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| Jean-François Bony Design for Embroidery ca. 1780 gouache on paper British Museum |
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| Jean-François Bony Design for Embroidery ca. 1780 gouache on paper British Museum |
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| Jakob Gauermann Joseph sold by his Brothers 1808 gouache on paper Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna |
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| Jakob Gauermann Alpine Life ca. 1825 gouache on paper Liechtenstein Museum, Vienna |
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| Frank Dicksee Reclining Draped Figure 1877 gouache on paper (study for painting) British Museum |
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| Frank Dicksee Plate Armour 1900 gouache on paper (study for painting) British Museum |
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| Constantin Brâncusi Study for The First Cry 1915 gouache on paper Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC |
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| Durr Freedley Design for Decoration of Piano Lid ca. 1916 gouache on paper Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |
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| Durr Freedley Design for Decoration of Piano Lid ca. 1916 gouache on paper Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |
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| Arvid Fougstedt Erik in the Doorway ca. 1925 gouache on paper private collection |
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| Donald Deskey Design for Textile ca. 1930 gouache on paper Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |
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| Arthur Dove Black and White 1940 gouache on paper Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC |
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| Josef Hoffmann Design for Textile ca. 1950-55 gouache on paper Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |
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| Una Foster Textile Design ca. 1950-51 gouache on paper National Gallery of Australia, Canberra |
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| Una Foster Textile Design ca. 1950-51 gouache on paper National Gallery of Australia, Canberra |
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| Burhan Dogançay Up-Wind 1974 gouache on paper Guggenheim Museum, New York |
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| Amy Cutler Pine-Fresh Scent 2004 gouache on paper Whitney Museum of American Art, New York |
As those images were limned in my mind (the morning star now almost arising in the east) I found my thoughts in a mild and quiet calm; and not long after, my senses one by one forgetting their uses began to give themselves over to rest, leaving me in a still and peaceable sleep, if sleep it may be called where the mind awaking is carried with free wings from out fleshly bondage. For heavy lids had not long covered their lights when methought, nay, sure I was, where I might discern all in this great All; the large compass of the rolling circles, the brightness and continual motion of those rubies of the night, which, by their distance, here below can not be perceived; the silver countenance of the wandering moon, shining by another's light; the hanging of the earth, as environed with a girdle of crystal; the sun enthronized in the midst of the planets, eye of the heavens, gem of this precious ring the world. But whilst with wonder and amazement I gazed on those celestial splendours and the beaming lamps of that glorious temple (like a poor countryman brought from his solitary mountains and flocks to behold the magnificence of some great city) there was presented to my sight a man, as in the spring of his years, with that self-same grace, comely feature, majestic look, which the late _______* was wont to have: on whom I had no sooner fixed mine eyes when, like one planet-strucken, I became amazed; but he with a mild demeanour and voice surpassing all human sweetness, appeared, methought, to say:
"What is it doth thus pain and perplex thee? Is it the remembrance of death, the last period of wretchedness, and entry to these happy places; the lantern which lighteneth men to see the mystery of the blessedness of spirits and that glory which transcendeth the curtain of things visible? Is thy fortune below on that dark globe (which scarce by the smallness of it appeareth here) so great that thou art heart-broken and dejected to leave it?"
"What is it doth thus pain and perplex thee? Is it the remembrance of death, the last period of wretchedness, and entry to these happy places; the lantern which lighteneth men to see the mystery of the blessedness of spirits and that glory which transcendeth the curtain of things visible? Is thy fortune below on that dark globe (which scarce by the smallness of it appeareth here) so great that thou art heart-broken and dejected to leave it?"
– William Drummond of Hawthornden, from A Cypress Grove (London: Hawthornden Press, 1919, reprinting the original edition of 1623)
*Drummond respectfully omits the name of Henry, Prince of Wales whose untimely death in 1612 informs the essay throughout