For men begin to pass their nature's bound,
And find new hopes and cares which fast supplant
Their proper joys and griefs; and outgrow all *
The narrow creeds of right and wrong, which fade
Before the unmeasured thirst for good; while peace
Rises within them ever more and more.
Such men are even now upon the earth,
Serene amid the half-formed creatures round,
Who should be saved by them and joined with them."

In the last three verses is indicated the doctrine of
the regenerating power of exalted personalities, so prominent
in Browning's poetry, and which is treated in the next paper.

--
* proper: In the sense of the Latin PROPRIUS, peculiar, private, personal.
--

There is no `tabula rasa' doctrine in these passages,
nor in any others, in the poet's voluminous works; and of all men
of great intellect and learning (it is always a matter of mere
insulated intellect), born in England since the days of John Locke,
no one, perhaps, has been so entirely untainted with this doctrine
as Robert Browning. It is a doctrine which great spiritual vitality
(and that he early possessed), reaching out, as it does,
beyond all experience, beyond all transformation of sensations,
and all conclusions of the discursive understanding,
naturally and spontaneously rejects. It simply says, "I know better",
and there an end.