Grandeur Sublimity. 273 



of this faculty, where no other reason can be given 

 for their existence. But when we come to consider 

 grandeur and sublimity, the case seems somewhat 

 different. We can hardly feel that the mountains 

 ; their heads that we may wonder at their majes- 

 ty; that the thunder-clouds marshal their forces, 

 and the ocean puts on the t< : the storm, that 



may witness the grand and sublime. \Ve feel 

 that these all are exhibitions of the great forces of 

 nature, and that they all have a purpose, irrespective 

 of man. But we cannot fail to recogni/e the design 

 of a wise Creator, in implanting in us the faculty of 

 'lending the- , so as to be filled 



with awe and wonder before them. If anything in 

 nature 1 .ir to God, it is the grand and 



terrible. We worship neither the mountain, nor the 

 in, nor the thunder ; but in their p: the 



boldest atheist sometimes forgets his doubts, and 

 stands humbly read}' to adore 



Not only is there this ample provision made for 

 the emotional nature, but the history of the race 

 shows that this higher nature of man, so nearly 

 allied to the moral and religious, was as perfect ages 

 ago as now. While science, which depends upon 

 long-continued and accumulated observations, could 

 come to perfection only in later times, so as to give 

 us any adequate conception of what the pure intel- 

 lect is capable, this higher emotional nature showed 

 its divine origin in the earliest historic times. If 

 we want the highest type of poetry, we turn to Ho- 

 mer and the Hebrew bards ; if the beautiful in form; 



12* 



