ise with flowers; but no flowers are
spoken of in Genesis. We may indeed conclude that in speaking of every herb
of the field, flowers are included. But they {61} are not named. The things
that are _named_ in the Garden of Delight are trees only.

The words are, "every tree that was pleasant to the sight and good for
food;" and as if to mark the idea more strongly for us in the Septuagint,
even the ordinary Greek word for tree is not used, but the word [Greek:
xulon],--literally, every 'wood,' every piece of _timber_ that was pleasant
or good. They are indeed the "vivi travi,"--living rafters, of Dante's
Apennine.

Do you remember how those trees were said to be watered? Not by the four
rivers only. The rivers could not supply the place of rain. No rivers do;
for in truth they are the refuse of rain. No storm-clouds were there, nor
hidings of the blue by darkening veil; but there went up a _mist_ from the
earth, and watered the face of the ground,--or, as in Septuagint and
Vulgate, "There went forth a fountain from the earth, and gave the earth to
drink."

30. And now, lastly, we continually think of that Garden of Delight, as if
it existed, or could exist, no longer; wholly forgetting that it is spoken
of in Scripture as perpetually existent; and some of its fairest trees as
existent also, or only recently destroyed. When Ezekiel is describing to
Pharaoh the greatness of the Assyrians, do you remember what image he gives
of them? "Behold, the Assyrian was a cedar in Lebanon, with fair branches;
and his top was among the thick boughs; the waters nourished him, and the
deep brought him up, with her rivers {62} running round about his plants.
Under his branches did all the beasts of the field bring forth their young;
and under his shadow dwelt all great nations."

31. Now hear what follows. "The cedars _in the Garden of God_ could not
hide _him_. The fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chestnut trees
were not like his branches; nor any tree in the Garden of God was like unto
him in beauty."

So that you see, whenever a nation rises into consistent, vital, and,
through many generations, enduring power, _there_ is still the Garden of
God; still it is the water of life which feeds the roots of it; and still
the succession of its people is imaged by the perennial leafage of trees of
Paradise. Could this be said of Assyria, and shall it not be said of
England? How much more, of lives such as ours should be,--just,