Why hold firm that you ought to be able at once
to know Browning's stops, and to pluck out the heart of his mystery?
Surely, if you do not understand him, the fact tells two ways. But,
if you _will_ understand him, you shall.
We have been desirous to explain and justify the state of feeling in
which we enter on the consideration of a new poem by Robert Browning.
Those who already feel with us will scarcely be disposed to forgive
the prolixity which, for the present, has put it out of our power to
come at the work itself: but, if earnestness of intention will plead
our excuse, we need seek for no other.
The Evil under the Sun
How long, oh Lord?--The voice is sounding still,
Not only heard beneath the altar stone,
Not heard of John Evangelist alone
In Patmos. It doth cry aloud and will
Between the earth's end and earth's end, until
The day of the great reckoning, bone for bone,
And blood for righteous blood, and groan for groan:
Then shall it cease on the air with a sudden thrill;
Not slowly growing fainter if the rod
Strikes one or two amid the evil throng,
Or one oppressor's hand is stayed and numbs,--
Not till the vengeance that is coming comes:
For shall all hear the voice excepting God?
Or God not listen, hearing?--Lord, how long?
_Published Monthly.
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