Of all inorganic substances, acting in their own proper 

 nature, and without assistance or combination, water is the 

 most wonderful. If we think of it as the source of all the 

 changefulness and beauty which we have seen in the clouds ; 

 then as the instrument by which the earth we have contem- 

 plated was modelled into symmetry, and its crags chiselled 

 into grace ; then as, in the form of snow, it robes the moun- 

 tains it has made, with that transcendent light which we 

 could not have conceived if we had not seen ; then as it 

 exists in the foam of the torrent, in the iris which spans it, 

 in the morning mist which rises from it, in the deep crystal- 

 line pools which mirror its hanging shore, in the broad lake 

 and glancing river, finally, in that which is to all human 

 minds the best emblem of unwearied, unconquerable power, 

 the wild, various, fantastic, tameless unity of the sea; what 

 shall we compare to this mighty, this universal element, for 

 glory and for beauty ? or how shall we follow its eternal 

 cheerfulness of feeling? It is like trying to paint a soul. 



RUSKIN. 



