No frost, however, had yet reached the bottom of the ravines through which we travelled. The path was rather damp and slippy, and the stream rushed on over the rocks without showing one icicle to mark the reign of winter. Father Francis's mule, which had delayed us on our former journey, now proved more sure-footed, at least, than either of the horses; and the good priest, finding himself quite secure and at his ease, dilated on the grandeur of the scenery and the magnificence of nature, even in her rudest forms. "I am nothing of a misanthrope," said he, "and yet I find in the contemplation of the works of God a charm that man and all his arts can never communicate. When I look upon the mighty efforts of creation, I feel them to be all true and genuine--all unchangeable--the effect of universal Beneficence acting with Almighty power: but when I consider even the greatest and most splendid deeds of man, I am never certain in what base motives they originated, or for what bad ends they were designed; how much pain and injustice their execution may have cost, or how much misery and vice may attend upon their consequences. In all man does there is that germ from which evil may ever spring, while the works of God are always beautiful in themselves, and excellent in their purpose." "And yet, my good father," said I, willing enough to shorten the tedious way with conversation, "though you pronounce the flash of glory to be but a misleading meteor, and power a dangerous precipice, and love a volcano as full of earthquakes as fertility, yet still there are some things amongst men's deeds which even you can contemplate with delight and admiration,--the protecting the weak, the assuaging grief, the dispensing joy, the leading unto virtue and right." "True, Louis! true!" answered he; "and yet I know not whether my mind is saddened to-day; but though all these actions are admirable, how rare it is we can be certain that the motives which prompted them were good! Only, I believe, when we look into our own breast; and then--if we examine steadfastly, clearly, accurately, how many faults, how many weaknesses, how many follies, how many crimes, do we not find to make us turn away our eyes from the sad prospect of the human heart! Here I can look around me, and see beauty springing from Beneficence, and everything that is magnificent proceeding from everything that is wise. And oh! how happy, how full of joy and tranquillity is the conviction, that death itself, the worst evil which can happen to this frail body, is the work of that great Creator who made both the body and the soul, and certainly made them not in vain."