And observe, farther, that this comparative

§ 4. And observe, farther, that this comparative Dimness and Untraceableness of the thoughts which are the sources of our admiration, is not a fault in the thoughts, at such a time. It is, on the contrary, a necessary condition of their subordination to the pleasure of Sight. If the thoughts were more distinct we should not see so well; and beginning definitely to think, we must comparatively cease to see. In the instance just supposed, as long as we look at the film of mountain or Alp,cheap oil paintings on canvas, with only an obscure consciousness of its being the source of mighty rivers, that consciousness adds to our sense of its sublimity; and if we have ever seen the Rhine or the Rhone near their mouths, our knowledge, so long as it is only obscurely suggested, adds to our admiration of the Alp; but once let the idea define itself,—once let us begin to consider seriously what rivers flow from that mountain, to trace their course, and to recall determinately our memories of their distant aspects,—and we cease to behold the Alp; or, if we still behold it, it is only as a point in a map which we are painfully designing,where to buy oil paintings, or as a subordinate object which we strive to thrust aside, in order to make room for our remembrances of Avignon or Rotterdam.
Again: so long as our idea of the multitudes who inhabit the ravines at its foot remains indistinct, that idea comes to the aid of all the other associations which increase our delight. But let it once arrest us, and entice us to follow out some clear course of thought respecting the causes of the prosperity or misfortune of the Alpine villagers, and the snowy peak again ceases to be visible, or holds its place only as a white spot upon the retina, while we pursue our meditations upon the religion or the political economy of the mountaineers. art oil painting reproduction