etter to carry a thick rug, and cast it down in the
shadow under the tall horse-chestnut-tree. It is only while in a
dreamy, slumbrous, half-mesmerized state that nature's ancient
papyrus roll can be read--only when the mind is at rest, separated
from care and labour; when the body is at ease, luxuriating in
warmth and delicious languor; when the soul is in accord and
sympathy with the sunlight, with the leaf, with the slender blades
of grass, and can feel with the tiniest insect which climbs up them
as up a mighty tree. As the genius of the great musicians, without
an articulated word or printed letter, can carry with it all the
emotions, so now, lying prone upon the earth in the shadow, with
quiescent will, listening, thoughts and feelings rise respondent to
the sunbeams, to the leaf, the very blade of grass. Resting the head
upon the hand, gazing down upon the ground, the strange and
marvellous inner sight of the mind penetrates the solid earth,
grasps in part the mystery of its vast extension upon either side,
bearing its majestic mountains, its deep forests, its grand oceans,
and almost feels the life which in ten thousand thousand forms
revels upon its surface. Returning upon itself, the mind joys in the
knowledge that it too is a part of this wonder--akin to the ten
thousand thousand creatures, akin to the very earth itself. How
grand and holy is this life! how sacred the temple which contains
it!

Out from the hedge, not five yards distant, pours a rush of deep
luscious notes, succeeded by the sweetest trills heard by man. It is
the nightingale, which tradition assigns to the night only, but
which in fact sings as loudly, and to my ear more joyously, in the
full sunlight, especially in the morning, and always close to the
nest. The sun has moved onward upon his journey, and this spot is no
longer completely shaded, but the foliage of a great oak breaks the
force of his rays, and the eye can even bear to gaze at his disc for
a few moments. Living for this brief hour at least in unalloyed
sympathy with nature, apart from all disturbing influences, the
sight of that splendid disc carries the soul with it till it feels
as eternal as the sun. Let the memory call up a picture of the
desert sands of Egypt--upon the kings with the double crown, upon
Rameses, upon Sesostris, upon Assurbanipal the burning beams of this
very sun descended, filling their veins with tumultuous life, three
thousand years ago. Lifted up in a