FROM A NEW ENGLAND HILLSIDE. 25 



tiful flowers, that you must bury your 

 self in ignorance concerning them, in order 

 to estimate them at their true value. With 

 great superiority they tell you that they 

 want to look upon the flowers and in 

 hale their perfume, not to pull them to 

 pieces and find out how they are made ; 

 to watch the clouds rolling through the 

 heavens, not to know that they are masses 

 of sun-lighted vapour, and that the barome 

 ter is rising or falling. Is it so easy to un 

 ravel the mystery of life ? Do you have 

 but to turn your hand, to discover that the 

 great earth as well as your small globe is 

 hollow, and that all dolls, big and little, 

 are stuffed with sawdust ? How petty the 

 awful universe must seem to such people ! 

 Have they ever thought, after the ancient 

 poet, &quot; When I consider the heavens, the 

 work of thy hands, the moon and the stars 

 which thou hast ordained, what is man that 

 thou art mindful of him, or the son of man 

 that thou regardest him ? &quot; 



I have sometimes watched those who 

 have expressed themselves as I have above 

 indicated, but I have failed to discover in 

 them any peculiar intensity of passion for 

 grace of form, glory of colour, smoothness 

 of melody, or richness of harmony. I have 



