of sky possible in
the lowlands which may not in equal perfection be seen among the hills;
but there are effects by tens of thousands, for ever invisible and
inconceivable to the inhabitant of the plains, manifested among the
hills in the course of one day. The mere power of familiarity with the
clouds, of walking with them and above them, alters and renders clear
our whole conception of the baseless architecture of the sky; and for
the beauty of it, there is more in a single wreath of early cloud,
pacing its way up an avenue of pines, or pausing among the points of
their fringes, than in all the white heaps that fill the arched sky of
the plains from one horizon to the other. And of the nobler cloud
manifestations,--the breaking of their troublous seas against the crags,
their black spray sparkling with lightning; or the going forth of the
morning along their pavements of moving marble, level-laid between dome
and dome of snow;--of these things there can be as little imagination or
understanding in an inhabitant of the plains as of the scenery of
another planet than his own.

And, observe, all these superiorities are matters plainly measurable and
calculable, not in any wise to be referred to estimate of _sensation_.
Of the grandeur or expression of the hills I have not spoken; how far
they are great, or strong, or terrible, I do not for the moment
consider, because vastness, and strength, and terror, are not to all
minds subjects of desired contemplation. It may make no difference to
some men whether a natural object be large or small, whether it be
strong or feeble. But loveliness of colour, perfectness of form,
endlessness of change, wonderfulness of structure, are precious to all
undiseased human minds; and the superiority of the mountains in all
these things to the lowland is, I repeat, as measurable as the richness
of a painted window matched with a white one, or the wealth of a museum
compared with that of a simply furnished chamber. They seem to have been
built for the human race, as at once their schools and cathedrals; full
of treasures of illuminated manuscript for the scholar, kindly in simple
lessons to the worker, quiet in pale cloisters for the thinker, glorious
in holiness for the worshipper.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 72: From "Modern Painters," Vol. IV, 1856, Chapter XX.]

D. SPLENDOURS OF SUNSET[73]

We have been speaking hitherto of what is constant and necessary in
nature, of the ordinary