portray it in lofty symbolism or in splendid 

 histories that embody the primitive ideals 

 of divinity and humanity ; the latest poets 

 and painters would fain touch their verse 

 or their canvas with some luminous gleam 

 from the heart of this perpetual miracle. 

 The unbroken procession of the seasons 

 changes month by month the relations of 

 earth and sky ; day and night all the water- 

 courses of the world rise in invisible moist- 

 ure to a fellowship with the birds that 

 have passed on swift wing above their 

 currents; the great outlying seas, that 

 sound the notes of their vast and passion- 

 ate unrest upon the shores of every conti- 

 nent, are continually drawn upward to 

 swell the invisible upper ocean which, out 

 of its mighty life, feeds every green and 

 fruitful thing upon the bosom of the earth. 

 This movement of the oceans upon the con- 

 tinents through the illimitable channels of 

 the sky is, in some ways, the most mysteri- 

 ous and the most sublime of those miracles 

 which each day testify to the presence and 

 majesty of that Spirit behind Nature of 

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