Excerpt from Go Up Higher: Or Religion in Common Life
There is a climbing instinct in man which makes him love to go up higher. The great popularity of Longfellow's little poem, "Excelsior," is due, in part, to its touching this much-loved note. To go to the top of high places is attractive. Therefore, in travelling, we love to ascend spires, towers, mountains; to go to the top of the Pyramids, the dome of St. Peter, the spire of Strasburg or Antwerp, or the lantern of our own State House. For to mount a few hundred feet above the level of the earth seems to lift us for the time above its cares into a more serene state. We look down from the summit of Trinity, in New York; or St. Paul's, in London; or Notre Dame, in Paris, upon the streets which swarm below. The currents of life move on, but we seem far away from them; the roar of business comes up to us, softened through the intervening air. We look down upon this hurrying crowd with a certain angelic composure, and wonder at its impatience. Its hurry and haste appear quite unnecessary. To us in our sublime elevation, bathed in the circumambient air, life has suddenly become calm, and our soul is serene.
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