taken place, and Browning probably uttered his own faith when he made St
John declare that

"The acknowledgment of God in Christ
Acknowledged by thy reason solves for thee
All questions in the earth and out of it."[139]

[Footnote 139: _Death in the Desert_. These lines, however "dramatic,"
mark with precision the extent, and the limits, of Browning's Christian
faith. The evidence of his writings altogether confirms Mrs Orr's
express statement that Christ was for him, from first to last, "a
manifestation of divine love," by human form accessible to human love;
but not the Redeemer of the orthodox creed.]

For to acknowledge this was to recognise that love was divine, and that
mankind at large, in virtue of their gift of love, shared in God's
nature, finite as they were; that whatever clouds of intellectual
illusion they walked in, they were lifted to a hold upon reality as
unassailable as God's own by the least glimmer of love. Whatever else is
obscure or elusive in Browning, he never falters in proclaiming the
absolute and flawless worth of love. The lover cannot, like the
scientific investigator, miss his mark, he cannot be baffled or misled;
the object of his love may be unworthy, or unresponsive, but in the mere
act of loving he has his reward.

"Knowledge means
Ever renewed assurance by defeat
That victory is somehow still to reach;
But love is victory, the prize itself."[140]