e lost paradise of Nature gradually
produced a state of melancholy hyper-sensitiveness, an epidemic of
world pain, quite as unnatural as the Rococo.

The heart came into its rights again and laid claim to absolute
dominion in its kingdom, and regret that it had lain so long deprived
of its own, gave rise to a tearful pensiveness, which added zest to
restitution. It was convalescence, but followed at once by another
complaint. Feeling swung from one extreme to the other.

German feeling in the first half of the eighteenth century was
chiefly influenced, on the one hand, by Richardson's novels, which
left no room for Nature, and by the poetry of Young and Thomson; on
the other, by the pastoral idylls interspersed with anacreontic
love-passages, affected by the French. At first description and
moralizing preponderated.

In 1729 Haller's _Alps_ appeared. It had the merit of drawing the
eyes of Europe to Alpine beauty and the moral worth of the Swiss, but
shewed little eye for romantic scenery. It is full of descriptive
painting, but not of a kind that appeals: scene follows scene with
considerable pathos, especially in dealing with the people; but
landscape is looked at almost entirely from the moralizing or
utilitarian standpoint.

'Here, where the majestic Mount Gothard elevates its summit above the
clouds, and where the earth itself seems to approach the sun, Nature
has assembled in one spot all the choicest treasure of the globe. The
deserts of Libya, indeed, afford us greater novelties, and its sandy
plains are more fertile in monsters: but thou, favoured region, art
adorned with useful productions only, productions which can satisfy
all the wants of man. Even those heaps of ice, those frowning rocks
in appearance so sterile, contribute largely to the general good, for
they supply inexhaustible fountains to fertilize the land. What a
magnificent picture does Nature spread before the eye, when the sun,
gilding the top of the Alps, scatters the sea of vapours which
undulates below! Through the receding vale the theatre of a whole
world rises to the view! Rocks, valleys, lakes, mountains, and
forests fill the immeasurable space, and are lost in the wide
horizon. We take in at a single glance the confines of divers states,
nations of various characters, languages, and manners, till the eyes,
overcome by such extent of vision, drop their weary lids, and we ask
of the enchanted fancy a continuance of the scene.

'When