42

ceived in my brain

And pronounced on the rest of his handwork returned him again

110

His creation's approval or censure: I spoke as I saw :

I report, as a man may of God's work love, yet all's law.

- all's

Now I lay down the judgeship he lent me.

Each faculty tasked

To perceive him, has gained an abyss, where a dewdrop was asked.

Have I knowledge? confounded it shrivels at Wisdom laid bare.

Have I forethought? how purblind, how blank, to the Infinite Care!

Do I task any faculty highest, to image success?

I but open my eyes, - and perfection, no more and no less,

In the kind I imagined, full-fronts me, and God is seen God

In the star, in the stone, in the flesh, in the soul and the clod.

I 20

And thus looking. within and around me, I

ever renew

These good things being given, to go on, and give one more, the best?

Ay, to save and redeem and restore him, maintain at the height

This perfection, succeed with life's dayspring, death's minute of night?

The submission of man's nothing-perfect to God's all-complete,

As by each new obeisance in spirit, I climb to his feet.

Yet with all this abounding experience, this

deity known,

I shall dare to discover some province, some gift of my own.

There's a faculty pleasant to exercise, hard to hoodwink,

I am fain to keep still in abeyance, (I laugh as I think)

Lest, insisting to claim and parade in it, wot ye, I worst

E'en the Giver in one gift. — Behold, I could love if I durst!

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But I sink the pretension as fearing a man may o'ertake

God's own speed in the one way of love: I abstain for love's sake.

What, my soul? see thus far and no farther? when doors great and small, Nine-and-ninety flew ope at our touch, should the hundredth appall?

In the least things have faith, yet distrust in the greatest of all?

Do I find love so full in my nature, God's ultimate gift,

That I doubt his own love can compete with it? Here, the parts shift?

Here, the creature surpass the Creator, the end, what Began?

Would I fain in my impotent yearning do all for this man,

140

And dare doubt he alone shall not help him, who yet alone can? Would it ever have entered my mind, the bare will, much less power,

To bestow on this Saul what I sang of, the marvellous dower

Of the life he was gifted and filled with? to make such a soul,

Such a body, and then such an earth for insphering the whole?

And doth it not enter my mind (as my warm tears attest)

the mistake,

Saul the failure, the ruin he seems now, and bid him awake

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From the dream, the probation, the prelude, to find himself set

Clear and safe in new light and new life,

So shall crown thee the topmost, ineffablest, uttermost crown

And thy love fill infinitude wholly, nor leave up nor down

One spot for the creature to stand in! It is by no breath,

Turn of eye, wave of hand, that salvation joins issue with death!

As thy Love is discovered almighty, almighty be proved

Thy power, that exists with and for it, of being Beloved!

He who did most, shall bear most; the strongest shall stand the most weak. 'Tis the weakness in strength, that I my flesh, that I seek

cry

for!

Will't please you sit and look at her? I said "Fra Pandolf" by design, for never read Strangers like you that pictured countenance, The depth and passion of its earnest glance, But to myself they turned (since none puts by The curtain I have drawn for you, but I) 10 And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst,

How such a glance came there; so, not the first

Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, 'twas not
Her husband's presence only, called that spot
Of joy into the Duchess' cheek: perhaps
Fra Pandolf chanced to say, "Her mantle laps
Over my lady's wrist too much," or "Paint
Must never hope to reproduce the faint
Half-flush that dies along her throat:" such
stuff

Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough
For calling up that spot of joy. She had 21
A heart how shall I say? too soon made

Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss, Or there exceed the mark"--and if she let Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse, - E'en then would be some stooping; and I choose

Never to stoop. Oh sir, she smiled, no doubt, Whene'er I passed her; but who passed with

out

Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands;