LILLY, in Latin, Lilium, in Hebrew, Susan, or Schuschan, perhaps by Reason of the Number of its Leaves, which are six, in Hebrew, Ses, or Schesch. The Lilly is a very common Flower. There are Lillies of different Colours, white, red, yellow, and Orange Colour. They were very common in Judæa, and grew in the open Fields. Consider the Lillies of the Field, says Jesus Christ in the Gospel; how they grow, they toil not, neither do they spin; yet I say unto you that Solomon in all his Glory is not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore if God so clothe the Grass of the Field, which to Day is, and to Morrow is cast into the Oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye little of Faith? We see here, that when the Lillies were withered, they were cut down and thrown into the Fire to burn.
Father Souciet a Jesuit affirms1, that the Lilly mentioned in the Scripture by the Name of Sousan, is the Crown Imperial, that is to say, that sort of Plant the Flowers whereof are disposed, as it were, like a Crown, with a Bunch of Leaves on the Top; this is the Persian Lilly, the Tusaï of the Persians, the Royal Lilly, or Lilium Basileium of the Greeks. In Reality it appears from the Canticles, that the Lilly spoken of by Solomon was red, and distilled a Cant. v. 13.certain Liquor: Labia ejus lilia distillantia Myrrham. There are Crown Imperials with yellow Flowers, others with red, which are the most common. The Stock that bears them is about an Inch thick, watered with a deep Purple, and about three Foot high. The Flowers differ very little from the white Lilly, except in Colour. They are always bent downwards, and disposed in the Manner of a Crown at the Extremity of the Stem, which has a Tuft of Leaves at the Top. Some have a double Row of Flowers, or double Flowers. They do not always grow in an equal Number, nor in the same Order. Sometimes there is but little Flower, and sometimes a great deal. At the Bottom of every Leaf of this Flower there is a certain watry Humour, which forms, as it were, a very white Pearl, which gradually distils very clear and pure Drops of Water. This Water is probably what the Spouse in the Canticles calls Myrrh: Labia ejus lilia distillantia Myrrham.
Judith speaks of an Ornament belonging to the Women, which was called Lilly2: Assumpsit dextraliola, & lilia & inaures. What these Lillies were we cannot tell. They might be something in the Judgment of Grotius, which hung about the Neck. Perhaps likewise Lilia in the Text may be a Fault of the Copist, who instead of Monilia Bracelets, which he did not understand, might have inserted Lilia. It is certain that the Greek says Pselia, and the Syriac had the same Reading.
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