the body, suffering each part of it to indulge its
own hunger after beauty; to feel the texture of petals, and draw the
long grasses through the fingers; to breathe an air laden with the scent
of blossoms, passing from uplands fragrant with bean-flowers into
untilled regions odorous with pines; to hear the birds' chorus at
sunrise and the distant sound of reaping; to see innumerable marvels;
the belts of clover mantling wine-dark in the wind; the poppies in the
standing corn, the carmine yew-stems on the downs; above you the soft
grey clouds delicately floating; below you, as the day declines, some
distant lonely water emerging in its glory to be the mirror and refuge
of all heaven's light; to remember the gorse and broom and look forward
to the royal purple of the heather--all this is a consummation of pure
life, a high, sensuous pleasure penetrating to the inmost soul, and of
such exceeding price that to disdain its offerings or to pass incurious
before them, is to live in the blindness of the tribe of Genseric.

In such wanderings the mind is filled with slow and seasonable thoughts,
lasting as the trees and buildings of the country-side. Old deliberate
contemplations, perceptions after long regard ingathered from abundant
nature, theories leisurely compacted in sunshine or storm, to stand in
the fields of memory, crowned with beauty by the indulgent years. So in
the visible meadows stand the ancient barns, with roofs of umber tiles
parcel-gilded with old gold of lichen, and crowning their seasoned
timbers "as naturally as leaves"; restful structures of a quiet age,
capacious of dim space, unvexed by the glare of a hundred summers.

And if you ask what profit is here for one who must do battle in the
loud world, study for a while the artifice and industrious policy of
plants by which they attract to themselves the visitants they need or
with most masterful defence repel the importunate advance, and you will
return to the societies of men, even to their parliaments, enriched with
arts of prudence beyond the practice of Machiavel. Examine the dog-rose
upon the hedge, how by putting forth thorns it raises itself to the
light and ranges irresistible along the leafy parapets; see how the
flowers adapt their form and colour to the convenience of the bee or the
predilections of the bird; consider the furze armed with spines against
browsing muzzles, and be near when it casts its seed wide upon the
earth; and then say if amo