Flowers belong to Fairyland: the flowers and the birds and the butterflies are all that the world has kept of its golden age--the only perfectly beautiful things on earth--joyous, innocent, half divine--useless, say they who are wiser than God.
Ouidafor what is the gift of the poet and the artist except to see the sights which others cannot see and to hear the sounds that others cannot hear?
OuidaThe bread of bitterness is the food on which men grow to their fullest stature; the waters of bitterness are the debatable ford through which they reach the shores of wisdom; the ashes boldly grasped and eaten without faltering are the price that must be paid for the golden fruit of knowledge.
Ouida