HUMANIZING MISSION OF THE ARTS. 315 



by nature as her own consummation of her plan. Hence, what 

 expresses all these facts, there is not a place or thing in the known 

 world but comes under the notion of property, evidently on the in- 

 sight that all things are man's, and may be of use ; and so he regis- 

 ters his claim to their reversion when he wants them. Thus the 

 planet has an intra-social existence, and the men who denounce our 

 pride in claiming all things for the race, hold their estates by title- 

 deeds of a later credit, and by weaker seals than that of this an- 

 cient faith. In evidence of this, the flag of property, either indi- 

 vidual ornational, waves over every region, from the northern to the 

 southern ice ; and gives Christian names and surnames to capes and 

 headlands, bays and islands ; mine and thine are the zenith and 

 nadir of the willing earth in the grasp of mankind. But what cul- 

 tivation and re-formation is to the ground, that is regeneration to 

 the mind, and reform to the state ; and as the mind and the state 

 become more human as the rights of the soul and the society enter 

 into and alter them, so does the world become more natural in pro- 

 portion as the cultivator stamps his humanity upon it. There is 

 more nature in that prophecied nature where the wilderness blossoms 

 as the rose, than where the sand alone extends. 



We should have enough to do with objections if our intention 

 cared that way : but we will briefly consider only two. 1. The 

 " moral" objection, that there is great pride in man, a little statue 

 of dust, a crowd of pismires on a hillock, a mote in the sunbeam, 

 &c, &c, conceiting that all things are his, when yet nature is so 

 much bigger than he. But to this we say, that all men act on this 

 belief, and the more faithfully, the better it is for the world about 

 them. The savages believe it least, and give nature the greatest 

 swing of laissez /aire; the consequence is, that she is a dirty and 

 undressed female, snaky-haired, under their feet. Humility how- 

 ever consists in obeisance to the truth, and if man is nature's king, 

 he must not be too proud to wear her crown ; for pride may rise on 

 that side also. Kingship is either nothing, or the chiefest service; 

 and if all things are for man, it is because he alone can make the 

 best of them. Humanity through industry is the very dew that 

 the Norns lade every day over the good ash, Yggdrasil (p. 311). 

 For the rest, this " humble" objection is always made with a lordly 



