9 



with awe at the cloudy majesty of the tempest, 

 or the bright glories of the noon-day sun ; as 

 listening to the voice of the thunder, or to the 

 rolling of the distant torrent, descending from 

 the lofty mountain's side ; and, as falling down 

 in lowly admiration of the Ruler of the earth, 

 the sea and sky. Full of the Love of Nature, and 

 absorbed in the contemplation of the beauties and 

 wonders which, in every variety of aspect she un- 

 folds to his view, he yields to the guidance of his 

 imagination ; on every side he beholds a God, 

 he hears his voice in the thunder, and sees his 

 red right arm made bare in the lightening. 



Turning to the immortal land of the Greeks, 

 we behold in their beautiful, and varied, and 

 highly imaginative mythology, the intensity of 

 the love and admiration of external nature which 

 they possessed. They embodied, in delightful 

 allegories, the loftiest conceptions of the universe 

 and the origin of things, exalting them as objects 

 of awe and of the admiration. Night, arid dark- 

 ness, and old chaos, and heaven, and earth, and 

 all the powers and elements of nature, they per- 

 sonified in their mystical imaginings, giving to 



" many an airy nothing 

 A local habitation and a name." 



Their numerous divinities, and all that was 

 grandest, and holiest, and dearest in their reli- 

 gion arose from nature. In Jupiter was embo- 

 died forth the majesty of the heavens; in Neptune 

 the alternate storm and tranquillity of the sea ; 



