Now we reveal our mental habits through this trick we have of falsifying plants. We say “false” asphodel, “false” rice, “false” hellebore, “false” spikenard and mitrewort, but the falsity is in our own vain imaginings. The plants are as true as the earth that bears them, or the rain and the sunshine that bring them to perfection. The Solomon’s seal is one lily, the “false” Solomon’s seal another. Man may be false, “perilous Godheads of choosing” are his, but the wild things of the woods are true, each in the order of its natureThere are no complexities or subtilities about wake-robin, here by the streamside. You may see it at a glance, for its principles are brief and fundamental, as wise old Marcus Aurelius bids us let our own be, and yet, the plant has had its vicissitudes; has met and solved its problems. Reasoning from analogies, time must have been when, like others of its great family, it grew in the water, floating out its broad leaves, lolling atease on the surface of swampy, watery places and still ponds. Times changed. Lands rose and waters subsided, and wake-robin found itself in the midst of new conditions. The problem of self-support confronted it, and the plant solved it by divesting from its broad, sustaining sepals nutriment to enable the long, swaying stem to meet the new demands upon it. It still loves water and seeks cool, damp woods and deep canyons, growing beside little streams where it lifts its face to greet the springtime. It is probably not so big as when it rested luxuriously upon the water, but it is wake-robin, still, and it does more than summon the birds: it calls each of us back to Nature, bidding us keep our hearts and souls alive to see, with each renewing of springtime, and to love afresh, the miracles of Nature’s redemptive force.
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