baffles every classifier. As a rule, the English poets have been caught
up, and inspired, by the exceeding grandeur of some single idea, in
whose service they spend themselves with that prodigal thrift which
finds life in giving it. Such an idea gives them a fresh way of looking
at the world, so that the world grows young again with their new
interpretation. In the highest instances, poets may become makers of
epochs; they reform as well as reveal; for ideas are never dead things,
"but grow in the hand that grasps them." In them lies the energy of a
nation's life, and we comprehend that life only when we make clear to
ourselves the thoughts which inspire it. It is thus true, in the deepest
sense, that those who make the songs of a people make its history. In
all true poets there are hints for a larger philosophy of life. But, in
order to discover it, we must know the truths which dominate them, and
break into music in their poems.

Whether it is always possible, and whether it is at any time fair to a
poet to define the idea which inspires him, I shall not inquire at
present. No doubt, the interpretation of a poet from first principles
carries us beyond the limits of art; and by insisting on the unity of
his work, more may be attributed to him, or demanded from him, than he
properly owns. To make such a demand is to require that poetry should be
philosophy as well, which, owing to its method of intuition, it can
never be. Nevertheless, among English poets there is no one who lends
himself so easily, or so justly, to this way of treatment as Browning.
Much of his poetry trembles on the verge of the abyss which is supposed
to separate art from philosophy; and, as I shall try to show, there was
in the poet a growing tendency to turn the power of dialectic on the
pre-suppositions of his art. Yet, even Browning puts great difficulties
in the way of a critic, who seeks to draw a philosophy of life from his
poems. It is not by any means an easy task to lift the truths he utters