The truth, told by one who had lived fifty years in the solitudes, among the rugged mountains, under the dark trees, and by the sides of the lonely streams, was the simple interpretation of a spirit in harmony with the bold, the beautiful, the serene, the silent.
He meant the Grand Canyon was only a mood of nature, a bold promise, a beautiful record.

He meant that mountains had sifted away in its dust, yet the canyon was young.

Man was nothing, so let him be humble.

This cataclysm of the earth, this playground of a river was not inscrutable; it was only inevitable--as inevitable as nature herself.

Millions of years in the bygone ages it had lain serene under a half moon; it would bask silent under a rayless sun, in the onward edge of time.
It taught simplicity, serenity, peace.