Men and Women by Robert Browning (best books to read TXT) 📖

Cardinal Wiseman on <Blougram>—<i.e.>, himself. It was in the <Rambler>, a Catholic journal of those days, and certified to be his by Father Prout, who said nobody else would have dared put it in." This review praises the poem for its "fertility of illustration and felicity of argument," and says that "though utterly mistaken in the very groundwork of religion, though starting from the most unworthy notions of the work of a Catholic bishop, and defending a self-indulgence every honest man must feel to be disgraceful, [it] is yet in its way triumphant."

6. Brother Pugin: (1810-1852), an eminent English architect, who, becoming a Roman Catholic, designed many structures for that Church.

34. Corpus Christi Day: Thursday after Trinity Sunday, when the Feast of the Sacrament of the Altar is celebrated.

45. Che: what.

54. Count D' Orsay: (1798-1852), a clever Frenchman, distinguished as a man of fashion, and for his drawings of horses.

113. Parma's pride, the 'Jerome . . . Correggio . . . the Modenese: the picture of Saint Jerome in the Ducal Academy at Parma, by Correggio, who was born in the territory of Modena, Italy.

184. A chorus-ending from Euripides: the Greek dramatist, Euripides (480 B. C.- 406 B. C.), frequently ended his choruses with this thought—sometimes with slight variations in expression: "The Gods perform many things contrary to our expectations, and those things which we looked for are not accomplished; but God hath brought to pass things unthought of."

316. Peter's . . . or rather, Hildebrand's: the claim of Hildebrand, Pope Gregory VII (1073-1085) for temporal power and authority exceeding Saint Peter's, the founder of the Roman Church.

411. Schelling: the German philosopher (1775-1854).

472. Austrian marriage: the marriage of Marie Louise, daughter of the Emperor of Austria, to Napoleon I.

475. Austerlitz: fought with success by Napoleon, in 1805, against the coalition of Austria, Russia, and England, and resulting in the alliance mentioned with Austria and fresh overtures to the Papal power and the old French nobility.

514. Trimmest house in Stratford: New Place, a mansion in the heart of the town, built for Sir Hugh Clopton, and known for two centuries as his "great house," bought with nearly an acre of ground by Shakespeare, in 1597.

516. Giulio Romano: Italian painter (1492-1546), referred to in "Winter's Tale," v. ii. 105. —Dowland: English musician, praised for his lute-playing in a sonnet in "The Passionate Pilgrim," attributed to Shakespeare.

519. "Pandulph," etc.: quotation from "King John," iii. i. 138.

568. Luther: Martin (1483-1546), whose enthusiasm reformed the Church.

577. Strauss: (1808-1874), one of the Tuebingen philosophers, author of a Rationalistic "Life of Jesus."

626. "What think ye," etc.: Matthew 22.42.

664. Ichors o'er the place: ichor=serum, which exudes where the skin is broken, coats the hurt, and facilitates its healing.

667. Snake 'neath Michael's foot: Rafael's picture in the Louvre of Saint Michael slaying the dragon.

703. Brother Newman: John Henry (1801-1890), leader of the
Tractarian movement at Oxford, which approached the doctrines of the
Roman Church. The last (90th) tract was entirely written by him.
The Bishop of Oxford was called upon to stop the series, and in 1845
Dr. Newman entered the Romish Church.

715. King Bomba: means King Puffcheek, King Liar, a sobriquet given to Ferdinand II, late king of the Two Sicilies. —Lazzaroni: Naples beggars, so called from the Lazarus of the Parable, Luke 16.20.

716. Antonelli: Cardinal, secretary of Pope Pius IX.

728. Naples' liquefaction: the supposed miracle of the liquefaction of the blood of Saint Januarius the Martyr. A small quantity of it is preserved in a crystal reliquary in the great church at Naples, and when brought into the presence of the head of the saint, it melts.

732. Decrassify: make less crass or gross.

744. Fichte: (1761-1814), celebrated German metaphysician, who defined God as the "moral order of the universe."

877. "<Pastor est tui Dominus>": the Lord is your shepherd.

915. Anacreon: Greek lyric poet of the sixth century B. C.

972. <In partibus Episcopus>, etc.: "In countries where the Roman Catholic faith is not regularly established, as it was not in England before the time of Cardinal Wiseman, there were no bishops of sees in the kingdom itself, but they took their titles from heathen lands."

CLEON

"As certain also of your own poets have said"—

1855

Cleon the poet (from the sprinkled isles,
Lily on lily, that o'erlace the sea,
And laugh their pride when the light wave lisps "Greece")—
To Protus in his Tyranny: much health!

   They give thy letter to me, even now:
I read and seem as if I heard thee speak.
The master of thy galley still unlades
Gift after gift; they block my court at last
And pile themselves along its portico
Royal with sunset, like a thought of thee: 10
And one white she-slave from the group dispersed
Of black and white slaves (like the chequer-work
Pavement, at once my nation's work and gift,
Now covered with this settle-down of doves),
One lyric woman, in her crocus vest
Woven of sea-wools, with her two white hands
Commends to me the strainer and the cup
Thy lip hath bettered ere it blesses mine.

   Well-counselled, king, in thy munificence!
For so shall men remark, in such an act 20
Of love for him whose song gives life its joy,
Thy recognition of the use of life;
Nor call thy spirit barely adequate
To help on life in straight ways, broad enough
For vulgar souls, by ruling and the rest.
Thou, in the daily building of thy tower—
Whether in fierce and sudden spasms of toil,
Or through dim lulls of unapparent growth,
Or when the general work 'mid good acclaim
Climbed with the eye to cheer the architect— 30
Didst ne'er engage in work for mere work's sake—
Hadst ever in thy heart the luring hope
Of some eventual rest a-top of it,
Whence, all the tumult of the building hushed,
Thou first of men mightst look out to the East:
The vulgar saw thy tower, thou sawest the sun.
For this, I promise on thy festival
To pour libation, looking o'er the sea,
Making this slave narrate thy fortunes, speak
Thy great words, and describe thy royal face— 40
Wishing thee wholly where Zeus lives the most,
Within the eventual element of calm.

   Thy letter's first requirement meets me here.
It is as thou hast heard: in one short life
I, Cleon, have effected all those things
Thou wonderingly dost enumerate.
That epos on thy hundred plates of gold
Is mine—and also mine the little chant,
So sure to rise from every fishing-bark
When, lights at prow, the seamen haul their net. 50
The image of the sun-god on the phare,
Men turn from the sun's self to see, is mine;
The Poecile, o'er-storied its whole length,
As thou didst hear, with painting, is mine too.
I know the true proportions of a man
And woman also, not observed before;
And I have written three books on the soul,
Proving absurd all written hitherto,
And putting us to ignorance again.
For music—why, I have combined the moods, 60
Inventing one. In brief, all arts are mine;
Thus much the people know and recognize,
Throughout our seventeen islands. Marvel not.
We of these latter days, with greater mind
Than our forerunners, since more composite,
Look not so great, beside their simple way,
To a judge who only sees one way at once,
One mind-point and no other at a time—
Compares the small part of a man of us
With some whole man of the heroic age, 70
Great in his way—not ours, nor meant for ours.
And ours is greater, had we skill to know:
For, what we call this life of men on earth,
This sequence of the soul's achievements here
Being, as I find much reason to conceive,
Intended to be viewed eventually.
As a great whole, not analyzed to parts,
But each part having reference to all—
How shall a certain part, pronounced complete,
Endure effacement by another part? 80
Was the thing done?—then, what's to do again?
See, in the chequered pavement opposite,
Suppose the artist made a perfect rhomb,
And next a lozenge, then a trapezoid—
He did not overlay them, superimpose
The new upon the old and blot it out,
But laid them on a level in his work,
Making at last a picture; there it lies.
So, first the perfect separate forms were made,
The portions of mankind; and after, so, 90
Occurred the combination of the same.
For where had been a progress, otherwise?
Mankind, made up of all the single men—
In such a synthesis the labor ends.
Now mark me! those divine men of old time
Have reached, thou sayest well, each at one point
The outside verge that rounds our faculty;
And where they reached, who can do more than reach?
It takes but little water just to touch
At some one point the inside of a sphere, 100
And, as we turn the sphere, touch all the rest
In due succession: but the finer air
Which not so palpably nor obviously,
Though no less universally, can touch
The whole circumference of that emptied sphere,
Fills it more fully than the water did;
Holds thrice the weight of water in itself
Resolved into a subtler element.
And yet the vulgar call the sphere first full
Up to the visible height—and after, void; 110
Not knowing air's more hidden properties.
And thus our soul, misknown, cries out to Zeus
To vindicate his purpose in our life:
Why stay we on the earth unless to grow?
Long since, I imaged, wrote the fiction out,
That he or other god descended here
And, once for all, showed simultaneously
What, in its nature, never can be shown,
Piecemeal or in succession;—showed, I say,
The worth both absolute and relative 120
Of all his children from the birth of time,
His instruments for all appointed work.
I now go on to image—might we hear
The judgment which should give the due to each,
Show where the labor lay and where the ease,
And prove Zeus' self, the latent everywhere!
This is a dream;—but no dream, let us hope,
That years and days, the summers and the springs,
Follow each other with unwaning powers.
The grapes which dye thy wine are richer far, 130
Through culture, than the wild wealth of the rock;
The wave plum than the savage-tasted drupe;
The pastured honey-bee drops choicer sweet;
The flowers turn double, and the leaves turn flowers;
That young and tender crescent-moon, thy slave,
Sleeping above her robe as buoyed by clouds,
Refines upon the women of my youth.
What, and the soul alone deteriorates?
I have not chanted verse like Homer, no—
Nor swept string like Terpander, no—nor carved 140
And painted men like Phidias and his friend;
I am not great as they are, point by point.
But I have entered into sympathy
With these four, running these into one soul,
Who, separate, ignored each other's art.
Say, is it nothing that I know them all?
The wild flower was the larger; I have dashed
Rose-blood upon its petals, pricked its cup's
Honey with wine, and driven its seed to fruit,
And show a better flower if not so large: 150
I stand myself. Refer this to the gods
Whose gift alone it is! which, shall I dare
(All pride apart) upon the absurd pretext
That such a gift by chance lay in my hand,
Discourse of lightly or depreciate?
It might have fallen to another's hand: what then?
I pass too surely: let at least truth stay!

   And next, of what thou