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. And of these great cathedrals of the earth, with their
gates of rock, pavements of cloud, choirs of stream and stone, altars
of snow, and vaults of purple traversed by the continual stars,--of
these, as we have seen,[28] it was written, nor long ago, by one of the
best of the poor human race for whom they were built, wondering in
himself for whom their Creator _could_ have made them, and thinking to
have entirely discerned the Divine intent in them--"They are inhabited
by the Beasts.
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