Not to admire is all the art I know
A Journey to the Centre of the Earth“Not to admire is all the art I know” is a couplet from Horace that Professor Hardwigg adopts at the moment the underground sea first revives Henry. The expression turns astonishment into a practice: the marvel is not merely to be observed, but to make a person happy and keep him so.
The Couplet and Its Speaker
After forty-seven days imprisoned in a dark, miserable tunnel, Henry breathes the saline air of the underground sea. Its dense atmosphere seems to restore his strength, inflating his lungs with unfamiliar oxygen, and the sight brings color back to his pallid cheeks. Against this account of bodily recovery, the couplet supplies Professor Hardwigg’s concise answer to the scene’s emotional force.
The narrator identifies the lines with the Latin poet Horace, then presents the couplet: “Not to admire is all the art I know, / To make man happy and to keep him so.” Professor Hardwigg has already recovered from his initial surprise. He does not deny the spectacle’s power; instead, the verse makes sustained appreciation a kind of art, linking admiration to human happiness rather than treating wonder as a momentary reaction.
From Wonder to Renewed Action
The words are immediately borne out by the exchange that follows. After allowing Henry time to appreciate the underground sea’s marvels, Professor Hardwigg asks whether he feels strong enough to walk up and down. Henry answers that he does, and that nothing would give him greater pleasure. The sequence moves from confinement and bodily debility to renewed movement: the sea’s air revives Henry, while the invitation to walk turns restored energy into action.
The couplet therefore marks a change in the expedition’s immediate condition without claiming that its dangers are over. Its paired aims—making someone happy and keeping him so—give the episode a small but meaningful shape: first the spectacle is received, then its restorative effect is tested in Henry’s readiness to move. Admiration here is not detached contemplation but a response joined to recovery and companionship.
