[00:10.39]The intimacy between man and Nature began with the birth of man on the earth,
[00:16.20]and becomes each century more intelligent and far reaching.
[00:22.13]To Nature, therefore, we turn as to the oldest and most influential teacher of our race;
[00:30.11]from one point of view once our task master, now our servant; from another point of view,
[00:37.26]our constant friend, instructor and inspirer.
[00:42.88]The very intimacy of this relation robs it of a certain mystery and richness which it would have for all minds
[00:52.02]if it were the reward of the few instead of being the privilege of the many.
[00:57.63]To the few it is, in every age, full of wonder and beauty;
[01:04.81]to the many it is a matter of course.
[01:08.36]The heavens shine for all,
[01:11.34]but they have a changing splendor to those only who see in every midnight sky
[01:18.61]a majesty of creative energy and resource which no repetition of the spectacle can dim.
[01:27.13]If the stars shone but once in a thousand years, men would gaze,
[01:34.93]awe struck and worshipful, on a vision which is not less but more wonderful
[01:43.02]because it shines nightly above the whole earth. In like manner, and for the same reason,
[01:51.11]we become indifferent to that delicately beautiful or sublimely impressive sky scenery
[01:58.65]which the clouds form and reform, compose and dissipate, a thousand times on a summer day.
[02:08.80]The mystery, the terror, and the music of the sea; the secret and subduing charm of the woods,
[02:18.76]so full of healing for the spent mind or the restless spirit;
[02:24.81]the majesty of the hills, holding in their recesses the secrets of light and atmosphere;
[02:32.83]the infinite variety of landscape, never imitative or repetitious,
[02:40.14]but always appealing to the imagination with some fresh and unsuspected loveliness;
[02:48.54]- who feels the full power of these marvelous resources for the enrichment of life,
[02:55.32]or takes from them all the health, delight, and enrichment they have to bestow?
