A Garden, an Elaboratory, a Work-house, Improvements and Breeding, are pleasant and Profitable Diversions to the Idle and Ingenious: For here they miss Ill Company, and converse with Nature and Art; whose Variety are equally grateful and instructing; and preserve a good Constitution of Body and Mind.
William Penn (1644 - 1718)
Source: Some Fruits of Solitude In Reflections And Maxims, 1682
"What," it will be questioned, "when the sun rises, do you not see a round disc of fire somewhat like a guinea?" "O no, no, I see an innumerable company of the heavenly host crying, 'Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty!'"
William Blake (1757 - 1827)
Source: Descriptive Catalogue, 1810. The Vision of Judgment
When mourning the loss of our departed friends, I cannot help but think that in every death there is a birth; the spirit leaves the body dead to us, and passes to the other side of the veil alive to that great and noble company that are also working for the accomplishment of the purpose of God, in the redemption and salvation of a fallen world.