POMEGRANATES
FROM AN ENGLISH GARDEN:

The required books of the C. L. S. C. are recommended by a Council of six. It must, however, be understood that recommendation does not involve an approval by the Council, or by any member of it, of every principle or doctrine contained in the book recommended.

The name of Robert Browning has been before the world now for fifty years. For the greater part of the time his work has had so little recognition, that one marvels at his courage in going so steadily on with it. His “Pomegranates” have been produced year after year, decade after decade, in unfailing abundance; and, while critics have kept paring at the rind, and the general public has not even asked if there was anything beneath it, he has laboured on with unremitting energy, calmly awaiting the time when “the heart within, blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity,” should be at length discovered. It can scarcely be said, even yet, that that time has come; but it is coming fast. Already he is something more than “the poet’s poet.” Few intelligent people now are content to know one of the master minds of the age simply as the author of “The Pied Piper of Hamelin,” as if that were the only thing he had written worth reading!

That the form in which the thought of Browning is cast is altogether admirable, is what none but his most undiscriminating admirers will assert. It is often, unquestionably, rough and forbidding. But there is strength even in its ruggedness; and in its entire freedom from conventionality there is a charm such as one enjoys in wild mountain scenery, even though only in little patches it may have any suggestion of the garden or the lawn. There are those who have charged the poet with affectation of the uncouth and the bizarre; but careful reading will, we think, render it apparent that it is rather his utter freedom from affectation which determines and perpetuates the peculiarities and oddities of his style; that, in fact, the aphorism of Buffon, “le iistyle est l’homme même,” is undoubtedly true as applied to him. It would, of course, be absurd to claim for the pomegranate the bloom and beauty of the peach; but, equally with the other, it is Nature’s gift, and to toss aside a rough-rinded fruit because it needs to be “cut deep down the middle” before its pulp and juices can be reached, is surely far from wise. Even hard nuts are not to be despised, if the kernels are good; and as to Browning’s “nuts,” we have this to say, that not only are they well worth cracking, but there is in the process excellent exercise for the teeth.

This brings us to the alleged “obscurity” of Browning’s writings, which still continues to be the main obstacle to their general appreciation. It is freely admitted that often it is not quite easy, and sometimes very difficult, to understand him; and it is hard for most people to see why he could not make his meaning plainer, and matter for regret to many, who heartily admire him, that he has not done so. That he has taken some pains to this end is evident from what he says in the preface to “Sordello,” written for an edition issued in 1863, twenty-three years after its original publication: “My own faults of expression were many.... I blame nobody, least of all myself, who did my best then and since, for I lately gave time and pains to turn my work into what the many might—instead of what the few must—like.” In a later preface (1872) he says, “Nor do I apprehend any more charges of being wilfully obscure, unconscientiously careless, or perversely harsh.” The true explanation of it seems to be what we have already suggested, that he does not think of his audience as he writes, his only care being to express the thought in the way which comes most natural to him. As a dramatist, he can throw himself with abandonment into the persons he represents; but he never seems to think of putting himself in the position of a listener, or, if he does, he assumes too readily that he has a mind of similar texture and grasp to his own. On the other hand, it is fair to say that the difficulty of understanding him arises in great part from the very excellence iiiof his work. The following considerations will illustrate what we mean:—

1. His work is full of thought, and the thought is never commonplace. There is so much of it, and all is so fresh, and therefore unfamiliar, that some mental effort is necessary to grasp it. The following characteristic remark of Bishop Butler, in his preface to the famous Fifteen Sermons, is worth consideration in this connection: “It must be acknowledged that some of the following Discourses are very abstruse and difficult; or, if you please, obscure; but I must take leave to add that those alone are judges, whether or no and how far this is a fault, who are judges, whether or no and how far it might have been avoided—those only who will be at the trouble to understand what is here said, and to see how far the things here insisted upon, and not other things, might have been put in a plainer manner; which yet I am very far from asserting that they could not.”

2. The expression is always the briefest. Not only are no words wasted, but, where connecting ideas are easily supplied, they are often left unexpressed, the intelligence and mental activity of the reader being always taken for granted.

3. The poems are, for the most part, dramatic in principle. The reader is brought face to face with some soul, in its thoughts and emotions, frequently in the very process of the thinking and the feeling. The poet has stepped aside, and of course supplies no key. The author does not appear, like the chorus in a Greek play, to point a moral or explain the situation. The dramatis personæ must explain themselves. And, just as Shakespeare must be studied in order to an appreciation other than second-hand, so must Browning be studied in order to be appreciated at all; for his writings are not yet old enough to secure much second-hand enthusiasm.

4. The wealth of allusion is another source of difficulty. The learning of our poet is encyclopædic; and though there is no display of it, there is large use of it; and it often happens that ivpassages or phrases, which seem crabbed or obscure, require only the knowledge of some unfamiliar fact in science or in history, or it may be something not readily thought of, and yet within easy range of a keen enough observation, to light them up and reveal unsuspected strength or beauty.

Before leaving the subject of the rough and often tough exterior of Browning’s work, it may be interesting to refer to the characteristic illustration of it he has lately given us in the prologue to “Ferishtah’s Fancies,” his most recent work. He begins by asking the reader whether he has ever “eaten ortolans in Italy,” and then goes on to describe the preparation of them. The following lines will show the use he makes of the illustration:

This extract also furnishes an example of the strange rhymes in which the poet sometimes indulges, with what appears too little refinement of taste.

The themes of Browning’s poetry are the very greatest that can engage the thought of man. He ranges over a vast variety of topic; but, wherever his thought may lead him, he never vloses sight of that which is to him the centre of all, the human soul, with its infinite wants and capabilities. In the preface to “Sordello” he says: “The historical decoration was purposely of no more importance than a background requires; and my stress lay on the incidents in the development of a soul: little else is worth study. I, at least, always thought so.” To this principle he has kept true through all his work; and hence it is that, whether the particular subject be love, or home, or country; poetry, painting, or music; life, death, or immortality; it is dealt with in its relation to “the development of a soul.” Hence it is that his poetry is so thoroughly and profoundly spiritual, and so exceedingly valuable as a counteractive to the materialism of the age, which ever tends to merge the soul in the body, and swallow up the real in mere phenomena.

As might be expected of one who deals so profoundly with all that he touches, the great reality of the universe to him is God. Agnosticism has little mercy at his hands; if a man knows anything at all, he knows God. And the God whom he knows is not a God apart, looking down from some infinite or indefinite height upon the world, but one in whom all live and move and have their being. Out of this springs, of course, the hope of immortality, and also that bright and cheerful view of life so completely opposed to the dark pessimism to which much of the unbelieving speculation of the present day so painfully tends. The dark things of human life and destiny are by no means ignored; rather are they dwelt on with a painful and sometimes frightful realism; but even amid deepest darkness the light above is never quite extinguished, and some little “Pippa passes” singing:

viThere has been much discussion as to Browning’s personal attitude to Christianity. The profoundly Christian tone of his writings is, of course, universally acknowledged; but attempts are sometimes made to evade the force of those numerous passages in which he speaks of the Incarnation, and Death, and Resurrection of the Lord Jesus, in a way which seems to imply his hearty acceptance of the substance of what is known as evangelical truth. Much has been made in this connection of the way in which, in one of his prefaces, he characterises his work as “poetry always dramatic in principle, and so many utterances of so many imaginary persons, not mine;” and it has been asserted that it is as unwarrantable to consider him to be speaking his own sentiments in a poem like “Christmas Eve,” as in one like “Johannes Agricola,” or “Bishop Blougram’s Apology.” The obvious answer is that this profound sympathy with the Christ of God and His salvation is not found in some solitary production, but appears and reappears, often when least expected, all through his works. In that remarkable little poem, entitled “House,” in which more strongly than anywhere else he claims personal privacy, while he declines to be regarded as having furnished his publishers with tickets to view his own soul’s dwelling, he admits that “whoso desires to penetrate deeper” may do so “by the spirit sense;” and accordingly some of his admirers, who dissent from him most strongly on this point, are the most ready to acknowledge that his Christian faith is no stage suit, but the very garment of his soul. As illustration of this we may refer to the admirable essay by the late James Thomson, published in Part II. of the Browning Society’s Papers, in which, after expressing his amazement that a great mind like Browning’s could be Christian, he asserts the, to him, remarkable but quite undeniable fact in these words: “The devout and hopeful Christian faith, explicitly or implicitly affirmed in such poems as Saul, Kharshish, Cleon, Caliban upon Setebos, A Death in the Desert, Instans Tyrannus, Rabbi Ben Ezra, viiProspice, the Epilogue, and throughout that stupendous monumental work, The Ring and the Book, must surely be as clear as noonday to even the most purblind vision.”

That a great Christian poet, in an age when so many of the intellectual magnates of the time are hostile or simply silent, should remain unknown or little known to any large proportion of Christian readers, is certainly very much to be regretted. Surely the admiration which is freely and generously accorded to his work by many who are constrained to it in spite of his faith in a Christ whom they reject, is a rebuke to the indifference of those who, sharing his faith, do not give themselves the trouble to inquire what he has to say about it. There are not so many avowed and outspoken Christians in the highest walks of literature that we can afford to pay only slight attention to the utterances of one who has the ear of the deepest thinkers in every school of thought all the world over.

The immediate object of this selection is to supply an introduction to the study of Browning for the benefit of the readers of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle; but it is hoped that many others, inspired with similar aims, and who have not had such advantages that they can dispense with all assistance in the study of a difficult author, may find help from this little book. It is, of course, better to read for one’s self than to follow the guidance of another; and yet it may be necessary to open a path far enough to lead within sight of the treasures in store. This is all that has been attempted here—only the indication of a few veins near the surface of a rich mine, which the reader is strongly recommended to explore for himself.

The selection has been arranged on the principle of beginning with that which is simple, and proceeding gradually to the more complex, with some regard also to variety and progress in subjects, and at the same time to appropriateness for the use of those younger readers for whom this selection mainly is intended.

The notes are meant to serve only as a guide to beginners; viiiand as guides are proverbially an annoyance when their services are imposed unsought, these are disposed at the end of each poem, and without reference marks to mar the pages, so that the selection may be read, if desired, without any interference from the notes.

Within the limits of a volume like this, only the shorter poems could find a place. Most valuable extracts from the longer works might have been given; but this is always a questionable method of dealing with the best writers, with those especially whose thought is strictly consecutive, while the effect of particular passages depends to a large extent on their setting and their relation to the work as a whole. The only^[A] exception to this is the treatment of “Christmas Eve and Easter Day,” with extracts from which this volume closes. That remarkable work occupies a middle position between the shorter and the longer poems of our author; and, though too long for insertion entire, is yet so important, that it seemed very desirable to give some idea of it. In furnishing a series of extracts from this work, an attempt has been made to reduce the disadvantage above referred to by supplying along with them a slight sketch or “argument,” so as to give some idea, to those unacquainted with it, of the course of thought throughout.

It is right to say that Mr. Browning has given his kind permission for the publication in the United States of this Selection, and also of the Notes, for which, however, as for the selection itself, he is in no wise responsible.

The former of these companion poems may have been written from Italy or the south of Spain, as would appear from the last line of it. Mr. E. C. Stedman, one of the severest of Browning’s appreciative critics, commenting (in his “Victorian Poets”) on the lines beginning “That’s the wise thrush,” says:—“Having in mind Shakespeare and Shelley, I nevertheless think these three lines the finest ever written touching the song of a bird.”

In the latter poem, the course is from the southern point of Portugal through the Straits. “Here and here”—the reference is to the battles of Cape St. Vincent (1796) and Trafalgar (1805), and perhaps to the defence of Gibraltar (1782).

The indefiniteness of the date at the head of this poem will be best explained by the following extract from a letter of Mr. Browning’s, published in 1881 in the Boston Literary World:—

“There is no sort of historical foundation about ‘Good News From Ghent.’ I wrote it under the bulwark of a vessel off the African coast, after I had been at sea long enough to appreciate even the fancy of a gallop on the back of a certain good horse ‘York,’ then in my stable at home.”

This poem, therefore, widely known and appreciated as one of the most stirring in the language, may be regarded as a living picture to illustrate the pages—no page in particular—of Motley.

As parallels in American literature, reference may be made to “Paul Revere’s Ride,” by Longfellow, and “Sheridan’s Ride,” by T. B. Reade.

The name, Echetlos, is derived from ἐχέτλη, a plough handle. It is not strictly a proper name, but an appellative, meaning “the Holder of the Ploughshare.” The story is found in Pausanias, author of the “Itinerary of Greece” (1, 15, 32). Nothing further is necessary in order to understand this little poem and appreciate its rugged strength than familiarity with the battle of Marathon, and some knowledge of Miltiades and Themistocles, the one known as the hero of Marathon, and the other as the hero of Salamis. The lesson of the poem (“The great deed ne’er grows small, not the great name!”) is taught in a way not likely to be forgotten. One is reminded of another, who wished to be nameless, heard only as “the voice of one crying in the wilderness!”

The ellipsis in thought between the eighth and ninth stanzas is so easily supplied that it is noticed here only as a simple illustration of what is sometimes the occasion of difficulty (see Introduction, p. iii). It would only have lengthened the poem and weakened it to have inserted a stanza telling in so many words that when the hero could not be found, a message was sent to the Oracle to enquire who it could be.

As a companion to “Echetlos” may be read the stirring poem of “Hervé Riel.”

The tower is one built by Lord Dufferin, in memory of his mother Helen, Countess of Gifford, on one of his estates in Ireland. “The Greek Beauty” is, of course, Helen of Troy, and the reference in the alternative heading is apparently to that fine passage in the third book of the “Iliad,” where Helen meets the Trojan chiefs at the Scæan Gate (see line 154, which speaks of “Helen at the Tower”).

On the last two lines, founded of course on the well-known passage in Job (xxxviii. 4-7), compare Dante:

There ought to be far more in a man than can be put into a front window. This man had all sorts of “curios” in his shop window, but there was nothing rich or rare in his soul; and so there was room for all of him in a den which would not have held the hundredth part of his wares. The contemptible manner of the man’s life is strikingly brought out by the various suppositions (stanzas 5, 6, 7) so different from the poor reality (8-9). All he cared for was business, which made him “chuckle” on the one hand or “chafe” on the other, according as times were good or bad (10). Even in his business it was not the real excellence of his wares he cared for, only their saleability (11). A merchant prince is a very different person (13-19). The last three stanzas give the lesson in a style partly humorous, but passing in the end to an impressive solemnity.

In connection with this should be read the companion piece, “House,” to which reference is made in the Introduction.

The lesson of this beautiful fancy is the complement of the “Shop” lesson. Even drudgery may be divine; since the will of God is the work to be done, no matter whether under St. Peter’s dome or in the cell of the craftsman (the Boy)—“all one, if on the earth or in the sun” (the Angel).

The poem is so full of exquisite things, that only a few can be noted. The value of the “little human praise” to God Himself (distich 12), all the dearer because of the doubts and fears in it (20-22); and the contrast between its seeming weakness and insignificance and its real importance as a necessary part of the great chorus of creation (34); the eager desire of Gabriel to anticipate the will of God, and his content to live on earth and bend over a common trade, if only thus he can serve Him best (13-19); and again the content of the “new pope Theocrite” to go back to his “cell and poor employ” and fill out the measure of his day of service, growing old at home, while Gabriel as contentedly takes his place as pope (probably a harder trial than the more menial service) and waits for the time when both “sought God side by side”—these are some of the fine and far reaching thoughts which find simple and beautiful expression here.

Longfellow’s “King Robert of Sicily,” though not really parallel, has points of similarity to “The Boy and the Angel.”

The Patriot, on his way to the scaffold, surrounded by a hooting crowd, remembers how, just a year ago, the same people had been mad in their enthusiasm for him. Anything at all, however extravagant, would have been too little for them to do for him (stanza 2; cf. Gal. iv. 15, 16); but now——! The fourth stanza is very powerful. All have gone who can, to be ready to see the execution; only the “palsied few,” who cannot, are at the windows to see him pass. In the last stanza the thought of a more sudden contrast still is presented. A man may drop dead in the midst of a triumph, to find that in its brief plaudits he has his reward, while a vast account stands against him at the higher tribunal. Far better die amid the execrations of men and find the contrast reversed.

It is “an old story,” and therefore general; but one naturally thinks of such cases as Arnold of Brescia, or the tribune Rienzi. A higher Name than these need not be introduced here, in proof of the people’s fickleness!

“Instans Tyrannus,” the present tyrant, the tyrant for the time only, whose apparently illimitable power to hurt shrivels into nothing in presence of the King of kings, whose dominion is everlasting.

The poor victim of this tyrant’s oppression is a true child of God, but the nobility of his inner life is of course concealed from the proud wretch who despises him, and who, it must be remembered, is the speaker throughout. We must be careful, therefore, to estimate at their proper worth the epithets he applies and the motives he attributes to the object of his hate. He can, of course, think of no other reason why his victim “would not moan, would not curse,” than that, if he did, “his lot might be worse.” And again, when temptation failed to shake his steadfast patience, the tyrant is quite consistent with himself, as one of those who call evil good, and good evil, in speaking of him as still keeping “to his filth.” The last stanza is magnificent. Has the power of prayer ever been set forth in nobler language?

“The Lost Leader” is supposed to be the poet Wordsworth, who, on accepting the laureateship, abandoned the party of distinguished literary men who had enthusiastically supported the principles of the French Revolution. It is necessary, of course, to enter into the lofty enthusiasm of that party, and for the moment to identify ourselves with it, in order to appreciate the wonderful power and pathos of this exquisite poem. (See Wordsworth’s “French Revolution as it appeared to enthusiasts at its commencement.”)

The contrasts are very powerful between the one (paltry) gift he gained, and all the others (love, loyalty, life, &c.) they were privileged to devote (far richer than mere possession); and again, between the niggardliness of his new patrons with their dole of silver, contrasted with the enthusiastic devotion of his own followers, who having nothing but “copper,” would yet put it all at his service—having nothing but “rags,” were yet so liberal with what they had, that had they been purple, he would have been proud indeed, seeing that “a riband to stick in his coat” had proved so great an attraction.

In the second stanza the fountains of the great deep of human feeling are broken up. “Life’s night begins” suggests at once the strength of the previous attachment, and the hopelessness of the broken tie being ever knit again on earth. The best thing is to be counted enemies now, and fight against each other as gallantly as they would have fought together. At the same time there is absolute confidence in the ultimate triumph of the party of freedom—he may “menace our hearts,” but we shall “master his”—and in the ultimate recovery of the lost leader himself, whom he hopes to find “pardoned in heaven, the first by the throne.”

The supreme value of love is a constantly recurring thought in the poems of our author. We shall meet it in its higher ranges in selections to come. Here we are still in the sphere of the mere earthly affection, with only the suggestion, in contrast with the transitoriness of earthly glory, of its indestructibility.

No explanation seems needed, excepting perhaps to call attention to this, that the “little turret” in stanza 4 is not a bartizan, but a staircase turret, or it could not “mark the basement, whence a tower in ancient time sprang sublime.”

Observe, in each stanza, the striking contrast between the former and the latter half, so balanced that the poem might be divided into fourteen single or six double stanzas.

There is not much of the descriptive in the poems of our author; he is the poet, not of Nature, but of Human Nature; but when he does touch landscape, as here, it is with the hand of a master.

The following sentence, from Walter Besant, in “All Sorts and Conditions of Men,” well expresses the key-thought of this little gem of a poem: “So great is the beauty of human nature, even in its second rate or third rate productions, that love generally follows when one of the two, by confession or unconscious self-betrayal, stands revealed to the other.”

Compare also the closing stanzas of “One Word More,” especially stanza 18.

This poem was first published in “Bells and Pomegranates” under the head of “Queen Worship.” How exquisite the plea of the unnoticed Flower, with no pretence to vie with the Mountain in its claim upon the Sun’s attention, except this, that the great unchanging Mountain is “vainly favoured,” while the Flower yields itself up in ceaseless and self-forgetting devotion to an imitation, however feeble and foolish, of the great Sun Life.

The second stanza is very rich. There is no mention in it of Sun or Mountain or Flower; but as the Flower looks up to the Sun from its nook at the Mountain’s base, so Rudel yearns for “one gold look” from his Sun, the “Angel of the East.”

The meaning of the third stanza will be apparent when it is remembered that “French Rudel” was a troubadour of the 12th century—the days of the Crusades, and of the romance of chivalry. In those days the best way to communicate with the East would be through some pilgrim passing thither: and nothing would be more natural than such a reference to the “device” which he had patiently, and in spite of difficulty, worked so as to wear it as her “favour:” and once more, it is eminently natural to represent the troubadour, not as sending a written message, but as finding a sympathetic pilgrim to burden his memory with it—charging him to keep it fresh by repetition till it had been duly delivered.

This poem, published in “Jocoseria” in 1883, has no connection with “Rudel,” published in “Bells and Pomegranates” in 1842; but it will naturally follow it as “another of the same,” only with a happier ending; for though we learn from history that poor Rudel did one day reach Tripoli, it was only to die there,—let us hope still looking “to the East—the East!”

We get a glimpse here of the shifting moods of a lover’s soul. First, there are the thoughts connected with the present experience—time and place all that could be desired, but the loved one, absent, (lines 1-5); next, thoughts arising from a dark dream or foreboding of the future when he and his loved one shall meet, but under circumstances cruelly unpropitious, the house narrow, the weather stormy, unsympathetic strangers by with furtive ears and hostile eyes, and even malice in their hearts (6-11); and last, the man within him rises to shake off the horrid serpent-like dream, and look forward with a healthy hope that time and place and all will be well; or, if the house must be narrow, (compare the Latin, “res angusta domi”) it will be a Home, storms and strangers without, peace and rest within!

This is still the love of earth; but dealt with so grandly, that it is no wonder that some have understood it of the higher love, and to the question of the first line would give the answer, “God.” Nor can it be said that the thought is alien—rather is it close akin; for is not the earthly love, when pure and true, an image of the heavenly? It would be well, indeed, if love songs were oftener written in such a way as to suggest thoughts of the love of Heaven. The Bible is especially fearless in its use of the one to illustrate the other. With the higher thought in view, we are reminded of the closing lines of “The Rhyme of the Duchess May,” by Mrs. Browning—

Compare “By the Fireside,” especially stanza 39.

This poem, so exquisite in finish, well-nigh perfect in form, is one of the few works of our author, almost universally known and admired. It is doubtful, however, if all its admirers look beneath the form and finish, or understand much more of it than they do of other poems, the crabbed style of which repels admiration as strongly as this attracts it. The tender pathos of the “geranium leaf” in the first and last stanzas, touches a chord in every heart; but the thought of the piece is something far deeper and stronger, namely this, that true love is immortal, and that, therefore, however much it may fail of its object here, or even (if possible) in lives that follow this, it cannot fail for ever, it must find its object and be satisfied. It is a poem, not of the pathos of death, but of the promise of Life!

This is the proem to “La Saisiaz,” one of the most remarkable of the poet’s works, in which the doctrine of immortality is argued with a profundity of thought that has perhaps never been surpassed, even in language freed from the fetters of verse. It also appears as No. III. of “Pisgah Sights” in the second English series of selections. Both of these connections suggest the key-note.

Observe the progress in the thought. In the first stanza the soul is “fretless and free”; in the second it moves onward and upward; in the third it has reached the region of “Sunshine and Love, Sky-blue and Spring!” Similarly as to the body—in the first stanza there is the apparent victory of the grave, “dust to dust”; in the next comes the thought that, after all, the body may only be slumbering; in the last, there is the beautiful suggestion that it is only hiding where it is tenderly cared for, till

These lines appeared first as the Epilogue to the second series of Dramatic Idyls, published in 1880. In October of the same year, the poet wrote, in the Album of a young American lady, a sequel to them, which appeared (in fac-simile) in the Century Magazine of November, 1882. They are given here, with the kind consent of the publishers of that magazine:—

The true poet is he who discovers and discloses, for man’s recognition and enjoyment, the hidden beauties which abound everywhere in the great kingdom of God. These beauties may be unrecognised at first, so that the poet is not known as a poet, except to such as the speaker here is supposed to be (“I know you”). He recognises in him a star. How is it, then, that his light is hidden? The hand of God, who looks down on him from far above (“God’s glow-worm”) as I look up to him from far below (“my star”), has closed around him to keep him and his light safe till the time shall come for discovery (Stanza 3) and for recognition (4). The drawing, or simile follows, of a Tyrian fisherman (5), who brings from the great sea the common-looking little whelk, from which, by a secret process, is obtained that wonderful dye which out-dazzles art, and almost equals Nature’s most exquisite tints (6-10). While the process is going on, the world stands aloof (11); but as soon as the extract is “priced and saleable,” the commonest people (12) can recognise it and make it pay (13); while the man who fished it up remains poor and unknown to fame.

The application is made with characteristic brevity, oddity, and antithetic power: Nokes, Stokes, & Co., gorging turtle; John Keats wanting porridge!

In connection with “Popularity” should be studied “The Two Poets of Croisic,” far too long to be inserted here. An interesting comparison, also, may be made with a little poem of Tennyson’s called “The Flower,” beginning—

“The Guardian Angel” is given as a slight specimen of an important class, dealing with painting and painters. In the lovely poem, “One Word More,” Browning disclaims all ability to paint; but no one could have a more exquisite appreciation of the art.

Has the tender pathos of these verses ever been surpassed? The calm of heaven is in this thought spread out—translated into song. Let it be read in connection with Spenser’s exquisite lines, beginning “And is there care in heaven?”

“Alfred, dear friend,” is Mr. Alfred Domett, who was then Prime Minister of New Zealand, at which far end of the world the Wairoa rolls to the sea.

This is a “gem of purest ray.” In order to understand it fully, it is necessary to know that the “group by Woolner” is of two deaf and dumb children—the one as if speaking, the other in the attitude of listening. The speech denied passage through the lips, breaks out in rarer beauty from the eyes; and for the hearing denied entrance by the ears, there is, instead, a subtle responsiveness of brow and cheek to the spirit utterance from the soul of the other; so that love, though “vexed,” is not suppressed.

The exquisite beauty of the illustration of “the prism’s obstruction,” and the tender pathos of the thought, will be manifest to every reader.

Having given specimen poems dealing with the arts of poetry, painting, and sculpture, we add one on the subject of music, which, though difficult to understand fully, has beauties which are apparent even to those who do not enter into its deepest thought. Vogler is not known as a composer of the first rank, having left no works behind him which entitle him to a place among the great masters; but, for this very reason, he is better suited for 66the poet’s purpose, which is to deal with music, not as represented by printed notes, but as existing for the moment in all its perfection, and at once melting away into silence and apparent nothingness. It is as extemporizer, not as author, he is chosen, and as Abbé (Ger. Abt) he appropriately thinks of those deep spiritual truths on which the loftier hopes of the latter part of the poem are founded.

The musician “has been extemporizing,”—pouring out his whole soul through the keys of his organ, and from that state of ecstasy he suddenly awakes and cries out, “Would that the structure brave, the manifold music I build ... might tarry!” It has been no mere “volume,” but a “palace” of sound. As Solomon (according to the well-known legend) summoned all spirits from above and from below, and all creatures of the earth, to build him a palace at once, so by a touch, “calling the keys to their work,” he has summoned demons of the bass, angels of the treble, earth creatures of the middle tones, who, by eager and tumultuous and yet harmoniously united efforts, have caused “the pinnacled glory” to “rush into sight” (stanzas 1-3).

Into sight? There was far more in it than could be seen. As the soul of the musician ascended from earth, heaven descended on him; its stars crowned his work; its moons, its suns were close beside him—“there was no more near nor far” (4). And the boundaries of time, as well as the limits of space, were gone. The absolute, the perfect was reached; and to this palace of perfection had flocked “presences plain in the place,” from the far Future and from the mystic Past. “There was no more sea”—no more distance or separation—all one, together, perfect (5). Reached how? Through music—the only one of the arts that leads into the region of the absolute and perfect, its effects not springing from causes the operation of which can be traced, and the law of their production defined, but responding directly to the will, even as creation responded to the fiat of God. Out of such simple elements can that be evoked, which should lead those who “consider” these things to “bow the head” (6, 7).

But was it only for a moment? Is it gone? Forever? (8).

I turn to God, and know it cannot be. Then follows that glorious passage, one of the finest in any language, every word of which should be studied, beginning—“There shall never be one lost good!” on to the end of stanza 11, which is the true climax of the poem.

The last stanza may be compared to the closing one of “Saul.” It is the return from the empyrean to the plain of common life. Let some musical friend show how at the cadence of a very grand piece he would feel his way 67down the chromatic scale, and then pause on that poignant discord, known as “the minor ninth,” effecting, as it were, a separation (“alien ground”) from the heights just descended, and giving thus the opportunity of looking up once more before a resting-place is found in “the common chord,”—“the C major of this life.”

This is a poem which should be read over and over till the music of it has fairly entered the soul.

It has become common now to speak slightingly of those representations of heaven which make large use of music to give them body in our thought, as if the idea intended to be conveyed were that the joy of heaven was to consist in an endless idle singing, a concert without a finale; but this easy criticism is surely too disregardful of the distinctive feature of music so strikingly set forth in this poem—viz., that it is the only one of the arts which while strongly appealing to sense, yet in its essence belongs to the realm of the unseen, so that it is in fact the only symbol within the range of man’s experience which can even suggest the absolute, the perfect, the pure heavenly.

The following passage, from the “Memorials of Frances Ridley Havergal,” (p. 151) is so strikingly illustrative of “Abt Vogler,” that we cannot forbear quoting it:—

“In the train I had one of those curious musical visions which only very rarely visit me. I hear strange and very beautiful chords, generally full, slow and grand, succeeding each other in most interesting sequences. I do not invent them, I could not; they pass before my mind, and I only listen. Now and then my will seems aroused when I see ahead how some fine resolution might follow, and I seem to will that certain chords should come, and then they do come; but then my will seems suspended again, and they go on quite independently. It is so interesting, the chords seem to fold over each other, and die away down into music of infinite softness, and then they unfold and open out, as if great curtains were being withdrawn one after another, widening the view, till, with a gathering power and intensity and fulness, it seems as if the very skies were being opened out before one, and a sort of great blaze and glory of music, such as my outward ears never heard, gradually swells out in perfectly sublime splendour. This time there was an added feature; I seemed to hear depths and heights of sound beyond the scale which human ears can receive, keen, far-up octaves, like vividly twinkling starlight of music, and mighty slow vibrations of gigantic strings going down into grand thunders of depths, octaves below anything otherwise appreciable as musical notes. Then, all at once, it seemed as if my soul had got a new sense, and I could see this inner music as well as hear it; and then it was like gazing down into marvellous abysses of sound, and up into dazzling regions of what, to the eye, would have been light and colour, but to this new sense was sound.”

“Men and Women,” a collection of fifty poems, first published in 1855, is probably the best known of our author’s numerous volumes. Some of the very finest of his work is in it. To this collection “One Word More” 76is an appendix, in the form of a dedication of the fifty poems to his wife, Elizabeth Barrett Browning. As we learn from stanza 13, this work differs from all others in having been dashed off, the first time of writing being also the last time; and yet (such is the inspiration of love) it stands with the very highest of his works. It needs careful reading, but presents no such difficulties as “Abt Vogler.”

Rafael, painter for the world, becomes for once a poet for his dearest. If only these wonderful sonnets could be found, how we should prize them; but the volume is hopelessly lost (stanzas 2-4).

Dante, poet for the world, prepares for once to paint an angel for his dearest. But, alas! he is hindered by the breaking in of some “people of importance” of the city, the sort of people who served as character models for “the folk of his Inferno” (5-7).

There would evidently be less of art and more of nature in such an outpouring of soul; and, therefore, the true artist would long to do it “once, and only once, and for one only.” “The man’s joy” would be found in the mere utterance of his soul to his dearest, without any thought of art, which, to the true artist, lifts so high an ideal that his shortcoming is always a “sorrow” (8).

So is it with the prophet, the exercise of whose high calling can never be dissociated from its burdens and cares (9). If he dared, which he may not (10), how gladly for the one that he loved would he “put off the prophet” and provide water, not by the forth putting of power, but simply as the man, through the self-denial of love (11).

Browning himself has only the one art, so cannot leave his poetry to paint, or carve, or “make music” (12); but as the nearest equivalent possible to him will write “once, and only once, and for one only,” a purely extemporaneous production (13), which shall not, like his other works, be dramatic in principle, but spoken in his own “true person” (14).

Then follows the wonderful moon illustration, so marvellously wrought out, based upon the familiar astronomical fact that, through all her phases and movements she always presents exactly the same face to the earth (15), the other remaining entirely concealed (“unseen of herdsman, huntsman, steersman,” &c.), and therefore available as a new revelation (who knows of what grandeur?) for the loved and specially-favoured mortal (16).

The application of the illustration in stanzas 17 and 18 is exquisitely beautiful, as is the gem-like quatrain with which the poem closes.

[The three selections which fill up the rest of this little volume are given as specimens of the distinctively Christian poems of our author. The first gives us Christ in the Old Testament; the second, Christ in the New; the third, Christianity in its essential truth and practical application. As only a portion of “Saul” can be given, a few words will be necessary to prepare the reader unacquainted with the whole for taking up the thread at the 14th stanza, from which, in the selection, the poem is continued uninterruptedly to the end.]

Young David is telling over to himself (see “my voice to my heart,” in stanza 14) the story of his mission to Saul, when, as an inspired poet-musician, he charmed the evil spirit away from him. Stanza 16, consisting of one line, is the hinge of the entire poem; for David has just reached the point where, after several unsuccessful, or very partially successful, attempts—first, by playing one and another and another tune, which might awaken some chord in the apathetic spirit of the king, and then by singing, accompanied by the harp, first, of the joy of life, then of the splendid results of a royal life like Saul’s in the great future of the world—he at last, the truth coming upon him, strikes the high key where full relief is found. As he approaches this crisis in the tale, he cannot go on without an earnest invocation for help to tell what he had been so wonderfully led to sing:—

Stanza 14.—Observe the meeting of the human and divine in the poet-prophet’s inspiration. As poet, his powers were in their fullest exercise, and still there was an unfathomable heaven of the unknown above him, till “one lift of Thy hand cleared that distance.”

The close of this stanza sets before us the scene of the writing of this reminiscence.

Stanza 15.—The soothing influence of the singing begins to appear. Be sure to keep in mind the picture, so wonderfully illustrated, of the attitude of the two; and mark the words of David, “All my heart how it loved 86him,” connecting them carefully with the next stanza (16), “Then the truth came upon me.” It is only to the earnestly-loving heart that such a revelation of God could be given. “God is Love, and he that loveth not knoweth not God.” Observe, also, in this short stanza the effect of the intense earnestness of his soul, leading him to lay aside his harp and cease his singing, and simply break out in impassioned speech.

Stanza 17.—Shall God be infinitely above his creature man, in all faculties except one, and that “the greatest of all,” viz., Love? (Note, in passing, the exquisite beauty of the lines: “With that stoop of the soul which in bending upraises it too,” and “As by each new obeisance in spirit, I climb to his feet.” The passage immediately following this line is of course ironical at his own expense, which is indicated by the parenthetical “I laugh as I think”; as if to say “how utterly foolish the thought that such a wide province, such a grand gift, as Love, should be mine quite apart from God, the great Ruler and Giver of all!”)

Stanza 18.—Impossible! God is the giver: all that I have—Love, as well as everything else—is from him; I can wish, but cannot will the thing I would; but God can, therefore God will; his love cannot be frustrated as mine is; it must even for such as “Saul, the failure, the ruin he seems now,” find Salvation; being infinite it must have its will, and find a way, however hard it be (see the striking line “it is by no breath,” &c.); and there it is! See the Christ stand!

Remember carefully the position as explained in the 15th stanza as you read the magnificent climax, beginning—

observe also the effect of the spondee with which stanza 18 closes, instead of the usual anapæst; it gives wonderful dignity and strength to the thought. The same effect is produced several times in the early part of the poem by the same means, but nowhere with such power as in this, the grand climax.

What a contrast here to the petty mechanical notions of inspiration which have so often degraded the loftiest subject of human thought; and how marvellously is the presence and the power of the Unseen on such a soul as David’s imaged forth in the lines of the closing stanza, in words which seem almost to utter the unutterable.

This most interesting and beautiful poem will afford a good illustration of one of the cases of difficulty referred to in the Introduction. The reader is placed in the position of one who has just found this Arabian epistle, and must decipher and interpret it without any extraneous aid.

First comes, according to Eastern custom, the name (line 1), then the address (7), with the greeting (15), and mention of articles sent with the letter—all in true Eastern style—with such adjuncts as give a general idea of the school of physiology and medicine to which the writer belongs.

The twenty-first letter had ended at Jericho, and here, accordingly, the twenty-second begins. The date appears as we read on, marked by the expedition of Vespasian and his son Titus against Jerusalem. When Bethany is mentioned, our interest is awakened, and we wonder what is coming; but to the writer Bethany has no such associations, as is indicated by the light and jocular way in which he marks its distance from Jerusalem, and carelessly proceeds to record the observations it is his main business to make wherever he goes.

Further on, however, we discover that there is something of importance weighing on his mind, which makes him hesitate and debate as to the trustworthiness 98of the messenger he intends to employ; while, at the same time, he is evidently ashamed to tell his master what is troubling him. This accounts for his abruptly ending his letter (determining, for the moment, to say nothing about it); then, unable to refrain, beginning again, yet still trying to conceal the depth of his feeling, and to apologize for what appears in spite of himself.

A long account of the case follows. By this time the reader has begun to have a pretty good idea who “the man” is that “had something in the look of him,” and knows that it is a veritable case of one raised from the dead. But Karshish cannot, of course, except under strong compulsion, be expected to take this view; and, accordingly, he begins by looking at it in a strictly professional light—“’Tis but a case of mania,” &c. He naturally supposes that his master will set it down as an ordinary instance of hallucination: “Such cases are diurnal, thou wilt cry.” Then he mentions points which strike him as altogether peculiar, certain features of the “after life” which are quite inconsistent with the idea of mania. Instead of being the worse for his mania, this man is immeasurably the better. Could Karshish and his master but penetrate the secret, what physicians they would be! The scene when Lazarus is brought in by the Elders of his tribe—who regard him as a madman, because he is living a life so far above anything they can understand—is inimitable.

In the illustration of the beggar suddenly become rich, Karshish lets out at last that he suspects there must be some truth in the man’s story. His patient, he observes, now measures things with no earthly measure, seeing often the small in the great and the great in the small; looking at everything “with larger, other eyes than ours”; accepting with perfect equanimity the very greatest sorrow, yet filled with alarm at the least gesture or look which gives token of sin, because to him it was like trifling with a match over a mine of Greek fire!

In the next illustration, of the thread of life across an orb of glory, the writer seems to get still fuller insight into the reality of the case—the little thread being, of course, the poor life in Bethany, and the vast orb of glory, the great eternity of God, in which Lazarus was consciously living. And here, again, we have the same lesson as in “The Boy and the Angel.” Though conscious of the glory of the great orb, Lazarus does not despise the little duties belonging to the thread of his earthly life. He sedulously follows his trade whereby he earns his daily bread; indeed, the special 99characteristic of the man is “prone submission to the Heavenly will.” Mark the profound suggestiveness of the lines—

He is so calm as to be provoking. At his inquisitor’s burst of indignation, he shows no sign of anger or impatience—“He merely looked with his large eyes on me.” And yet no apathy about him; a man full of loving interest in all things. (Compare Coleridge’s well-known lines: “He prayeth best who loveth best,” &c.)

The paragraph which follows introduces us to a region familiar and sacred to us, but foreign and inexplicable to our physician, who refers to it from his own point of view, stigmatizing the claim of “the Nazarene who wrought this cure” as not only false, but monstrous; and yet—and yet—and yet—he cannot get over it; it haunts him. But still he is ashamed to acknowledge it, and so turns abruptly from what he affects to call “trivial matters” to “things of price,” like “blue-flowering borage”!

Then he gives another elaborate apology, and tries to account for the hold the phenomenon has taken of him by a reference to his state of body and surroundings when first he met this Lazarus; and, accordingly, professing to care little whether the letter reaches or not, again he closes.

Yet still he cannot rest. The great thought haunts him. “The very God! think, Abib.” Then follows that consummate passage with which this magnificent poem closes.

After this “Epistle” should by all means be read “A Death in the Desert,” too long and too difficult to be inserted here. The surprise awaiting the reader of the parchment “supposed of Pamphylax the Antiochene” will add to the interest of a poem so full of beauty and power.

CHRISTMAS-EVE.

Between Christmas-Eve and Easter-Morn lies the earth history of the Incarnate Son of God. Into the shadows of our world He came; and, after a brief night amid its darkness, rose again into the light of heaven. These titles then may well include the whole substance of Christianity. Christmas suggests the thought of heaven come down to earth; Easter, of earth raised up to heaven. “Christmas-Eve” leads naturally to the contemplation of the Christian Faith; “Easter-Day,” to the contemplation of the Christian Life.

Each poem turns on an impressive natural phenomenon which suggests the blending of heaven and earth—the one, of the night, a lunar rainbow; the other, of the dawn, the aurora borealis.

The speaker (who is the same throughout the former poem) begins his Christmas-Eve experiences with the flock assembling in “Zion Chapel,” a congregation of rude, unlettered people, worshipping with heart and soul indeed, but with little mind and less taste. It is not from choice that he is there. It is a stormy night of wind and rain, from which he has taken shelter in the “lath and plaster entry” of the little meeting house.

In the same light and humorous, half irreverent style, he proceeds to a somewhat detailed description of the people and their uncouth worship—not altogether a caricature, but evidently wanting in that sympathy with the good at the heart of it, the thought of which was afterwards so strongly borne in upon his soul. So, he “very soon had enough of it,” and gladly “flung out of the little chapel” “into the fresh night air again.”

Then follows a long and rather abstruse passage, leading up to the following lofty and inspiring conclusion:—

The lunar rainbow, so wonderfully described in the next stanza, is the occasion and point of departure of the poetic vision or ecstasy which occupies the remainder of the poem—

He did see One emerging from the glory—

The confession of his sin in despising His friends in the little chapel is speedily followed by a gracious token of forgiveness:—

His sin thus purged (how exquisitely wrought out the lovely simile of the sun-cleansed wool!), he is “caught up in the whirl and drift of the vesture’s amplitude,” and thus clinging to the garment’s hem, is carried across land and sea—to a scene so complete a contrast to the one he has just left that he is confused, and some time elapses before he discovers that he is in front of St. Peter’s at Rome:—

There follows a description of the worship in the great cathedral—not now, as before, unsympathetic and merely critical, but giving evidence of the liveliest appreciation of the feelings of the intelligent and devout ritualist, as in the following passage:—

Still he cannot enter into it. He is left outside the door. Distracted with conflicting emotions, his reason repelled by the superstition, his spirit attracted by the lofty devotion which he discovers at the heart of the too gorgeous ritual—he cannot make up his mind whether he should join them for the one reason, or shun them for the other—

The remainder of the stanza is taken up with a most eloquent, but somewhat difficult passage, illustrating the triumph of the new Love over the old Culture. In the following stanza he makes up his mind that he “will feast his love, then depart elsewhere, that his intellect may find its share”; so the next transition, by the same mode of rapture, is to a German University. What he sees there provokes again his latent humour:—

The stanza which follows gives an account of the discourse, which is a learned discussion of “this Myth of Christ,” “which, when reason had strained and abated it of foreign matter, left, for residuum, a man!—a right true man,” but nothing more. He has no difficulty in determining his duty here (“this time He would not bid me enter.”) The religious atmosphere in which Papist and Dissenter live may be far from pure, in the one case for one reason, and in the other for the opposite; but either of the two is immeasurably better than the vacuum left when the Critic has done his work of destruction. Then follows a long argument to show the unreasonableness of denying the divinity of Christ, only a part of which can be given here.

Reasonings that grow out of the main discussion are continued throughout stanzas 17-20, till once more he is caught up and carried back to his original starting point. The remainder of the poem can now be given without interruption, and will be readily understood. (The exquisite development of the simile of the cup and the water will be specially noted, as also the charitable wish so strikingly expressed on behalf of the poor Professor, that before the end comes he may know Christ as “the God of salvation.”)

As Christmas-Eve has suggested the subject of the Christian Faith, Easter-Day gives occasion to a discussion concerning the Christian Life—the life of those who are “risen with Christ.” The poem is in substance a conversation or discussion between two persons, one of whom (a thorough Christian) finds it very hard, while the other (who takes a much lower and more common-place view of spiritual things) thinks it quite easy, to be a Christian. It is not, however, in the form of a conversation. As usual in Browning’s work, one speaks, stating his own views and quoting the other’s, which are therefore distinguished from his own (except when he quotes, as he sometimes does, from himself) by quotation marks. The argument is too abstruse to be followed out in all its ramifications; but enough of it can be given to render quite intelligible the extracts from it which we find it possible to give. The opening sentence will give the theme:—

After some preliminary discussion about faith in its relation to life, the easy-going friend takes this position:—

123The stanza which follows gives the speaker’s answer, ending with this striking passage:—

To which the other replies by reproaching him for ingratitude to God, who really asks us to give up nothing that is good, but only to observe such moderation in our pleasures that life is all the more enjoyable, while sorrow almost disappears, transfigured in the light of love. This answer has such a ring of the true metal in it, that the speaker begins his rejoinder with the question, “Do you say this, or I?” and then proceeds (in a passage of wonderful power) to expose the superficiality of the view he is endeavouring to support.

The counsel was, to choose by all means the safe side, by giving up everything as literally as did the martyrs in the early days of persecution; at which a shudder of doubt comes over him, and he answers (note the very remarkable illustration of the moles and the grasshoppers):—

His friend now reproaches him with the thanklessness of the task he is undertaking, in trying to so little purpose to disturb the peace of a man who has no such high-flown views of duty; whereupon he relates to him a wonderful experience he had on Easter-morn three years before:—

127To this solemn question a friendly answer seems to come from Common Sense, assuring him that all would be right; for, though his ship might not sail very grandly into the eternal haven, it was enough if, in whatever state of wreck, it arrived at all; which leads him to utter the deepest wish and expectation of his heart:—

The next stanza gives the famous description of the fiery aurora, when even “the south firmament with north-fire did its wings refledge!” (Compare description of lunar rainbow in “Christmas-Eve.”) He feels sure that his wish is realized, and the Judgment Day has come!

As in “Christmas-Eve,” the question rises of a Presence in the awful scene.

Then follows the Sentence, excluding him from the heaven of spirit, and leaving him to the world of sense, hopeless for ever of anything higher—a sentence which seemed to him at first to be rather a reward than a punishment, as he thought of “earth’s resources—vast exhaustless beauty, endless change of wonder!” Even a fern-leaf a museum in itself!

The answer of the Voice to this shallow thought leads us into the very loftiest regions of the imagination, suggesting views of the future of the redeemed which make the soul thrill with eager expectancy—

At this answer “sharp despairs shot through” him, at the thought of what he had missed; but on reflection he finds comfort in the prospect of the possibilities of Art. Again the inexorable voice is heard, pronouncing loss unspeakable. Even if he could be a Michelangelo (Buonarroti), it would be only the initial earthly stage of his development that was possible for him. (The whole passage is magnificent; but perhaps the exquisitely wrought-out illustration of the lizard in its narrow rock-chamber will be most enjoyed.)

The poem proceeds in the same lofty strain, till—humbled to the dust at the thought of the unutterable folly of his choice, especially in view of the love of God expressed on Calvary, a love which he had slighted in the happy days gone by—he presents the touching plea of the 31st stanza, the result of which appears in what follows, spoken of by Professor Kirkman of Cambridge, as “the splendid consummation of Easter-Day so closely resembling the well-known crisis in Faust.”

In order to create a permanent library of useful and standard books for the homes of our C. L. S. C. members, and to reduce the expense of the Seal courses, we have organized the Chautauqua Press.

The first issues of the Chautauqua Press will be “The Garnet Series,” four volumes in the general line of the “required readings” for the coming year, as follows:—

This volume contains chapters from Ruskin on “The Poetry of Architecture,” “The Cottage—English, French, and Italian,” “The Villa—Italian,” and “St. Mark’s,” from “Stones of Venice.”

This volume contains Lord Macaulay’s Essays on “Dante,” “Petrarch,” and “Machiavelli,” “Lays of Ancient Rome,” and “Pompeii.”

This volume contains lectures on “Decorative Art, Form, Color, Dress, and Needlework,” “Fine Arts,” “Sculpture,” “Architecture,” “Painting.”

Any graduate or undergraduate of the C. L. S. C. reading the four volumes of the Chautauqua Library Garnet Series will be entitled to the new Garnet Seal (University Seal) on his diploma.

These volumes are designed as much for the general market as for members of the C. L. S. C., and will form the nucleus of a valuable library of standard literature.

Address

Page vi, ‘implicity’ changed to ‘implicitly,’ “explicitly or implicitly affirmed”

Page 13, apostrophe inserted before ‘Twas,’ “’Twas moonset at starting”

Page 15, single quote changed to double quote before ‘How,’ ““How they’ll greet us!”

Page 42, comma changed to full stop after ‘chivalry,’ “of chivalry. In those days”

Page 50, double quote inserted after ‘awhile,’ “since, and lost awhile.””

Page 51, single quote changed to double quote before ‘Touch,’ ““Touch him ne’er so”

Page 54, full stop inserted after ‘shone,’ “his presence shone.”

Page 61, full stop inserted after ‘sight,’ “soul was in sight.”

Page 67, double quote inserted after ‘sound,’ “new sense was sound.””

Page 77, full stop inserted after ‘end,’ “uninterruptedly to the end.”

Page 81, single quote changed to double quote before ‘Here,’ ““Here, the creature”

Page 108, quoting regularized in stanza VIII.

Page 122, single quote inserted before ‘My,’ “‘My list of coleoptera!”

Page 133, ‘omipotence’ changed to ‘omnipotence,’ “Like the omnipotence which”