54: NAT URAL HISTORY 



bank, always discounting freely, but never demand- 

 ing pay ? The mere student inquires its relation to 

 the Intellect, and his scale of worth measures its 

 power of exercising and developing the faculties of 

 the mind. The artist rises higher still, and, above 

 all notions of wealth, above the pure conceptions of 

 intellect, he ranks the emotional nature the love 

 and enjoyment of the beautiful for its own sake. 

 Nature to him has value as the Cosmos, revealing a 

 mind, and speaking to the mind, in its varied lan- 

 guage of order, proportion, and grandeur ; thus 

 awakening the emotions of beauty and sublimity. 

 These may, indeed, arise from very general views, 

 hardly to be ranked as the study of Natural History ; 

 it is, however, the study of each particular part that 

 brings out the keener enjoyment of the soul, as the 

 fine tones in music add deliciousness and richness to 

 the harmony. But, rising higher still than all per- 

 ceptions of material beauty, all enjoyment from the 

 possible combinations of matter, is the spiritual 

 nature and sense of moral beauty. To this all other 

 sources of happiness must be inferior, if not condi- 

 tional, for it is in this direction that man approaches 



