The Wonder of the World 35 



has felt, and perhaps Walt Whitman most keenly 

 of all — the inextinguishable wonder of the world. 



*' I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work 



of the stars, 

 And the pismire is equally perfect, and the grain of sand, 



and the egg of the wren. 

 And the tree-toad is a chef-d'oeuvre for the highest. 

 And the running blackberry would adorn the parlours of 



heaven. 

 And the narrowest hinge in my hand puts to scorn all 



machinery. 

 And the cow crunching with depressed head surpasses 



any statue. 

 And a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of 



infidels." 



This is high doctrine, and who shall attain unto 

 it? but it is an ideal of rational emotion worth 

 striving after. There's the same idea more briefly 

 put in Meredith's famous lines : 



"You, of any well that springs, 

 May unfold the heaven of things." 



It need hardly be said that with the growth 

 of knowledge the precise basis of wonder may 

 change. Our forefathers wondered at the light- 

 ning, we wonder at electricity; the child wonders 

 at the sunbeam dancing about the room, we won- 

 der at the Rbntgen rays; the simple mind wonders 

 at the snowflakes, we wonder at the results of the 

 Great Ice Age. 



