SECTION II. 



The Pleasure of observing Nature. 



IT is impossible to imagine a happier combination 

 of qualities and circumstances, than when that 

 which is of the greatest use to us, at the same 

 time affords us the greatest pleasure ; and if it so 

 happen that that pleasure, instead of palling upon 

 the appetite, becomes the more exquisite the more 

 heartily and the longer it is enjoyed, then the 

 happiness thence arising may be considered as the 

 very best that human beings can enjoy. That is 

 the case with the observation of nature : nothing 

 can be more useful than that, for it is the 

 source of all that we know; nothing can af- 

 ford higher pleasure, for it is the source of all 

 that we can enjoy; and we can never tire of 

 it it never can pall on the appetite, because it is 

 always healthful and invigorating in the pursuit, 

 and new at every step we take and at every mo- 

 ment we live. It brings us a two-fold pleasure : 

 it saves us from misery, and it affords us direct 

 happiness ; and there is scarcely an ill in life for 

 which there is not, if we could find it out and 

 apply it, a balm in the creation around us. The 

 Author of that has so tempered the productions of 

 the earth and the waters, arid the changes and 

 the appearances of the atmosphere, to the wants 

 of man in every zone, from the burning equator 

 to the icy pole, that, amid all the varieties of sea- 

 son and climate, the man who knows and loves 



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