Nihil hic elegans aut venustum, sed ingens et magnificum, et quod placet magnitudine sua et quadam specie immensitatis.  Hinc intuebar maris aequabilem superficiem, usque et usque diffusam, quantum maximum oculorum acies ferri potuit; illinc disruptissimam terrae faciem, et vastas moles varie elevatas aut depressas, erectas, propendentes, reclinatas, coacervatas, omni situ inaequali et turbido.  Placuit, ex hac parte, Naturae unitas et simplicitas, et inexhausta quaedam planities; ex altera, multiformis confusio magnorum corporum, et insanae rerum strages:  quas cum intuebar, non urbis alicujus aut oppidi, sed confracti mundi rudera, ante oculos habere mihi visus sum.

’In singulis fere montibus erat aliquid insolens et mirabile, sed prae caeteris mihi placebat illa, qua sedebam, rupes; erat maxima et altissima, et qua terram respiciebat, molliori ascensu altitudinem suam dissimulabat:  qua vero mare, horrendum praeceps, et quasi ad perpendiculum facta, instar parietis.  Praeterea facies illa marina adeo erat laevis ac uniformis (quod in rupibus aliquando observare licet) ac si scissa fuisset a summo ad imum, in illo plano; vel terrae motu aliquo, aut fulmine, divulsa.

’Ima pars rupis erat cava, recessusque habuit, et saxeos specus, euntes in vacuum montem; sive natura pridem factos, sive exesos mari, et undarum crebris ictibus:  In hos enim cum impetu ruebant et fragore, aestuantis maris fluctus; quos iterum spumantes reddidit antrum, et quasi ab imo ventre evomuit.

’Dextrum latus montis erat praeruptum, aspero saxo et nuda caute; sinistrum non adeo neglexerat Natura, arboribus utpote ornatum:  et prope pedem montis rivus limpidae aquae prorupit; qui cum vicinam vallem irrigaverat, lento motu serpens, et per varios maeandros, quasi ad protrahendam vitam, in magno mari absorptus subito periit.  Denique in summo vertice promontorii, commode eminebat saxum, cui insidebam contemplabundus.  Vale augusta sedes, Rege digna:  Augusta rupes, semper mihi memoranda!’ P. 89. Telluris Theoria sacra, &c.  Editio secunda.

516. ’Of Mississippi, or that Northern Stream;’ William Gilbert. [’Excursion,’ Book iii. l. 935.]

’A man is supposed to improve by going out into the World, by visiting London.  Artificial man does; he extends with his sphere; but, alas! that sphere is microscopic; it is formed of minutiae, and he surrenders his genuine vision to the artist, in order to embrace it in his ken.  His bodily senses grow acute, even to barren and inhuman pruriency; while his mental become proportionally obtuse.  The reverse is the Man of Mind:  he who is placed in the sphere of Nature and of God, might be a mock at Tattersall’s and Brooks’, and a sneer at St. James’s:  he would certainly be swallowed alive by the first Pizarro that crossed him:—­But when he walks along the river of Amazons; when he rests his eye on the unrivalled Andes; when he measures the long and watered savannah;