INTRODUCTION


LIFE OF BROWNING

Robert Browning was born in Camberwell, London, May 7, 1812. He was
contemporary with Tennyson, Dickens, Thackeray, Lowell, Emerson,
Hawthorne, Darwin, Spencer, Huxley, Dumas, Hugo, Mendelssohn, Wagner,
and a score of other men famous in art and science.

Browning's good fortune began with his birth. His father, a clerk in
the Bank of England, possessed ample means for the education of his
children. He had artistic and literary tastes, a mind richly stored
with philosophy, history, literature, and legend, some repute as a
maker of verses, and a liberality that led him to assist his gifted
son in following his bent. From his father Robert inherited his
literary tastes and his vigorous health; in his father he found a
critic and companion. His mother was described by Carlyle as a type
of the true Scotch gentlewoman. Her "fathomless charity," her love of
music, and her deep religious feeling reappear in the poet.

Free from struggles with adversity, and devoid of public or stirring
incidents, the story of Browning's life is soon told. It was the life
of a scholar and man of letters, devoted to the study of poetry,
philosophy, history; to the contemplation of the lives of men and
women; and to the exercise of his chosen vocation.