When philosophical curiosity is awakened, it disengages from the general sentiment of power the definite idea of the cause which becomes the explanation of the phenomena.  The reason of man, by virtue of its very constitution, finds a need of conceiving of an absolute cause which escapes by its eternity the lapse of time, and by its infinite character the bounds of limited existences; a principle, the necessary being of which depends on no other; in a word a unique cause, establishing by its unity the universal harmony.  So, when reason meets with the idea of the sole and Almighty Creator, it attaches itself to it as the only thought which accounts to it for the world and for itself.

The Creator is, first of all, He whose glory the heavens declare, while the earth makes known the work of His hands.  He is the Mighty One and the Wise, whose will has given being to nature, and who directs at once the chorus of stars in the depths of the heavens, and the drop of vital moisture in the herb which we tread under foot.

If, after having looked around, we turn our regard in upon ourselves, we then discover other heavens, spiritual heavens, in which shine, like stars of the first magnitude, those objects which cause the heart of man to beat, so long as he is not self-degraded:  truth, goodness, beauty.  Now we feel that we are made for this higher world.  Material enjoyments may enchain our will; we may, in the indulgence of unworthy passions, pursue what in its essence is only evil, error, and deformity; but, if all the rays of our true nature are not extinguished, a voice issues from the depth of our souls and protests against our debasement.  Our aspirations toward these spiritual excellences are unlimited.  Our thought sets out on its course:  have we solved one question? immediately new questions arise, which press, no less than the former, for an answer.  Our conscience speaks:  have we come in a certain degree to realize what is right and good? immediately conscience demands of us still more.  Is our feeling for beauty awakened?  Well, sirs, when an artist is satisfied with the work of his hands, do you not know at once what to think of him?  Do you not know that that man will never do any thing great, who does not see shining in his horizon an ideal which stamps as imperfect all that he has been able to realize?  The voice which urges us on through life from the cradle to the grave, and which, without allowing us a moment’s pause, is ever crying—­Forward! forward! this voice is not more imperious than the noble instinct which, in the view of beauty, of truth, of good, is also saying to us—­Forward! forward! and, with the American poet, Excelsior! higher, ever higher!  Many of you know that instinct familiar to the climbers of the Alps,[2] as they are called, who, arrived at one summit, have no rest so long as there remains a loftier height in view.  Such is our destiny; but the last peak is veiled in shining clouds which conceal it from our sight.  Perfection,—­this is the point to which our nature aspires; but it is the ladder of Jacob:  we see the foot which rests upon the earth; the summit hides itself from our feeble view amidst the splendors of the infinite.