LOVERS OF NATURE 215 



ture everywhere greater than we are, and everywhere 

 impenetrable; all-embracing passion, ripened wis- 

 dom, delicious self-abandonment — everything that a 

 mortal heart can contain of life- weariness and yearn- 

 ing, I felt it all. I experienced it all, in this mem- 

 orable night. I have made a grave step toward the 

 age of decline. I have swallowed up ten years of 

 life at once. Happy the simple whose heart is al- 

 ways young ! " 



The moral element is behind this also, and is the 

 source of its value and charm. In literature never 

 nature for her own sake, but for the sake of the soul 

 which is over and above all. 



II 



One of the most desirable things in life is a fresh 

 impression of an old fact or scene. One's love of 

 nature may be a constant factor, yet it is only now 

 and then that he gets a fresh impression of the 

 charm and meaning of nature; only now and then 

 that the objects without and the mood within so fit 

 together that we have a vivid and original sense of 

 the beauty and significance that surround us. How 

 often do we really see the stars ? Probably a great 

 many people never see them at all — that is, never 

 look upon them with any thrill of emotion. If I see 

 them a few times a year, I think myself in luck. 

 If I deliberately go out to see them, I am quite sure 

 to miss them ; but occasionally, as one glances up to 

 them in his lonely night walk, the mind opens, or 

 the heaven opens — which is it ? — and he has a mo- 



