Jason in 1867; to be followed by The Earthly Paradise; and the change
of manner wrought in the interval, entire, almost a revolt, is
characteristic of the aesthetic poetry. Here there is no delirium or
illusion, no experiences of mere soul while the body and the bodily
senses sleep, or wake with convulsed intensity at the prompting of
imaginative love; but rather the great primary passions under broad
daylight as of the pagan Veronese. This simplification interests us,
not merely for the sake of an individual poet--full of charm as he
is--but chiefly because it explains through him a transition which,
under many forms, is one law of the life of the human spirit, and of
which what we call the Renaissance is only a supreme instance. Just
so the monk in his cloister, through the "open vision," open only to
the spirit, divined, aspired to, and at last apprehended, a better
daylight, but earthly, open only to the senses. Complex and subtle
interests, which the mind spins for itself may occupy art and poetry
or our own spirits for a time; but sooner or later they come back
with a sharp rebound to the simple elementary passions--anger,
desire, regret, [222] pity, and fear: and what corresponds to them in
the sensuous world--bare, abstract fire, water, air, tears, sleep,
silence, and what De Quincey has called the "glory of motion."

This reaction from dreamlight to daylight gives, as always happens, a
strange power in dealing with morning and the things of the morning.
Not less is this Hellenist of the Middle Age master of dreams, of
sleep and the desire of sleep--sleep in which no one walks, restorer
of childhood to men--dreams, not like Galahad's or Guenevere's, but
full of happy, childish wonder as in the earlier world. It is a
world in which the centaur and the ram with the fleece of gold are
conceivable. The song sung always claims to be sung for the first
time. There are hints at a language common to birds and beasts and