There, From The Height Of A Steep Bank, As It Were (But A Bank Many
Thousands Of Feet High), One Looked Down Into A Whole District Or
Little World.
On the map, I say, it had seemed so great that I had
thought one would command but this or that portion of it; as it was,
one saw it all.
And this is a peculiar thing I have noticed in all mountains, and have
never been able to understand - - namely, that if you draw a plan or
section to scale, your mountain does not seem a very important thing.
One should not, in theory, be able to dominate from its height, nor to
feel the world small below one, nor to hold a whole countryside in
one's hand - yet one does. The mountains from their heights reveal to
us two truths. They suddenly make us feel our insignificance, and at
the same time they free the immortal Mind, and let it feel its
greatness, and they release it from the earth. But I say again, in
theory, when one considers the exact relation of their height to the
distances one views from them, they ought to claim no such effect, and
that they can produce that effect is related to another thing - the way
in which they exaggerate their own steepness.
For instance, those noble hills, my downs in Sussex, when you are upon
them overlooking the weald, from Chanctonbury say, feel like this - or
even lower. Indeed, it is impossible to give them truly, so
insignificant are they; if the stretch of the Weald were made nearly a
yard long, Chanctonbury would not, in proportion, be more than a fifth
of an inch high!
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