To regain that faculty is to
be born again, out of a false world into a true. The constant repetition
of the laws of Nature blunts our spirits to the amazing character of
every detail which she reproduces. To catch again the wonder of common
things--
"the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower"
--is to pass from darkness into light, from falsehood to truth. "All the
towering materialism which dominates the modern mind rests ultimately
upon one assumption: a false assumption. It is supposed that if a thing
goes on repeating itself it is probably dead: a piece of clockwork." But
that is mere blindness to the mystery and surprise of everything that
goes to make up actual human experience. "The repetition in Nature
seemed sometimes to be an excited repetition, like that of an angry
schoolmaster saying the same thing over and over again. The grass seemed
signalling to me with all its fingers at once; the crowded stars seemed
bent on being understood. The sun would make me see him if he rose a
thousand times."
That is one fact, which fairy tales emphasise--the constant demand for
wonder in the world, and the appropriateness and rightness of the
wondering attitude of mind, as man passes through his lifelong gallery
of celestial visions.
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