52 



thy origination, for that would be to date thy actions previous to 

 thy birth. How then didst thou begin? Methink, the spirit of the 

 hills, at the question, shakes from him his beloved repose ; himself, 

 apart, speaks with a commissioned voice the language of the whole ; 

 yet it is a voice sweet and soft, it floats like a zephyr, and is heard 

 only in the stillness of the world ; it is a whisper to the soul, which 

 swells when it comprehends the great idea, and echoes thus the 

 truth, in accents of its own : " Search not when that began which 

 always has been ; ages and ages have revolved, myriads of changes 

 have been wrought, forms have been made, endured, and vanished; 

 destruction has succeeded quickly to creation : yet Nature was, be- 

 fore all this; her processes were repeated in periods infinite, which 

 thou, with a capacity for finite purposes, understandest not, but 

 must still think true." 



47. Is then great Nature indebted to no other power but her 

 own] Say what this other power is, and try if here our thoughts 

 of infinite duration succeed more happily; something had no be- 

 ginning then; the voice is surejy no chimera: hark! it speaks again: 

 48. " What in this world, which so excites thy admiration, 

 canst thou perceive but an assemblage of forms? Thou wouldst 

 know when and how they came to be. Oh! dull perceiver! little 

 dost thou deserve to rise to universal truths, if thou so readily canst 

 overlook what in thine own experience is without exception. 

 Observe of things which are y but were not: thyself observe. The 

 sun has not yet thirty annual courses run, since the creatures which 

 are like thee knew thee not: ask how thou earnest to be, what has 

 produced the thing thou art? Thy history is clear; thy formation 

 has, throughout, been passive; that which thou hast, by which thcu 

 dost exist, is given thee; nought hast thou but what is conferred; 

 conferred by whom, or what? A form thou hadst prepared for 

 change, from others like' thyself derived, but most imperfect. And 

 what made this? thy curiosity would ask. It is plain, an assem- 

 blage of existences, of occult forms or properties, whose being is 

 inferred, because existence is their effect, but which to develop will 

 yet for centuries to come make full employment for the restless 

 spirits of thy kind. But this imperfect form derived, the earth 

 feeds with constituents, animals, and plants: these transfused sup- 

 ply thy growth with its materials, and thy accessions are as they are 

 furnished ." 



49. Yes, this is the manner of it: existences all related; and 

 their relations fixed, not by themselves, but by the force of the 

 existences which are included within themselves; existence still 

 maintains existence, and nought begins where no existence is. 



50. What sum of admiration is sufficient for this grand world, 

 enclosing in itself an endless series of forms and combinations! 

 Existence still springing from itself, and by itself perpetuated; 

 whose beginning no time has witnessed, whose end no period will 

 define; existing without our knowledge how; describing various 



