to be said for the view that to search for a mood
is in its nature moonshine. It may be said that this is especially
true in the crowded and commonplace conditions in which most
sight-seeing has to be done. It may be said that thirty tourists
going together to see a tombstone is really as ridiculous as thirty
poets going together to write poems about the nightingale.
There would be something rather depressing about a crowd
of travellers, walking over hill and dale after the celebrated
cloud of Wordsworth; especially if the crowd is like the cloud,
and moveth all together if it move at all. A vast mob assembled
on Salisbury Plain to listen to Shelley's skylark would probably
(after an hour or two) consider it a rather subdued sort of skylarking.
It may be argued that it is just as illogical to hope to fix beforehand
the elusive effects of the works of man as of the works of nature.
It may be called a contradiction in terms to expect the unexpected.
It may be counted mere madness to anticipate astonishment, or go
in search of a surprise. To all of which there is only one answer;
that such anticipation is absurd, and such realisation will
be disappointing, that images will seem to be idols and idols
will seem to be dolls, unless there be some rudiment of such
a habit of mind as I have tried to suggest in this chapter.
No great works will seem great, and no wonders of the world
will seem wonderful, unless the angle from which they are seen
is that of historical humility.

One more word may be added of a more practical sort. The place where
the most passionate convictions on this planet are concentrated is not
one where it will always be wise, even from a political standpoint,
to air our plutocratic patronage and our sceptical superiority.
Strange scenes have already been enacted round that fane where the
Holy Fire bursts forth to declare that Christ is risen; and whether
or no we think the thing holy there is no doubt about it being fiery.
Whether or no the superior person is right to expect the unexpected,
it is possible that something may be revealed to him that he really
does not expect. And whatever he may think about the philosophy
of sight-seeing, it is not unlikely that he may see some sights.

CHAPTER V

THE STREETS OF THE CITY

When Jerusalem had been half buried in snow for two or three days,
I remarked to a friend that I was prepared henceforward to justify
all the Christmas cards. The cards tha