“‘There is something marvelously soft in the study of nature which attaches a name to  every being, a thought to every name affection and memories to every thought'” (page 31)

Wow. Marvelously soft… I suppose all things do have that nature. As I write this, I am on the back porch of an internet cafe on the banks of the Puget Sound. The ocean is so soft. The ocean is so rigid. It can be a smiling mother with its coral reefs, its gentle, lapping waves, its reflection of the dim sunlight. It can also be a beast, a monster. The ocean topples cities, and sucks apart ships, and drowns a newborn baby without a second thought (or a first for that matter). What a marvelously merciful and remorseless body that I am sitting next to. Now a sea breeze blows through me, a soft nudge, a rigid shiver.