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)
He will have been toned and tuned up to the highest pitch in his
wrestling with Nature, and will have been purged and purified in the
white region of the highest mountains. And in this high-strung state
he will now see that creation and manifestation of Nature which of
all natural objects will best declare her meaning, bring him into
closer touch with her very Heart, and stir in him the deepest
emotions. Between him and this object there will be possible the
closest community of soul. Here then he will see Natural Beauty at
its very finest.
The natural object in which he will see this consummation of Beauty
will be the woman who will be to him a kindred spirit, and whom he
will first admire and then love.
It was through the love of man and woman for each other in the
far-off ages when love first came into the hearts of men that Natural
Beauty also first dawned upon them. It is through that love that
Natural Beauty has been continually growing in fulness and
splendour. And it will be through that same love of man and woman
for each other that the Artist will see Natural Beauty reach its
highest perfection. For in this love man first learned to enter into the
soul of another, to recognise samenesses between himself and
another, and to live in communion with another. And so in time he
came to recognise samenesses between what was in his heart and
what was in the Heart of Nature, to enter into communion with
Nature, and through the wedding of himself with Nature see the
Beauty in her. He was able in some slight degree to be towards
Nature what we see the midge buzzing round a man must be if that
midge is to see the beauty of man. Just as the midge, if it is to see
the beauty in man, must be able to recognise samenesses between its
life and the life of man, so man to see Beauty in Nature had to
recognise identity of life between him and Nature as he was first
inspired to see it through the love of man and woman for each other.
And now the Artist with his wide experience of Nature and united
with his own countrywoman in his own country will recognise a still
closer identity between himself and Nature, and so see an even fuller
Beauty in her.
Assuming the man and woman, both by their upbringing and by
outward circumstances, to have been able to develop the best
capacities within them and to be meeting now under conditions most
favourable for their union, we shall see how perfect is the Beauty
which may be revealed. The man will be in the prime of his
manhood, and the woman in the prime of her womanhood. The man
manly and radiating manhood, the woman womanly and radiating
womanhood: their manhood and womanhood welling up within
them, each eager to answer the call of the other.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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