God, by the Gulf of Aphaca whence issues the river Adonis. Strangely
enough, it was at Athens, in 1865, that I first felt a strong backward
impulse, the effect being that of a fresh and bracing breeze coming
from afar.

The impression which Athens made upon me was the strongest which I
have ever felt. There is one and only one place in which perfection
exists, and that is Athens, which outdid anything I had ever imagined.
I had before my eyes the ideal of beauty crystallised in the marble of
Pentelicus. I had hitherto thought that perfection was not to be
found in this world; one thing alone seemed to come anywhere near to
perfection. For some time past I had ceased to believe in miracles
strictly so called, though the singular destiny of the Jewish people,
leading up to Jesus and Christianity, appeared to me to stand alone.
And now suddenly there arose by the side of the Jewish miracle the
Greek miracle, a thing which has only existed once, which had never
been seen before, which will never be seen again, but the effect of
which will last for ever, an eternal type of beauty, without a single
blemish, local or national. I of course knew before I went there that
Greece had created science, art, and philosophy, but the means of
measurement were wanting. The sight of the Acropolis was like a
revelation of the Divine, such as that which I experienced when,
gazing down upon the valley of the Jordan from the heights of Casyoun,
I first felt the living reality of the Gospel. The whole world then
appeared to me barbarian. The East repelled me by its pomp, its
ostentation, and its impostures. The Romans were merely rough
soldiers; the majesty of the noblest Roman of them all, of an Augustus
and a Trajan, was but attitudinising compared to the ease and simple
nobility of these proud and peaceful citizens. Celts, Germans, and
Slavs appeared as conscientious but scarcely civilised Scythians. Our
own Middle Ages seemed to me devoid of elegance and style, disfigured
by misplaced pride and pedantry, Charlemagne was nothing more than an
awkward German stableman; our chevaliers louts at whom Themistocles
and Alcibiades would have laughed. But here you had a whole people
of aristocrats, a general public composed entirely of connoisseurs,
a democracy which was capable of distinguishing shades of art so
delicate that even our most refined judges can scarcely appreciate
them. Here you had a public capable of understanding in what consisted