Chapter III: Introduction (3)

2. Lucrezia: di Baccio del Fede, a cap-maker's widow, says Vasari, who ensnared Andrea "before her husband's death, and who delighted in trapping the hearts of men."

15. Fiesole: a hillside city on the Arno, three miles west of Florence.

93. Morello: the highest of the Apennine mountains north of Florence.

105. The Urbinate: Raphael Santi (1483-1520), so called because born
at Urbino.

106. Vasari: painter and writer of the "Lives of the Most Excellent Italian Painters," which supplied Browning with material for this poem and for "Fra Lippo."

130. Agnolo: Michel Agnolo Buonarotti, painter, sculptor, and 1architect (1475-564).

149. Francis: Francis I of France (1494-1547), who invited Andrea to his Court at Fontainebleau, where he was loaded with gifts and honors, until, says Vasari, "came to him certain letters from Florence written to him by his wife . . . with bitter complaints," when, taking "the money which the king confided to him for the purchase of pictures and statues, . . . he set off . . . having sworn on the Gospels to return in a few months. Arrived in Florence, he lived joyously with his wife for some time, making presents to her father and sisters, but doing nothing for his own parents, who died in poverty and misery. When the period specified by the king had come . . . he found himself at the end not only of his own money but . . . of that of the king."

184. Agnolo . . . to Rafael: Angelo's remark is given thus by Bocchi, "Bellezze di Firenze"; "There is a bit of a manikin in Florence who, if he chanced to be employed in great undertakings as you have happened to be, would compel you to look well about you."

210. Cue-owls: the owl's cry gives it its common name in various languages and countries; the peculiarity of its cry as to the predominant sound of oo or ow naming the species. This Italian <a`>ulo> is probably the <Bubo>, of the same family as our cat-owl. Buffon gives its note, <he-hoo>, <boo-hoo>; hence the Latin name, <Bubo>.

241. Scudi: Italian coins.

261. The New Jerusalem: Revelation 21.15-17.

263. Leonard: Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), painter, sculptor, architect, and engineer, who, together with Rafael and Agnolo, incarnates the genius of the Renaissance. He visited the same Court to which Andrea was invited, and was said to have died in the arms of Francis I.

THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB AT SAINT PRAXED'S CHURCH

ROME, 15-

1845

Vanity, saith the preacher, vanity! Draw round my bed: is Anselm keeping back? Nephews--sons mine . . . ah God, I know not! Well-- She, men would have to be your mother once, Old Gandolf envied me, so fair she was! What's done is done, and she is dead beside, Dead long ago, and I am Bishop since, And as she died so must we die ourselves, And thence ye may perceive the world's a dream. Life, how and what is it? As here I lie 10 In this state-chamber, dying by degrees, Hours and long hours in the dead night, I ask "Do I live, am I dead?" Peace, peace seems all. Saint Praxed's ever was the church for peace; And so, about this tomb of mine. I fought With tooth and nail to save my niche, ye know: --Old Gandolf cozened me, despite my care; Shrewd was that snatch from out the corner South He graced his carrion with. God curse the same! Yet still my niche is not so cramped but thence 20 One sees the pulpit o' the epistle-side, And somewhat of the choir, those silent seats, And up into the aery dome where live The angels, and a sunbeam's sure to lurk; And I shall fill my slab of basalt there, And 'neath my tabernacle take my rest, With those nine columns round me, two and two, The odd one at my feet where Anselm stands: Peach-blossom marble all, the rare, the ripe As fresh-poured red wine of a mighty pulse. 30 --Old Gandolf with his paltry onion-stone, Put me where I may look at him! True peach, Rosy and flawless: how I earned the prize! Draw close: that conflagration of my church --What then? So much was saved if aught were missed! My sons, ye would not be my death? Go dig The white-grape vineyard where the oil-press stood, Drop water gently till the surface sink, And if ye find . . . Ah God, I know not, I! . . . Bedded in store of rotten fig-leaves soft, 40 And corded up in a tight olive-frail, Some lump, ah God, of <lapis lazuli>, Big as a Jew's head cut off at the nape, Blue as a vein o'er the Madonna's breast . . . Sons, all have I bequeathed you, villas, all, That brave Frascati villa with its bath, So, let the blue lump poise between my knees, Like God the Father's globe on both his hands Ye worship in the Jesu Church so gay, For Gandolf shall not choose but see and burst! 50 Swift as a weaver's shuttle fleet our years: Man goeth to the grave, and where is he? Did I say basalt for my slab, sons? Black-- 'T was ever antique-black I meant! How else Shall ye contrast my frieze to come beneath? The bas-relief in bronze ye promised me, Those Pans and Nymphs ye wot of, and perchance Some tripod, thyrsus, with a vase or so, The Saviour at his sermon on the mount, Saint Praxed in a glory, and one Pan 60 Ready to twitch the Nymph's last garment off, And Moses with the tables . . . but I know Ye mark me not! What do they whisper thee, Child of my bowels, Anselm? Ah, ye hope To revel down my villas while I gasp Bricked o'er with beggar's mouldy travertine Which Gandolf from his tomb-top chuckles at! Nay, boys, ye love me--all of jasper, then! 'T is jasper ye stand pledged to, lest I grieve. My bath must needs be left behind, alas! 70 One block, pure green as a pistachio-nut, There's plenty jasper somewhere in the world-- And have I not Saint Praxed's ear to pray Horses for ye, and brown Greek manuscripts, And mistresses with great smooth marbly limbs? --That's if ye carve my epitaph aright, Choice Latin, picked phrase, Tully's every word, No gaudy ware like Gandolf's second line-- Tully, my masters? Ulpian serves his need! And then how I shall lie through centuries, 80 And hear the blessed mutter of the mass, And see God made and eaten all day long, And feel the steady candle-flame, and taste Good strong thick stupefying incense-smoke! For as I lie here, hours of the dead night, Dying in state and by such slow degrees, I fold my arms as if they clasped a crook, And stretch my feet forth straight as stone can point, And let the bedclothes, for a mortcloth, drop Into great laps and folds of sculptor's-work: 90 And as yon tapers dwindle, and strange thoughts Grow, with a certain humming in my ears, About the life before I lived this life, And this life too, popes, cardinals and priests, Saint Praxed at his sermon on the mount, Your tall pale mother with her talking eyes, And new-found agate urns as fresh as day, And marble's language, Latin pure, discreet, --Aha, ELUCESCEBAT quoth our friend? No Tully, said I, Ulpian at the best! 100 Evil and brief hath been my pilgrimage. All lapis, all, sons! Else I give the Pope My villas! Will ye ever eat my heart? Ever your eyes were as a lizard's quick, They glitter like your mother's for my soul, Or ye would heighten my impoverished frieze, Piece out its starved design, and fill my vase With grapes, and add a vizor and a Term, And to the tripod ye would tie a lynx That in his struggle throws the thyrsus down, 110 To comfort me on my entablature Whereon I am to lie till I must ask "Do I live, am I dead?" There, leave me, there! For ye have stabbed me with ingratitude To death--ye wish it--God, ye wish it! Stone-- Gritstone, a-crumble! Clammy squares which sweat As if the corpse they keep were oozing through-- And no more lapis to delight the world! Well go! I bless ye. Fewer tapers there, But in a row: and, going, turn your backs 120 --Ay, like departing altar-ministrants, And leave me in my church, the church for peace, That I may watch at leisure if he leers-- Old Gandolf, at me, from his onion-stone, As still he envied me, so fair she was!

NOTES

"The Bishop orders his Tomb" This half-delirious pleading of the dying prelate for a tomb which shall gratify his luxurious artistic tastes and personal rivalries, presents dramatically not merely the special scene of the worldly old bishop's petulant struggle against his failing power, and his collapse, finally, beneath the will of his so-called nephews, it also illustrates a characteristic gross form of the Renaissance spirit encumbered with Pagan survivals, fleshly appetites, and selfish monopolizings which hampered its development.-- "It is nearly all that I said of the Central Renaissance--its worldliness, inconsistency, pride, hypocrisy, ignorance of itself, love of art, of luxury, and of good Latin--in thirty pages of the 'Stones of Venice,' put into as many lines, Browning's being also the antecedent work" (Ruskin). The Church of St.Praxed is notable for the beauty of its stone-work and mosaics, one of its chapels being so extraordinarily rich that it was called <Orto del Paradiso>, or the Garden of Paradise; and so, although the bishop and his tomb there are imaginary, it supplies an appropriate setting for the poetic scene.

1. Vanity, saith the preacher: Ecclesiastes 1.2.

21. Epistle-side: the right-hand side facing the altar, where the epistle is read by the priest acting as celebrant, the gospel being read from the other side by the priest acting as assistant.

25. Basalt: trap-rock, leaden or black in color.

31. Onion stone: for the Italian <cipollino>, a kind of greenish-white marble splitting into coats like an onion, <cipolla>; hence so called.

41. Olive-frail: a basket made of rushes, used for packing olives.

42. Lapis lazuli: a bright blue stone.

46. Frascati: near Rome, on the Alban hills.

48. God the Father's globe: in the group of the Trinity adorning the altar of Saint Ignatius at the church of Il Gesu in Rome.

51. Weaver's shuttle: Job 7.6.

54. Antique-black: Nero antico. Browning gives the English equivalent for the name of this stone.

58. Tripod: the seat with three feet on which the priestess of Apollo sat to prophesy, an emblem of the Delphic oracle.

Thyrsus: the ivy-coiled staffer spear stuck in a pine-cone, symbol of Bacchic orgy. These, with the other Pagan tokens and pictures, mingle oddly but significantly with the references to the Saviour, Saint Praxed, and Moses. See also line 92, where Saint Praxed is confused with the Saviour, in the mind of the dying priest. Saint Praxed, the virgin daughter of a Roman Senator and friend of Saint Paul, in whose honor the Bishop's Church is named, is again brought forward in lines 73-75 in a queer capacity which pointedly illustrates the speaker and his time.

66. Travertine: see note "Pictor Ignotus," 67.

68. jasper: a dark green stone with blood-red spots, susceptible of high polish.

77. Tully's: Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-46 B. C.).

79. Ulpian: a Roman jurist (170-228 A. D.), belonging to the degenerate age of Roman literature.

99. <Elucescebat>: he was illustrious; formed from <elucesco>, an inceptive verb from <eluceo>: in post classic Latin.

102. Else I give the Pope my villas: perhaps a threat founded on the custom of Julius II and other popes, according to Burckhardt, of enlarging their power "by making themselves heirs of the cardinals and clergy . . . Hence the splendor of tile tombs of the prelates . . . a part of the plunder being in this way saved from the hands of the Pope."

108. A vizor and a Term: a mask, and a bust springing from a square pillar, representing the Roman god Terminus, who presided over boundaries.

BISHOP BLOUGRAM'S APOLOGY

1855

No more wine? then we'll push back chairs and talk. A final glass for me, though: cool, i' faith! We ought to have our Abbey back, you see. It's different, preaching in basilicas, And doing duty in some masterpiece Like this of brother Pugin's, bless his heart! I doubt if they're half baked, those chalk rosettes, Ciphers and stucco-twiddlings everywhere; It's just like breathing in a lime-kiln: eh? These hot long ceremonies of our church 10 Cost us a little--oh, they pay the price, You take me--amply pay it! Now, we'll talk.

So, you despise me, Mr. Gigadibs. No deprecation--nay, I beg you, sir! Beside 't is our engagement: don't you know, I promised, if you'd watch a dinner out, We'd see truth dawn together?--truth that peeps Over the glasses' edge when dinner's done, And body gets its sop and holds its noise And leaves soul free a little. Now's the time: 20 Truth's break of day! You do despise me then. And if I say, "despise me"--never fear! 1 know you do not in a certain sense-- Not in my arm-chair, for example: here, I well imagine you respect my place (<Status, entourage>, worldly circumstance) Quite to its value--very much indeed: --Are up to the protesting eyes of you In pride at being seated here for once-- You'll turn it to such capital account! 30 When somebody, through years and years to come, Hints of the bishop--names me--that's enough: "Blougram? I knew him"--(into it you slide) "Dined with him once, a Corpus Christi Day, All alone, we two; he's a clever man: And after dinner--why, the wine you know-- Oh, there was wine, and good!--what with the wine . . . 'Faith, we began upon all sorts of talk! He's no bad fellow, Blougram; he had seen Something of mine he relished, some review: 40 He's quite above their humbug in his heart, Half-said as much, indeed--the thing's his trade. I warrant, Blougram 's sceptical at times: How otherwise? I liked him, I confess!" <Che che>, my dear sir, as we say at Rome, Don't you protest now! It's fair give and take; You have had your turn and spoken your home-truths: The hand's mine now, and here you follow suit.

Thus much conceded, still the first fact stays-- You do despise me; your ideal of life 50 Is not the bishop's: you would not be I. You would like better to be Goethe, now, Or Buonaparte, or, bless me, lower still, Count D'Orsay--so you did what you preferred, Spoke as you thought, and, as you cannot help, Believed or disbelieved, no matter what, So long as on that point, whate'er it was, You loosed your mind, were whole and sole yourself. --That, my ideal never can include, Upon that element of truth and worth 60 Never be based! for say they make me Pope-- (They can't--suppose it for our argument!) Why, there I'm at my tether's end, I've reached My height, and not a height which pleases you: An unbelieving Pope won't do, you say. It's like those eerie stories nurses tell, Of how some actor on a stage played Death, With pasteboard crown, sham orb and tinselled dart, And called himself the monarch of the world; Then, going in the tire-room afterward, 70 Because the play was done, to shift himself, Got touched upon the sleeve familiarly, The moment he had shut the closet door, By Death himself. Thus God might touch a Pope At unawares, ask what his baubles mean, And whose part he presumed to play just now. Best be yourself, imperial, plain and true!

So, drawing comfortable breath again, You weigh and find, whatever more or less I boast of my ideal realized 80 Is nothing in the balance when opposed To your ideal, your grand simple life, Of which you will not realize one jot. I am much, you are nothing; you would be all, I would be merely much: you beat me there.

No, friend, you do not beat me: hearken why! The common problem, yours, mine, every one's, Is--not to fancy what were fair in life Provided it could be--but, finding first What may be, then find how to make it fair 90 Up to our means: a very different thing! No abstract intellectual plan of life Quite irrespective of life's plainest laws, But one, a man, who is man and nothing more, May lead within a world which (by your leave) Is Rome or London, not Fool's-paradise. Embellish Rome, idealize away, Make paradise of London if you can, You're welcome, nay, you're wise.

A simile! We mortals cross the ocean of this world 100 Each in his average cabin of a life; The best's not big, the worst yields elbow-room. Now for our six months' voyage--how prepare? You come on shipboard with a landsman's list Of things he calls convenient: so they are! An India screen is pretty furniture, A piano-forte is a fine resource, All Balzac's novels occupy one shelf, The new edition fifty volumes long; And little Greek books, with the funny type 110 They get up well at Leipsic, fill the next: Go on! slabbed marble, what a bath it makes! And Parma's pride, the Jerome, let us add! 'T were pleasant could Correggio's fleeting glow Hang full in face of one where'er one roams, Since he more than the others brings with him Italy's self--the marvellous Modenese!-- Yet was not on your list before, perhaps. --Alas, friend, here's the agent . . . is 't the name? The captain, or whoever's master here-- 120 You see him screw his face up; what's his cry Ere you set foot on shipboard? "Six feet square!" If you won't understand what six feet mean, Compute and purchase stores accordingly-- And if, in pique because he overhauls Your Jerome, piano, bath, you come on board Bare--why, you cut a figure at the first While sympathetic landsmen see you off; Not afterward, when long ere half seas over, You peep up from your utterly naked boards 130 Into some snug and well-appointed berth, Like mine for instance (try the cooler jug-- Put back the other, but don't jog the ice!) And mortified you mutter "Well and good; He sits enjoying his sea-furniture; 'Tis stout and proper, and there's store of it; Though I've the better notion, all agree, Of fitting rooms up. Hang the carpenter, Neat ship-shape fixings and contrivances-- I would have brought my Jerome, frame and all!" 140 And meantime you bring nothing: never mind-- You've proved your artist-nature: what you don't You might bring, so despise me, as I say.

Now come, let's backward to the starting-place. See my way: we're two college friends, suppose. Prepare together for our voyage, then; Each note and check the other in his work-- Here's mine, a bishop's outfit; criticise! What's wrong? why won't you be a bishop too?

Why first, you don't believe, you don't and can't, 150 (Not statedly, that is, and fixedly And absolutely and exclusively) In any revelation called divine. No dogmas nail your faith; and what remains But say so, like the honest man you are? First, therefore, overhaul theology! Nay, I too, not a fool, you please to think, Must find believing every whit as hard: And if I do not frankly say as much, The ugly consequence is clear enough. 160

Now wait, my friend: well, I do not believe-- If you'll accept no faith that is not fixed, Absolute and exclusive, as you say. You're wrong--I mean to prove it in due time. Meanwhile, I know where difficulties lie I could not, cannot solve, nor ever shall, So give up hope accordingly to solve-- (To you, and over the wine). Our dogmas then With both of us, though in unlike degree, Missing full credence--overboard with them! 170 I mean to meet you on your own premise: Good, there go mine in company with yours!

And now what are we? unbelievers both, Calm and complete, determinately fixed To-day, to-morrow and forever, pray? You'll guarantee me that? Not so, I think! In no wise! all we've gained is, that belief, As unbelief before, shakes us by fits, Confounds us like its predecessor. Where's The gain? how can we guard our unbelief, 180 Make it bear fruit to us?--the problem here. Just when we are safest, there's a sunset-touch, A fancy from a flower-bell, some one's death, A chorus-ending from Euripides-- And that's enough for fifty hopes and fears As old and new at once as nature's self, To rap and knock and enter in our soul, Take hands and dance there, a fantastic ring, Round the ancient idol, on his base again-- The grand Perhaps! We look on helplessly. 190 There the old misgivings, crooked questions are-- This good God--what he could do, if he would, Would, if he could--then must have done long since: If so, when, where and how? some way must be-- Once feel about, and soon or late you hit Some sense, in which it might be, after all. Why not, "The Way, the Truth, the Life?"

--That way Over the mountain, which who stands upon Is apt to doubt if it be meant for a road; While, if he views it from the waste itself, 200 Up goes the line there, plain from base to brow, Not vague, mistakable! what's a break or two Seen from the unbroken desert either side? And then (to bring in fresh philosophy) What if the breaks themselves should prove at last The most consummate of contrivances To train a man's eye, teach him what is faith? And so we stumble at truth's very test! All we have gained then by our unbelief Is a life of doubt diversified by faith, 210 For one of faith diversified by doubt: We called the chess-board white--we call it black.

"Well," you rejoin, "the end's no worse, at least; We've reason for both colors on the board: Why not confess then, where I drop the faith And you the doubt, that I'm as right as you?"

Because, friend, in the next place, this being so, And both things even--faith and unbelief Left to a man's choice--we'll proceed a step, Returning to our image, which I like. 220

A man's choice, yes--but a cabin-passenger's-- The man made for the special life o' the world-- Do you forget him? I remember though! Consult our ship's conditions and you find One and but one choice suitable to all; The choice, that you unluckily prefer, Turning things topsy-turvy--they or it Going to the ground. Belief or unbelief Bears upon life, determines its whole course, Begins at its beginning. See the world 230 Such as it is--you made it not, nor I; I mean to take it as it is--and you, Not so you'll take it--though you get naught else. I know the special kind of life I like, What suits the most my idiosyncrasy, Brings out the best of me and bears me fruit In power, peace, pleasantness and length of days. I find that positive belief does this For me, and unbelief, no whit of this. --For you, it does, however?--that, we'll try! 240 'T is clear, I cannot lead my life, at least, Induce the world to let me peaceably, Without declaring at the outset, "Friends, I absolutely and peremptorily Believe!"--I say, faith is my waking life: One sleeps, indeed, and dreams at intervals, We know, but waking's the main point with us, And my provision's for life's waking part. Accordingly, I use heart, head and hand All day, I build, scheme, study, and make friends; 250 And when night overtakes me, down I lie, Sleep, dream a little, and get done with it, The sooner the better, to begin afresh. What's midnight's doubt before the dayspring's faith? You, the philosopher, that disbelieve, That recognize the night, give dreams their weight-- To be consistent you should keep your bed, Abstain from healthy acts that prove you man, For fear you drowse perhaps at unawares! And certainly at night you'll sleep and dream, 260 Live through the day and bustle as you please. And so you live to sleep as I to wake, To unbelieve as I to still believe? Well, and the common sense o' the world calls you Bed-ridden--and its good things come to me. Its estimation, which is half the fight, That's the first-cabin comfort I secure: The next . . . but you perceive with half an eye! Come, come, it's best believing, if we may; You can't but own that! Next, concede again, 270 If once we choose belief, on all accounts We can't be too decisive in our faith, Conclusive and exclusive in its terms, To suit the world which gives us the good things. In every man's career are certain points Whereon he dares not be indifferent; The world detects him clearly, if he dare, As baffled at the game, and losing life. He may care little or he may care much For riches, honor, pleasure, work, repose, 280 Since various theories of life and life's Success are extant which might easily Comport with either estimate of these; And whoso chooses wealth or poverty, Labor or quiet, is not judged a fool Because his fellow would choose otherwise; We let him choose upon his own account So long as he's consistent with his choice. But certain points, left wholly to himself, When once a man has arbitrated on, 290 We say he must succeed there or go hang. Thus, he should wed the woman he loves most Or needs most, whatsoe'er the love or need-- For he can't wed twice. Then, he must avouch, Or follow, at the least, sufficiently, The form of faith his conscience holds the best, Whate'er the process of conviction was: For nothing can compensate his mistake On such a point, the man himself being judge: He cannot wed twice, nor twice lose his soul. 300

Well now, there's one great form of Christian faith I happened to be born in--which to teach Was given me as I grew up, on all hands, As best and readiest means of living by; The same on examination being proved The most pronounced moreover, fixed, precise And absolute form of faith in the whole world-- Accordingly, most potent of all forms For working on the world. Observe, my friend! Such as you know me, I am free to say, 310 In these hard latter days which hamper one, Myself--by no immoderate exercise Of intellect and learning, but the tact To let external forces work for me, --Bid the street's stones be bread and they are bread; Bid Peter's creed, or rather, Hildebrand's, Exalt me o'er my fellows in the world And make my life an ease and joy and pride; It does so--which for me 's a great point gained, Who have a soul and body that exact 320 A comfortable care in many ways. There's power in me and will to dominate Which I must exercise, they hurt me else: In many ways I need mankind's respect, Obedience, and the love that's born of fear: While at the same time, there's a taste I have, A toy of soul, a titillating thing, Refuses to digest these dainties crude. The naked life is gross till clothed upon: I must take what men offer, with a grace 330 As though I would not, could I help it, take An uniform I wear though over-rich-- Something imposed on me, no choice of mine; No fancy-dress worn for pure fancy's sake And despicable therefore! now folk kneel And kiss my hand--of course the Church's hand. Thus I am made, thus life is best for me, And thus that it should be I have procured; And thus it could not be another way, I venture to imagine.

You'll reply, 340 So far my choice, no doubt, is a success; But were I made of better elements, With nobler instincts, purer tastes, like you, I hardly would account the thing success Though it did all for me I say.

But, friend, We speak of what is; not of what might be, And how 'twere better if 'twere otherwise. I am the man you see here plain enough: Grant I'm a beast, why, beasts must lead beasts' lives! Suppose I own at once to tail and claws; 350 The tailless man exceeds me: but being tailed I'll lash out lion fashion, and leave apes To dock their stump and dress their haunches up. My business is not to remake myself, But make the absolute best of what God made. Or--our first simile--though you prove me doomed To a viler berth still, to the steerage-hole, The sheep-pen or the pig-stye, I should strive To make what use of each were possible; And as this cabin gets upholstery, 360 That hutch should rustle with sufficient straw.

But, friend, I don't acknowledge quite so fast I fail of all your manhood's lofty tastes Enumerated so complacently, On the mere ground that you forsooth can find In this particular life I choose to lead No fit provision for them. Can you not? Say you, my fault is I address myself To grosser estimators than should judge? And that's no way of holding up the soul, 370 Which, nobler, needs men's praise perhaps, yet knows One wise man's verdict outweighs all the fools'-- Would like the two, but, forced to choose, takes that. I pine among my million imbeciles (You think) aware some dozen men of sense Eye me and know me, whether I believe In the last winking Virgin, as I vow, And am a fool, or disbelieve in her And am a knave--approve in neither case, Withhold their voices though I look their way: 380 Like Verdi when, at his worst opera's end (The thing they gave at Florence--what's its name?) While the mad houseful's plaudits near outbang His orchestra of salt-box, tongs and bones, He looks through all the roaring and the wreaths Where sits Rossini patient in his stall.

Nay, friend, I meet you with an answer here-- That even your prime men who appraise their kind Are men still, catch a wheel within a wheel, See more in a truth than the truth's simple self, 390 Confuse themselves. You see lads walk the street Sixty the minute; what's to note in that? You see one lad o'erstride a chimney-stack; Him you must watch--he's sure to fall, yet stands! Our interest's on the dangerous edge of things. The honest thief, the tender murderer, The superstitious atheist, demirep That loves and saves her soul in new French books-- We watch while these in equilibrium keep The giddy line midway: one step aside, 400 They're classed and done with. I, then, keep the line Before your sages--just the men to shrink From the gross weights, coarse scales and labels broad You offer their refinement. Fool or knave? Why needs a bishop be a fool or knave When there's a thousand diamond weights between? So, I enlist them. Your picked twelve, you'll find, Profess themselves indignant, scandalized At thus being held unable to explain How a superior man who disbelieves 410 May not believe as well: that's Schelling's way! It's through my coming in the tail of time, Nicking the minute with a happy tact. Had I been born three hundred years ago They'd say, "What's strange? Blougram of course believes;" And, seventy years since, "disbelieves of course." But now, "He may believe; and yet, and yet How can he?" All eyes turn with interest. Whereas, step off the line on either side-- You, for example, clever to a fault, 420 The rough and ready man who write apace, Read somewhat seldomer, think perhaps even less-- You disbelieve! Who wonders and who cares? Lord So-and-so--his coat bedropped with wax, All Peter's chains about his waist, his back Brave with the needlework of Noodledom-- Believes! Again, who wonders and who cares? But I, the man of sense and learning too, The able to think yet act, the this, the that, I, to believe at this late time of day! 430 Enough; you see, I need not fear contempt.

--Except it's yours! Admire me as these may, You don't. But whom at least do you admire? Present your own perfection, your ideal, Your pattern man for a minute--oh, make haste, Is it Napoleon you would have us grow? Concede the means; allow his head and hand, (A large concession, clever as you are) Good! In our common primal element Of unbelief (we can't believe, you know-- 440 We're still at that admission, recollect!) Where do you find--apart from, towering o'er The secondary temporary aims Which satisfy the gross taste you despise-- Where do you find his star?--his crazy trust God knows through what or in what? it's alive And shines and leads him, and that's all we want. Have we aught in our sober night shall point Such ends as his were, and direct the means Of working out our purpose straight as his, 450 Nor bring a moment's trouble on success With after-care to justify the same? --Be a Napoleon, and yet disbelieve-- Why, the man's mad, friend, take his light away! What's the vague good o' the world, for which you dare With comfort to yourself blow millions up? We neither of us see it! we do see The blown-up millions--spatter of their brains And writhing of their bowels and so forth, In that bewildering entanglement 460 Of horrible eventualities Past calculation to the end of time! Can I mistake for some clear word of God (Which were my ample warrant for it all) His puff of hazy instinct, idle talk, "The State, that's I," quack-nonsense about crowns, And (when one beats the man to his last hold) A vague idea of setting things to rights, Policing people efficaciously, More to their profit, most of all to his own; 470 The whole to end that dismallest of ends By an Austrian marriage, cant to us the Church, And resurrection of the old regime? Would I, who hope to live a dozen years, Fight Austerlitz for reasons such and such? No: for, concede me but the merest chance Doubt may be wrong--there's judgment, life to come With just that chance, I dare not. Doubt proves right? This present life is all?--you offer me Its dozen noisy years, without a chance 480 That wedding an archduchess, wearing lace, And getting called by divers new-coined names, Will drive off ugly thoughts and let me dine, Sleep, read and chat in quiet as I like! Therefore I will not.

Take another case; Fit up the cabin yet another way. What say you to the poets? shall we write Hamlet, Othello--make the world our own, Without a risk to run of either sort? I can't!--to put the strongest reason first. 490 "But try," you urge, "the trying shall suffice; The aim, if reached or not, makes great the life: Try to be Shakespeare, leave the rest to fate!" Spare my self-knowledge--there's no fooling me! If I prefer remaining my poor self, I say so not in self-dispraise but praise. If I'm a Shakespeare, let the well alone; Why should I try to be what now I am? If I'm no Shakespeare, as too probable-- His power and consciousness and self-delight 500 And all we want in common, shall I find-- Trying forever? while on points of taste Wherewith, to speak it humbly, he and I Are dowered alike--I'll ask you, I or he, Which in our two lives realizes most? Much, he imagined--somewhat, I possess. He had the imagination; stick to that! Let him say, "In the face of my soul's works Your world is worthless and I touch it not Lest I should wrong them"--I'll withdraw my plea. 510 But does he say so? look upon his life! Himself, who only can, gives judgment there. He leaves his towers and gorgeous palaces To build the trimmest house in Stratford town; Saves money, spends it, owns the worth of things, Giulio Romano's pictures, Dowland's lute; Enjoys a show, respects the puppets, too, And none more, had he seen its entry once, Than "Pandulph, of fair Milan cardinal." Why then should I who play that personage, 520 The very Pandulph Shakespeare's fancy made, Be told that had the poet chanced to start From where I stand now (some degree like mine Being just the goal he ran his race to reach) He would have run the whole race back, forsooth, And left being Pandulph, to begin write plays? Ah, the earth's best can be but the earth's best! Did Shakespeare live, he could but sit at home And get himself in dreams the Vatican, Greek busts, Venetian paintings, Roman walls, 530 And English books, none equal to his own, Which I read, bound in gold (he never did). --Terni's fall, Naples' bay and Gothard's top-- Eh, friend? I could not fancy one of these; But, as I pour this claret, there they are: I've gained them--crossed St. Gothard last July With ten mules to the carriage and a bed Slung inside; is my hap the worse for that? We want the same things, Shakespeare and myself, And what I want, I have: he, gifted more, 540 Could fancy he too had them when he liked, But not so thoroughly that, if fate allowed, He would not have them ...also in my sense. We play one game; I send the ball aloft No less adroitly that of fifty strokes Scarce five go o'er the wall so wide and high Which sends them back to me: I wish and get. He struck balls higher and with better skill, But at a poor fence level with his head, And hit--his Stratford house, a coat of arms, 550 Successful dealings in his grain and wool-- While I receive heaven's incense in my nose And style myself the cousin of Queen Bess. Ask him, if this life's all, who wins the game?

Believe--and our whole argument breaks up. Enthusiasm's the best thing, I repeat; Only, we can't command it; fire and life Are all, dead matter's nothing, we agree: And be it a mad dream or God's very breath, The fact's the same--belief's fire, once in us, 560 Makes of all else mere stuff to show itself; We penetrate our life with such a glow As fire lends wood and iron--this turns steel, That burns to ash--all's one, fire proves its power For good or ill, since men call flare success. But paint a fire, it will not therefore burn. Light one in me, I'll find it food enough! Why, to be Luther--that's a life to lead, Incomparably better than my own. He comes, reclaims God's earth for God, he says, 570 Sets up God's rule again by simple means, Re-opens a shut book, and all is done. He flared out in the flaring of mankind; Such Luther's luck was: how shall such be mine? If he succeeded, nothing's left to do: And if he did not altogether--well, Strauss is the next advance. All Strauss should be I might be also. But to what result? He looks upon no future: Luther did. What can I gain on the denying side? 580 Ice makes no conflagration. State the facts, Read the text right, emancipate the world-- The emancipated world enjoys itself With scarce a thank-you: Blougram told it first It could not owe a farthing--not to him More than Saint Paul! 't would press its pay, you think? Then add there's still that plaguy hundredth chance Strauss may be wrong. And so a risk is run-- For what gain? not for Luther's, who secured A real heaven in his heart throughout his life, 590 Supposing death a little altered things.

"Ay, but since really you lack faith," you cry, "You run the same risk really on all sides, In cool indifference as bold unbelief. As well be Strauss as swing 'twixt Paul and him. It's not worth having, such imperfect faith, No more available to do faith's work Than unbelief like mine. Whole faith, or none!"

Softly, my friend! I must dispute that point. Once own the use of faith, I'll find you faith. 600 We're back on Christian ground. You call for faith; I show you doubt, to prove that faith exists. The more of doubt, the stronger faith, I say, If faith o'ercomes doubt. How I know it does? By life and man's free will. God gave for that! To mould life as we choose it, shows our choice: That's our one act, the previous work's his own. You criticise the soul? it reared this tree-- This broad life and whatever fruit it bears! What matter though I doubt at every pore, 610 Head-doubts, heart-doubts, doubts at my fingers' ends, Doubts in the trivial work of every day, Doubts at the very bases of my soul In the grand moments when she probes herself-- If finally I have a life to show, The thing I did, brought out in evidence Against the thing done to me underground By hell and all its brood, for aught I know? I say, whence sprang this? shows it faith or doubt? All's doubt in me; where's break of faith in this? 620 It is the idea, the feeling and the love, God means mankind should strive for and show forth Whatever be the process to that end-- And not historic knowledge, logic sound, And metaphysical acumen, sure! "What think ye of Christ," friend? when all's done and said, Like you this Christianity or not? It may be false, but will you wish it true? Has it your vote to be so if it can? Trust you an instinct silenced long ago 630 That will break silence and enjoin you love What mortified philosophy is hoarse, And all in vain, with bidding you despise? If you desire faith--then you've faith enough: What else seeks God--nay, what else seek ourselves? You form a notion of me, we'll suppose, On hearsay; it's a favorable one: "But still" (you add) "there was no such good man, Because of contradiction in the facts. One proves, for instance, he was born in Rome, 640 This Blougram; yet throughout the tales of him I see he figures as an Englishman." Well, the two things are reconcilable. But would I rather you discovered that, Subjoining--"Still, what matter though they be? Blougram concerns me naught, born here or there."

Pure faith indeed--you know not what you ask! Naked belief in God the Omnipotent, 0mniscient, Omnipresent, sears too much The sense of conscious creatures to be borne. 650 It were the seeing him, no flesh shall dare. Some think, Creation's meant to show him forth: I say it's meant to hide him all it can, And that's what all the blessed evil's for. Its use in Time is to environ us, Our breath, our drop of dew, with shield enough Against that sight till we can bear its stress. Under a vertical sun, the exposed brain And lidless eye and disemprisoned heart Less certainly would wither up at once 660 Than mind, confronted with the truth of him. But time and earth case-harden us to live; The feeblest sense is trusted most; the child Feels God a moment, ichors o'er the place, Plays on and grows to be a man like us. With me, faith means perpetual unbelief Kept quiet like the snake 'neath Michael's foot Who stands calm just because he feels it writhe. Or, if that's too ambitious--here's my box-- I need the excitation of a pinch 670 Threatening the torpor of the inside-nose Nigh on the imminent sneeze that never comes. "Leave it in peace" advise the simple folk: Make it aware of peace by itching-fits, Say I--let doubt occasion still more faith!

You 'll say, once all believed, man, woman, child, In that dear middle-age these noodles praise. How you'd exult if I could put you back Six hundred years, blot out cosmogony, Geology, ethnology, what not, 680 (Greek endings, each the little passing-bell That signifies some faith's about to die) And set you square with Genesis again-- When such a traveller told you his last news, He saw the ark a-top of Ararat But did not climb there since 'twas getting dusk And robber-bands infest the mountain's foot! How should you feel, I ask, in such an age, How act? As other people felt and did; With soul more blank than this decanter's knob, 690 Believe--and yet lie, kill, rob, fornicate Full in belief's face, like the beast you'd be!

No, when the fight begins within himself, A man's worth something. God stoops o'er his head, Satan looks up between his feet--both tug-- He's left, himself, i' the middle: the soul wakes And grows. Prolong that battle through his life! Never leave growing till the life to come! Here, we've got callous to the Virgin's winks That used to puzzle people wholesomely: 700 Men have outgrown the shame of being fools. What are the laws of nature, not to bend If the Church bid them?--brother Newman asks. Up with the Immaculate Conception, then-- On to the rack with faith!--is my advice. Will not that hurry us upon our knees, Knocking our breasts, "It can't be--yet it shall! Who am I, the worm, to argue with my Pope? Low things confound the high things!" and so forth. That's better than acquitting God with grace 710 As some folk do. He's tried--no case is proved, Philosophy is lenient--he may go!

You'll say, the old system's not so obsolete But men believe still: ay, but who and where? King Bomba's lazzaroni foster yet The sacred flame, so Antonelli writes; But even of these, what ragamuffin-saint Believes God watches him continually, As he believes in fire that it will burn, Or rain that it will drench him? Break fire's law, 720 Sin against rain, although the penalty Be just a singe or soaking? "No," he smiles; "Those laws are laws that can enforce themselves."

The sum of all is--yes, my doubt is great, My faith's still greater, then my faith's enough. I have read much, thought much, experienced much, Yet would die rather than avow my fear The Naples' liquefaction may be false, When set to happen by the palace-clock According to the clouds or dinner-time. 730 I hear you recommend, I might at least Eliminate, decrassify my faith Since I adopt it; keeping what I must And leaving what I can--such points as this. I won't--that is, I can't throw one away. Supposing there's no truth in what I hold About the need of trial to man's faith, Still, when you bid me purify the same, To such a process I discern no end. Clearing off one excrescence to see two, 740 There's ever a next in size, now grown as big, That meets the knife: I cut and cut again! First cut the Liquefaction, what comes last But Fichte's clever cut at God himself? Experimentalize on sacred things! I trust nor hand nor eye nor heart nor brain To stop betimes: they all get drunk alike. The first step, I am master not to take.

You'd find the cutting-process to your taste As much as leaving growths of lies unpruned, 750 Nor see more danger in it--you retort. Your taste's worth mine; but my taste proves more wise When we consider that the steadfast hold On the extreme end of the chain of faith Gives all the advantage, makes the difference With the rough purblind mass we seek to rule: We are their lords, or they are free of us, Justas we tighten or relax our hold. So, other matters equal, we'll revert To the first problem--which, if solved my way 760 And thrown into the balance, turns the scale-- How we may lead a comfortable life, How suit our luggage to the cabin's size.

Of course you are remarking all this time How narrowly and grossly I view life, Respect the creature-comforts, care to rule The masses, and regard complacently "The cabin," in our old phrase. Well, I do. I act for, talk for, live for this world now, As this world prizes action, life and talk: 770 No prejudice to what next world may prove, Whose new laws and requirements, my best pledge To observe then, is that I observe these now, Shall do hereafter what I do meanwhile. Let us concede (gratuitously though) Next life relieves the soul of body, yields Pure spiritual enjoyment: well, my friend, Why lose this life i' the meantime, since its use May be to make the next life more intense?

Do you know, I have often had a dream 780 (Work it up in your next month's article) Of man's poor spirit in its progress, still Losing true life forever and a day Through ever trying to be and ever being-- In the evolution of successive spheres-- Before its actual sphere and place of life, Halfway into the next, which having reached, It shoots with corresponding foolery Halfway into the next still, on and off! As when a traveller, bound from North to South, 790 Scouts far in Russia: what's its use in France? In France spurns flannel: where's its need in Spain? In Spain drops cloth, too cumbrous for Algiers! Linen goes next, and last the skin itself, A superfluity at Timbuctoo. When, through his journey, was the fool at ease? I'm at ease now, friend; worldly in this world, I take and like its way of life; I think My brothers, who administer the means, Live better for my comfort--that's good too; 800 And God, if he pronounce upon such life, Approves my service, which is better still. If he keep silence--why, for you or me Or that brute beast pulled-up in to-day's "Times," What odds is 't, save to ourselves, what life we lead?

You meet me at this issue: you declare-- All special-pleading done with--truth is truth, And justifies itself by undreamed ways. You don't fear but it's better, if we doubt, To say so, act up to our truth perceived 810 However feebly. Do then--act away! 'T is there I'm on the watch for you. How one acts Is, both of us agree, our chief concern: And how you 'll act is what I fain would see If, like the candid person you appear, You dare to make the most of your life's scheme As I of mine, live up to its full law Since there's no higher law that counterchecks. Put natural religion to the test You've just demolished the revealed with--quick, 820 Down to the root of all that checks your will, All prohibition to lie, kill and thieve, Or even to be an atheistic priest! Suppose a pricking to incontinence-- Philosophers deduce you chastity Or shame, from just the fact that at the first Whoso embraced a woman in the field, Threw club down and forewent his brains beside, So, stood a ready victim in the reach Of any brother savage, club in hand; 830 Hence saw the use of going out of sight In wood or cave to prosecute his loves: I read this in a French book t' other day. Does law so analyzed coerce you much? Oh, men spin clouds of fuzz where matters end, But you who reach where the first thread begins, You'll soon cut that!--which means you can, but won't, Through certain instincts, blind, unreasoned-out, You dare not set aside, you can't tell why, But there they are, and so you let them rule. 840 Then, friend, you seem as much a slave as I, A liar, conscious coward and hypocrite, Without the good the slave expects to get, In case he has a master after all! You own your instincts? why, what else do I, Who want, am made for, and must have a God Ere I can be aught, do aught?--no mere name Want, but the true thing with what proves its truth, To wit, a relation from that thing to me, Touching from head to foot--which touch I feel, 850 And with it take the rest, this life of ours! I live my life here; yours you dare not live,