And so, my dear friend, you who have been reading this last page in
wonder, and who, instead of a
Description of Athens, have been
accommodated with a lament on the part of the writer, that he was
idle at school, and does not know Greek, excuse this momentary
outbreak of egotistic despondency. To say truth, dear Jones, when
one walks among the nests of the eagles, and sees the prodigious
eggs they laid, a certain feeling of discomfiture must come over us
smaller birds. You and I could not invent - it even stretches our
minds painfully to try and comprehend part of the beauty of the
Parthenon - ever so little of it, - the beauty of a single column, - a
fragment of a broken shaft lying under the astonishing blue sky
there, in the midst of that unrivalled landscape. There may be
grander aspects of nature, but none more deliciously beautiful.
The hills rise in perfect harmony, and fall in the most exquisite
cadences - the sea seems brighter, the islands more purple, the
clouds more light and rosy than elsewhere. As you look up through
the open roof, you are almost oppressed by the serene depth of the
blue overhead. Look even at the fragments of the marble, how soft
and pure it is, glittering and white like fresh snow! "I was all
beautiful," it seems to say: "even the hidden parts of me were
spotless, precious, and fair" - and so, musing over this wonderful
scene, perhaps I get some feeble glimpse or idea of that ancient
Greek spirit which peopled it with sublime races of heroes and
gods; {1} and which I never could get out of a Greek book, - no, not
though Muzzle flung it at my head.
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