John Wesley Powell

“ Behind us are cool springs, green meadows, and forest-clad slopes; below us, stretching to the south until the world is lost in blue haze, is a painted desert--not a desert plain, but a desert of rocks cut by deep gorges and relieved by towering cliffs and pinnacled rocks--naked rocks, brilliant in the sunlight.
By a difficult trail we make our way down the basaltic ledge, through which innumerable streams here gather into a little river running in a deep canyon. The river runs close to the foot of the cliffs on the right-hand side and the trail passes along to the right. ”

“ There is not a trail but what they know; every gulch and every rock seems familiar. I have prided myself on being able to grasp and retain in my mind the topography of a country; but these Indians put me to shame. My knowledge is only general, embracing the more important features of a region that remains as a map engraved on my mind; but theirs is particular. They know every rock and every ledge, every gulch and cañon, and just where to wind among these to find a pass; and their knowledge is unerring. They cannot describe a country to you, but they can tell you all the particulars of a route. ”

“ A trivial accident may befall a soldier in line of battle which he interprets as a wound; he hears the coming of the shell from a piece of field artillery, it strikes the ground and scatters its fragments broadcast together with chips and gravel. A bit of wood strikes the soldier; he interprets it as a fragment of shell, has the illusion of being wounded, and feels the pain and expresses all the agony which a real wound may actually produce. ”

“ No, the laws of brute evolution have been repealed by substitution and the new ways are methods of culture. The laws of nature unmodified by man produce horns, claws, fangs, and poisons for attack, with armor, cowardice, and deceit for defense. Culture replaces these brutal devices; smiling fields, cheerful homes, and all the products of civilization are derived from the inventions of man himself. As the generations come each inherits from his predecessor and adds to the patrimony by self-activity. That which the self can accomplish is multiplied by all which the social environment produces. ”

“ In the lower stages of savagery the cosmos is bounded by the great plain of land and sea on which we tread, and the firmament, the azure surface above, set with brilliants; and beyond is an abyss of—nothing. Within these bounds all things are known, all things are explained; there are no mysteries but the whims of the gods. But when the plain on which we tread becomes a portion of the surface of a great globe, and the domed firmament becomes the heavens, stretching beyond Alcyone and Sirius, with this enlargement of the realm of philosophy the verity of philosophy is questioned. ”

“ Clouds are playing in the canyon to-day. Sometimes they roll down in great masses, filling the gorge with gloom; sometimes they hang aloft from wall to wall and cover the canyon with a roof of impending storm, and we can peer long distances up and down this canyon corridor, with its cloud-roof overhead, its walls of black granite, and its river bright with the sheen of broken waters. Then a gust of wind sweeps down a side gulch and, making a rift in the clouds, reveals the blue heavens, and a stream of sunlight pours in. ”

“ To a man who has not devoted his life to chemical research and has familiarized himself only to a limited extent with the history and theories of chemistry, the vast body of experiments, the innumerable verifications of prophecies and the congeries of congruities which have developed since Dalton propounded the atomic theory are such a monument of accomplishment by inference and verification that they appear as a pyramid of truth. ”

“ Weary with a long walk, I climb to the summit of a rock, from which vantage ground I hope to obtain a better view while resting. In climbing I grasp the angle of a boulder over my head and immediately feel a pain thrilling through my nerves. From the sensation of touch I gather other knowledge, as I think that I have cut my finger on the sharp edge of a crystal. ”

“ In that pre-Columbian time, before the advent of white men, all the Indian tribes of North America gathered on winter nights by the shores of the seas where the tides beat in solemn rhythm, by the shores of the great lakes, where the waves dashed against frozen beaches, and by the banks of the rivers flowing ever in solemn mystery—each in its own temple of illumined space—and listened to the story of its own supreme gods, the ancients of time. ”

“ Drama becomes histrionic art indeed, and the stage becomes the mirror in which are reflected the causes and consequences of the deeds of life. Religion soars on wings of aspiration into the empyrean of hope—hope for a purer and better life which bears fruit in purer and better conduct.
The germ of dramatic art is the dance, which in its first stage is religion. Of course religion must be distinguished from theology. Theology is a system of opinions, while religion is a system of worship. ”