These dark channelled rocks, worn, as with eternal tears,--these
traces, so evident of ancient and vast desolations,--suggest the idea
of boundless power and inexorable will, before whose course the most
vehement of human feelings are as the fine spray of the cataract.
"For, surely, the mountain, falling, cometh to nought;
The rock is remored out of his place;
The waters wear the stones;
Thou washest away the things that grow out of the earth,
And thou destroyest the hopes of man;
Thou prevailest against him, and he passeth;
Thou changest his countenance, and sendest him away."
The sceptical inquirer into the mysteries of eternal things might
here, if ever, feel the solemn irony of Eliphaz the Temanite:--
"Should a wise man utter vain knowledge?
Should he reason with unprofitable talk?
Or with speeches that can do no good?
Art thou the first man that ever was born?
Or wast thou made before the hills?"
There are some of my fellow-travellers, by the by, who, if they
_had_ been made before the hills, would never have been much
wiser. All through these solemn passages and gorges, they are
discussing hotels, champagne, wine, and cigars.
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