Preview
Circa Date
circa 1887
Transcription
82
[& mere exposure merely to the landscapes causes intense keen pleasure which all the] while the whole body seems to feel beauty when exposed to it as it feels [the warmth of fire or] sunshine the campfire or this [the beams of this mountain beauty from all the mountains seem to] entering no by the eyes along but equally through [sketch cut out from reverse side of page] [every p…ides or al…a consu…of plea…body th…hout no arg…anaton…us any m…or enthuse…Perched…d smooth] settling down into dumb [passive] admiration without definite hope of ever learning much [the meaning of it all] Yet with [the] longing unrest effort that lies at the door of hope, humbling prostrate before the vast display of God’s power & eager to offer self denial & [utter] renunciation with eternal toil [labor] to learn any lesson in the rocky manuscript ¶ ([here] add from pg 76) It is easier to feel than to realize or in any way to
83
explain [appreciate] the Yosemite grandeur of architecture the magnitudes of the rocks & trees & streams are so delicately harmonized. They are mostly hidden [so as to hide their vastness] sheer precipices 3000 feet high [sheer down plunging] are fringed with tall trees [forests 200 feet high] growing close like grass on the brow of a lowland hill & extending along the feet of the precipices a ribbon of meadow [half] a mile wide & six or seven [five or six] long[though it] seems[seen as] like a strip [of grass] that a farmer might mow in less than [half] a day. Waterfalls 1000 to 2000 feet high are so subordinated to the mighty cliffs over which they pour, they seem like [calm white] wisps of smoke gentle as floating clouds [in sunshine] though their voices fill [all] the valley [from wall to wall] & make the rocks rumble [the granite tremble as if it were half liquid]. The mountains too along the eastern sky [with snow & ice filling the grooves & notches between them] & the domes in front of them, & the succession of smooth rounded waves [of granite] between swelling higher & higher with [breadth of] dark woods in the hollows [so] serene in massive exuberant bulk & beauty [boundlessness] tend yet more to hide the grandeur of the Yosemite temple & make it appear
Date Occurred
1869
Resource Identifier
MuirReel31 Notebook07 Img044.jpg
Contributing Institution
Holt-Atherton Special Collections, University of the Pacific Library
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