Chapter VII: Water

Of all inorganic substances, acting in their own proper nature,
and without assistance or combination, water is the most
wonderful. If we think of it as the source of all the
changefulness and beauty which we have seen in the clouds; then
as the instrument by which the earth we have contemplated was
modelled into symmetry, and its crags chiselled into grace;
then as, in the form of snow, it robes the mountains it has
made, with that transcendent light which we could not have
conceived if we had not seen; then as it exists in the foam of
the torrent, in the iris which spans it, in the morning mist
which rises from it, in the deep crystalline pools which mirror
its hanging shore, in the broad lake and glancing river,
finally, in that which is to all human minds the best emblem of
unwearied, unconquerable power, the wild, various, fantastic,
tameless unity of the sea; what shall we compare to this
mighty, this universal element, for glory and for beauty? or
how shall we follow its eternal cheerfulness of feeling? It is
like trying to paint a soul.--RUSKIN.