The Clandestine Marriage

POETS and Painters, who from Nature draw Their beſt and richeſt Stores, have made this Law: That each ſhould neighbourly aſſiſt his Brother, And ſteal with Decency from one another. To-night, your matchleſs Hogarth gives the Thought, Which from his Canvas to the Stage is brought. And who ſo fit to warm the Poet's Mind, As he who pictur'd Morals and Mankind? But not the ſame their Characters and Scenes; Both labour for one End, by different Means: Each, as it ſuits him, takes a ſeparate Road, Their one great Object, Marriage-a-la-mode! Where Titles deign with Cits to have and hold, And change rich Blood for more ſubſtantial Gold! And honour'd Trade from Intereſt turns aſide, To hazard Happineſs for titled Pride. The Painter dead, yet ſtill he charms the Eye; While England lives, his Fame can never die: But he, who ſtruts his Hour upon the Stage, Can ſcarce extend his Fame for Half an Age; Nor Pen nor Pencil can the Actor ſave, The Art, and Artiſt, ſhare one common Grave. O let me drop one tributary Tear, On poor Jack Falſtaff's Grave, and Juliet's Bier! You to their Worth muſt Teſtimony give; 'Tis in your Hearts alone their Fame can live. Still as the Scenes of Life will ſhift away, The ſtrong Impreſſions of their Art decay. Your Children cannot feel what you have known; They'll boaſt of Quins and Cibbers of their own: The greateſt Glory of our happy few, Is to be felt, and be approv'd by you.

Botany in the romantic era played a role in debates about life, nature, and knowledge, as evidenced in this ambitious, beautifully illustrated study. Winner, 2012 British Society for Literature and Science Book Prize Romanticism was a cultural and intellectual movement characterized by discovery, revolution, and the poetic as well as by the philosophical relationship between people and nature. Botany sits at the intersection where romantic scientific and literary discourses meet. Clandestine Marriage explores the meaning and methods of how plants were represented and reproduced in scientific, literary, artistic, and material cultures of the period. Theresa M. Kelley synthesizes romantic debates about taxonomy and morphology, the contemporary interest in books and magazines devoted to plant study and images, and writings by such authors as Mary Wollstonecraft and Anna Letitia Barbauld. Period botanical paintings of flowers are reproduced in vibrant color, bringing her argument and the romantics' passion for plants to life. In addition to exploring botanic thought and practice in the context of British romanticism, Kelley also looks to the German philosophical traditions of Kant, Hegel, and Goethe and to Charles Darwin’s reflections on orchids and plant pollination. Her interdisciplinary approach allows a deeper understanding of a time when exploration of the natural world was a culture-wide enchantment.