The Heart of Nature; or, The Quest for Natural BeautyYounghusband, Francis Edward, Sir
Philosophy
The Heart of Nature; or, The Quest for Natural Beauty
Younghusband, Francis Edward, Sir
Himalaya Mountains -- Description and travel; Natural history -- Himalaya Mountains; Nature (Aesthetics)
We have now to understand what is meant by saying that Nature is a
Person actuated by a hidden ideal and being in process of realising
that ideal. When travelling across the Gobi Desert I found a yellow
rose--a dwarf, simple, single rose. It is known to botanists as _Rosa
persica,_ and is believed to be the original of all roses. I found it on
the extreme outlying spurs of the Altai Mountains. Now, a seed of
the rose, partly under the influence of its surroundings (soil,
moisture, air, sunshine) but chiefly _by virtue of something which it
contains within itself,_ something inherent in its very nature, will
grow up into a rose-bush and give forth roses. The seed develops
into a rose, not because some outside super-gardener takes hold of
each one of the million million ultra-microscopic particles of which
it is made up and puts it carefully into its appointed place, as a
builder might put the stones of a building into their exact places
according to the plans of an architect; but because each of those
minutest ultimate particles has that within it which prompts it to act
of its own accord in response to the call of the whole. Each of these
electrons is in incessant and terrific motion, moving at the rate of
something like 180,000 miles a second, so placing it in position
would be a difficult matter. Besides which, each electron is not a
tiny bit of matter as we ordinarily conceive matter--something which
we can touch and handle. It is a mere centre or nucleus of energy.
Any placing of it in position by a super-gardener is therefore out of
the question. Each of those little particles moves and acts of itself in
accordance with its own inner promptings, and in response to the
influence of those other myriads of particles and groups of particles
about it. And that system of these groups of particles which is
enclosed within the rondure of the seed must have within it the ideal
of the rose to be. Each particle will act on its own initiative, but all
will act under the mutual influence of one another, and in their
togetherness will make up the rose-spirit, being informed by the
ideal of the rose which in its turn will suffuse the whole. And this
rose-spirit--this rose-disposition--as it gives itself play, so controls
and directs their movements that eventually the full-blown rose
comes into being.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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