PREFACE 



The value of Knowledge and Character is duly im- 

 pressed upon us. Of the value of Freedom we are 

 told so much that we have come to regard it as an 

 end in itself instead of only a means, or necessary 

 condition. But Beauty we are half -inclined to 

 connect with the effeminate. Poetry, Music, and 

 Literature are under suspicion with the average 

 English schoolboy, whose love of manliness he will 

 share with nothing else. Yet love of Beauty per- 

 sists in spite of all discouragement, and will not be 

 suppressed. Natural Beauty, especially, insists on 

 a place in our affections. Derived originally from 

 Love, and essentially and inseparably connected 

 with it, Natural Beauty acknowledges supremacy to 

 Love alone. And it deserves our generous recog- 

 nition, for it is wholesome and refreshing for our 

 souls. 



The acute observation and telling description of 

 Natural Beauty is at least as necessary for the enjoy- 

 ment of life as the pursuit of Natural Science to 

 which so much attention is paid. For the concern 

 of the former is the character, and of the latter only 

 the cause of natural phenomena ; and of the two, 

 character is the more important. It is, indeed, high 

 time that we Englishmen were more awake than 

 we are to the value of Natural Beauty. For we are 

 born lovers of Nature, and no more poetic race than 



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