very good planet.  In the first place; there is the alternations of night and day, morning and sunset, cool evening followed by a hot day, silent and a clear dawn presaging a busy morning and there is nothing better than that.  In the second place, there is the alternation of summer and winter, perfect in themselves, made still more perfect by being gradually ushered in by spring and autumn.  In the third place, there are the silent and the dignified trees, giving us shade in summer and not shutting out the warm sunshine in winter.  In the fourth place, there are flowers blooming and fruits ripening by rotation in different months.  In the fifth place, there are cloudy and misty days alternating with clear and sunny days. 

In the sixth place, there are spring showers and summer thunderstorms and the dry crisp wind of autumn and the snow of winter.  In the seventh place, there are peacocks and parrots and skylarks and canaries singing inimitable songs.  In the eighth place, there is a zoo, with monkeys, tigers, bears, camels, elephants, rhinoceros, crocodiles, sea-lions, cows, horses, dogs, cats, foxes, squirrels, woodchucks and so many other species.  In the ninth place, there are rainbow fish, sword fish, electric eels, whales, winnones, clams, abalones, lobsters, shrimps and turtles and many more. In the tenth place, there are magnificent red wood trees, fire spouting volcanoes, magnificent caves, majestic peaks, undulating hills, placid lakes, winding rivers and shady banks.  The menu is practically endless to suit individual tastes and the only sensible things to do is to and partake of the feast and not complain about the monotony of life.