Tag Archives: Camille Corot

Painting, Poetry

The Two Women

Woman with a Pearl. Camille Corot. 1870.

 

The Two Women

G.K. Chesterton

 

Lo! very fair is she who knows the ways

Of joy: in pleasure’s mocking wisdom old,

The eyes that might be cold to flattery, kind;

The hair that might be grey with knowledge, gold.

 

But thou art more than these things, O my queen,

For thou art clad in ancient wars and tears.

And looking forth, framed in the crown of thorns,

I saw the youngest face in all the spheres.

 

Women have a special beauty who experience joy throughout their lives, but more beautiful still is the woman who emerges serene from trial and tribulation.

Memory Box, Painting, Poetry

‘I Praise the Frenchman’

The Solitude. Recollection of Vigen, Limousin. Camille Corot. 1866.

 

William Cowper

 

I praise the Frenchman, his remark was shrewd—

How sweet, how passing sweet is solitude!

But grant me still a friend in my retreat,

Whom I may whisper, Solitude is sweet.

 

A Little Poetry—The ‘Frenchman’ is the Enlightenment philosopher Voltaire who famously wrote that “The happiest of all lives is a busy solitude.”