But thanks be to the beautiful flower [the white pond lily] for growing at any rate. It is a marvel whence it derives its loveliness and perfume, sprouting as it does from the black mud over which the river sleeps, and from which the yellow lily likewise draws its unclean life and noisome odor. So it is with many people in this world; the same soil and circumstances may produce the good and beautiful, and the wicked and ugly. Some have the faculty of assimilating to themselves only what is evil, and so they become as noisome as the yellow water-lily. Some assimilate none but good influences, and their emblem is the fragrant and spotless pond-lily, whose very breath is a blessing to all the region round about.
― From Nathaniel Hawthornes journal entry for August 6th, 1842. From
Passages from The American Note-Books.
http://www.hawthorneinsalem.org/mirr...h/pfanb01.html