Divine attributes, through material agencies, still more transcendently sublime. None will regret the wreck, or rubbish, or burning of one world, passing into the glory of another. In the grand generalizations of Humboldt there are some admirable disclosures of the nature of the connection between the physical phenomena of sublimity and beauty, and their exciting effect upon the soul. The following passage from the Cosmos goes far towards the spiritual light going and returning between God's two revelations of the Scriptures and the worlds. "In the uniform plain, bounded only by the distant horizon, where the lowly heather, the cistus, or waving grasses deck the soil; on the ocean shore, where the waves, softly rippling over the beach, leave a track, green with the weeds of the sea; everywhere the mind is penetrated by the same sense of the grandeur and vast expanse of nature, revealing to the soul, by a mysterious inspiration, the existence of laws that regulate the forces of the universe. Mere communion with nature, mere contact with the free air, exercise a soothing, yet strengthening influence on the wearied spirit, calm the storm of passion, and soften the heart when shaken by sorrow to its inmost depths. Everywhere in every region of the globe, in every stage of intellectual culture, the same sources of enjoyment are alike vouchsafed to man. The earnest and solemn thoughts awakened by a communion with nature intuitively arise from a presentiment of the order and harmony pervading the whole universe, and from the contrast we draw between the narrow limits of our own existence and the image of infinity revealed on every side, whether we look upward to the starry vault of heaven, or scan the farstretching plain before us, or seek to trace the dim horizon across the vast expanse of ocean." But this is not all. There are particular lessons, and the habit of discovering analogies is inestimable. It may be so formed, gradually, as to arm the vision of the soul towards nature with a moral telescopic power. Thus nature may be read habitually as a revelation, and all the while an unobserved. process of simplicity and refinement in the mind and heart may be going on, as the result of uninterrupted communion with so many lovely scenes in God's beautiful world. An interesting reflection occurs in Foster's memoranda of intervals of thought. Looking at these objects is reading;" said he to himself, while beholding various rural scenes, meadows, sheep, the river, and the landscape; "is not this more than reading descriptions of these things?" He had been regretting how little he had read respecting some things that can be seen. The truth is, both the reading and the looking are important; but even the looking should be reading, or the reading can be of little account as to practical knowledge and reflection. 66 Now when Humboldt speaks of the earnest and solemn thoughts that intuitively arise from a presentiment within us, connected with the image of infinity around us, he refers to an innate power of discovery and appreciation of great spiritual truths, that, as it were, lie slumbering in our own souls, till external realities furnish awakening occasions, and excitements. There is a correspondence between the instinctive and intuitive discernment and knowledges of the soul, and the frame and goings on of the world, in which it is confined for a season as in a school-house. What we see, carries us beyond what is seen by an intuitive necessity in our own being. And the intuitive faculties of the mind, as they are sometimes seen judging of nature, reading what the forms of nature mean, or rising to what they indicaté, are most surprising; nay, they excite our solemn reverence and awe, and make us think of David's exclamation, "I am fearfully and wonderfully made!” SIN clouds the mind's clear vision; man, not earth With principles of being made to suit Man's varied powers and raise him from the brute. And shall the earth of higher ends be full? Earth, which thou tread'st; and thy poor mind be dull? Thou talk of life, with half thy soul asleep? Thou living dead man, let thy spirits leap Forth to the day; and let the fresh air blow Through thy soul's shut up mansion. Wouldst thou know Something of what is life? Shake off this death! Have thy soul feel the universal breath With which all nature's quick; and learn to be Sharer in all that thou dost touch or see. Then move in sympathy with God's great whole, DANA.—Thoughts on the Soul. IT is because man useth so amiss Her dearest blessings, Nature seemeth sad; Else why should she, in such fresh hour as this, From her fair face? It is that man is mad! Then chide me not, clear Star, that I repine, When nature grieves; nor deem this heart is bad. Thou lookest towards earth; but yet the heavens are thine While I to earth am bound.-When will the heavens be mine? If man would but his finer nature learn, And not in life fantastic lose the sense Of simple things; could nature's features stern DANA's Daybreak. |