POMEGRANATES
FROM AN ENGLISH GARDEN:
A SELECTION FROM THE POEMS OF
ROBERT BROWNING.
WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY
JOHN MONRO GIBSON.
“Or from Browning some ‘Pomegranate,’ which, if cut deep down the
middle,
Shows a heart within, blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity.”
_Lady Geraldine’s Courtship._
NEW YORK:
CHAUTAUQUA PRESS,
C. L. S. C. Department.
1885.
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The required books of the C. L. S. C. are recommended by a Council of
six. It must, however, be understood that recommendation does not
involve an approval by the Council, or by any member of it, of every
principle or doctrine contained in the book recommended.
Copyright 1885, by PHILLIPS & HUNT, 805 Broadway, New York.
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INTRODUCTORY.
The name of Robert Browning has been before the world now for fifty
years. For the greater part of the time his work has had so little
recognition, that one marvels at his courage in going so steadily on
with it. His “Pomegranates” have been produced year after year, decade
after decade, in unfailing abundance; and, while critics have kept
paring at the rind, and the general public has not even asked if there
was anything beneath it, he has laboured on with unremitting energy,
calmly awaiting the time when “the heart within, blood-tinctured, of a
veined humanity,” should be at length discovered. It can scarcely be
said, even yet, that that time has come; but it is coming fast. Already
he is something more than “the poet’s poet.” Few intelligent people now
are content to know one of the master minds of the age simply as the
author of “The Pied Piper of Hamelin,” as if that were the only thing he
had written worth reading!
That the form in which the thought of Browning is cast is altogether
admirable, is what none but his most undiscriminating admirers will
assert. It is often, unquestionably, rough and forbidding. But there is
strength even in its ruggedness; and in its entire freedom from
conventionality there is a charm such as one enjoys in wild mountain
scenery, even though only in little patches it may have any suggestion
of the garden or the lawn. There are those who have charged the poet
with affectation of the uncouth and the bizarre; but careful reading
will, we think, render it apparent that it is rather his utter freedom
from affectation which determines and perpetuates the peculiarities and
oddities of his style; that, in fact, the aphorism of Buffon, “_le style
est l’homme même_,” is undoubtedly true as applied to him. It would, of
course, be absurd to claim for the pomegranate the bloom and beauty of
the peach; but, equally with the other, it is Nature’s gift, and to toss
aside a rough-rinded fruit because it needs to be “cut deep down the
middle” before its pulp and juices can be reached, is surely far from
wise. Even hard nuts are not to be despised, if the kernels are good;
and as to Browning’s “nuts,” we have this to say, that not only are they
well worth cracking, but there is in the process excellent exercise for
the teeth.
This brings us to the alleged “obscurity” of Browning’s writings, which
still continues to be the main obstacle to their general appreciation.
It is freely admitted that often it is not quite easy, and sometimes
very difficult, to understand him; and it is hard for most people to see
why he could not make his meaning plainer, and matter for regret to
many, who heartily admire him, that he has not done so. That he has
taken some pains to this end is evident from what he says in the preface
to “Sordello,” written for an edition issued in 1863, twenty-three years
after its original publication: “My own faults of expression were
many.... I blame nobody, least of all myself, who did my best then and
since, for I lately gave time and pains to turn my work into what the
many might—instead of what the few must—like.” In a later preface (1872)
he says, “Nor do I apprehend any more charges of being wilfully obscure,
unconscientiously careless, or perversely harsh.” The true explanation
of it seems to be what we have already suggested, that he does not think
of his audience as he writes, his only care being to express the thought
in the way which comes most natural to him. As a dramatist, he can throw
himself with abandonment into the persons he represents; but he never
seems to think of putting himself in the position of a listener, or, if
he does, he assumes too readily that he has a mind of similar texture
and grasp to his own. On the other hand, it is fair to say that the
difficulty of understanding him arises in great part from the very
excellence of his work. The following considerations will illustrate
what we mean:—
1. His work is full of _thought_, and the thought is never commonplace.
There is so much of it, and all is so fresh, and therefore unfamiliar,
that some mental effort is necessary to grasp it. The following
characteristic remark of Bishop Butler, in his preface to the famous
Fifteen Sermons, is worth consideration in this connection: “It must be
acknowledged that some of the following Discourses are very abstruse and
difficult; or, if you please, obscure; but I must take leave to add that
those alone are judges, whether or no and how far this is a fault, who
are judges, whether or no and how far it might have been avoided—those
only who will be at the trouble to understand what is here said, and to
see how far the things here insisted upon, and not other things, might
have been put in a plainer manner; which yet I am very far from
asserting that they could not.”
2. The expression is always the briefest. Not only are no words wasted,
but, where connecting ideas are easily supplied, they are often left
unexpressed, the intelligence and mental activity of the reader being
always taken for granted.
3. The poems are, for the most part, dramatic in principle. The reader
is brought face to face with some soul, in its thoughts and emotions,
frequently in the very process of the thinking and the feeling. The poet
has stepped aside, and of course supplies no key. The author does not
appear, like the chorus in a Greek play, to point a moral or explain the
situation. The _dramatis personæ_ must explain themselves. And, just as
Shakespeare must be _studied_ in order to an appreciation other than
second-hand, so must Browning be studied in order to be appreciated at
all; for his writings are not yet old enough to secure much second-hand
enthusiasm.
4. The wealth of allusion is another source of difficulty. The learning
of our poet is encyclopædic; and though there is no display of it, there
is large use of it; and it often happens that passages or phrases, which
seem crabbed or obscure, require only the knowledge of some unfamiliar
fact in science or in history, or it may be something not readily
thought of, and yet within easy range of a keen enough observation, to
light them up and reveal unsuspected strength or beauty.
Before leaving the subject of the rough and often tough exterior of
Browning’s work, it may be interesting to refer to the characteristic
illustration of it he has lately given us in the prologue to
“Ferishtah’s Fancies,” his most recent work. He begins by asking the
reader whether he has ever “eaten ortolans in Italy,” and then goes on
to describe the preparation of them. The following lines will show the
use he makes of the illustration:
“First comes plain bread, crisp, brown, a toasted square;
Then, a strong sage-leaf;
(So we find books with flowers dried here and there
Lest leaf engage leaf.)
First, food—then, piquancy—and last of all
Follows the thirdling;
Through wholesome hard, sharp soft, your tooth must bite
Ere reach the birdling.
Now, were there only crust to crunch, you’d wince:
Unpalatable!
Sage-leaf is bitter-pungent—so’s a quince;
Eat each who’s able!
But through all three bite boldly—lo, the gust!
Flavour—no fixture—
Flies permeating flesh and leaf and crust
In fine admixture.
So with your meal, my poem; masticate
Sense, sight and song there!
Digest these, and I praise your peptics’ state,
Nothing found wrong there.”
This extract also furnishes an example of the strange rhymes in which
the poet sometimes indulges, with what appears too little refinement of
taste.
The themes of Browning’s poetry are the very greatest that can engage
the thought of man. He ranges over a vast variety of topic; but,
wherever his thought may lead him, he never loses sight of that which is
to him the centre of all, the human soul, with its infinite wants and
capabilities. In the preface to “Sordello” he says: “The historical
decoration was purposely of no more importance than a background
requires; and my stress lay on the incidents in the development of a
soul: little else is worth study. I, at least, always thought so.” To
this principle he has kept true through all his work; and hence it is
that, whether the particular subject be love, or home, or country;
poetry, painting, or music; life, death, or immortality; it is dealt
with in its relation to “the development of a soul.” Hence it is that
his poetry is so thoroughly and profoundly spiritual, and so exceedingly
valuable as a counteractive to the materialism of the age, which ever
tends to merge the soul in the body, and swallow up the real in mere
phenomena.
As might be expected of one who deals so profoundly with all that he
touches, the great reality of the universe to him is God. Agnosticism
has little mercy at his hands; if a man knows anything at all, he knows
God. And the God whom he knows is not a God apart, looking down from
some infinite or indefinite height upon the world, but one in whom all
live and move and have their being. Out of this springs, of course, the
hope of immortality, and also that bright and cheerful view of life so
completely opposed to the dark pessimism to which much of the
unbelieving speculation of the present day so painfully tends. The dark
things of human life and destiny are by no means ignored; rather are
they dwelt on with a painful and sometimes frightful realism; but even
amid deepest darkness the light above is never quite extinguished, and
some little “Pippa passes” singing:
“The year’s at the spring
And day’s at the morn;
Morning’s at seven;
The hill-side’s dew-pearled;
The lark’s on the wing;
The snail’s on the thorn:
God’s in his heaven—
All’s right with the world.”
There has been much discussion as to Browning’s personal attitude to
Christianity. The profoundly Christian tone of his writings is, of
course, universally acknowledged; but attempts are sometimes made to
evade the force of those numerous passages in which he speaks of the
Incarnation, and Death, and Resurrection of the Lord Jesus, in a way
which seems to imply his hearty acceptance of the substance of what is
known as evangelical truth. Much has been made in this connection of the
way in which, in one of his prefaces, he characterises his work as
“poetry always dramatic in principle, and so many utterances of so many
imaginary persons, not mine;” and it has been asserted that it is as
unwarrantable to consider him to be speaking his own sentiments in a
poem like “Christmas Eve,” as in one like “Johannes Agricola,” or
“Bishop Blougram’s Apology.” The obvious answer is that this profound
sympathy with the Christ of God and His salvation is not found in some
solitary production, but appears and reappears, often when least
expected, all through his works. In that remarkable little poem,
entitled “House,” in which more strongly than anywhere else he claims
personal privacy, while he declines to be regarded as having furnished
his publishers with tickets to view his own soul’s dwelling, he admits
that “whoso desires to penetrate deeper” may do so “by the spirit
sense;” and accordingly some of his admirers, who dissent from him most
strongly on this point, are the most ready to acknowledge that his
Christian faith is no stage suit, but the very garment of his soul. As
illustration of this we may refer to the admirable essay by the late
James Thomson, published in Part II. of the Browning Society’s Papers,
in which, after expressing his amazement that a great mind like
Browning’s could be Christian, he asserts the, to him, remarkable but
quite undeniable fact in these words: “The devout and hopeful Christian
faith, explicitly or implicitly affirmed in such poems as _Saul_,
_Kharshish_, _Cleon_, _Caliban upon Setebos_, _A Death in the Desert_,
_Instans Tyrannus_, _Rabbi Ben Ezra_, _Prospice_, the _Epilogue_, and
throughout that stupendous monumental work, _The Ring and the Book_,
must surely be as clear as noonday to even the most purblind vision.”
That a great Christian poet, in an age when so many of the intellectual
magnates of the time are hostile or simply silent, should remain unknown
or little known to any large proportion of Christian readers, is
certainly very much to be regretted. Surely the admiration which is
freely and generously accorded to his work by many who are constrained
to it in spite of his faith in a Christ whom they reject, is a rebuke to
the indifference of those who, sharing his faith, do not give themselves
the trouble to inquire what he has to say about it. There are not so
many avowed and outspoken Christians in the highest walks of literature
that we can afford to pay only slight attention to the utterances of one
who has the ear of the deepest thinkers in every school of thought all
the world over.
* * * * *
The immediate object of this selection is to supply an introduction to
the study of Browning for the benefit of the readers of the Chautauqua
Literary and Scientific Circle; but it is hoped that many others,
inspired with similar aims, and who have not had such advantages that
they can dispense with all assistance in the study of a difficult
author, may find help from this little book. It is, of course, better to
read for one’s self than to follow the guidance of another; and yet it
may be necessary to open a path far enough to lead within sight of the
treasures in store. This is all that has been attempted here—only the
indication of a few veins near the surface of a rich mine, which the
reader is strongly recommended to explore for himself.
The selection has been arranged on the principle of beginning with that
which is simple, and proceeding gradually to the more complex, with some
regard also to variety and progress in subjects, and at the same time to
appropriateness for the use of those younger readers for whom this
selection mainly is intended.
The notes are meant to serve only as a guide to beginners; and as guides
are proverbially an annoyance when their services are imposed unsought,
these are disposed at the end of each poem, and without reference marks
to mar the pages, so that the selection may be read, if desired, without
any interference from the notes.
Within the limits of a volume like this, only the shorter poems could
find a place. Most valuable extracts from the longer works might have
been given; but this is always a questionable method of dealing with the
best writers, with those especially whose thought is strictly
consecutive, while the effect of particular passages depends to a large
extent on their setting and their relation to the work as a whole. The
only[A] exception to this is the treatment of “Christmas Eve and Easter
Day,” with extracts from which this volume closes. That remarkable work
occupies a middle position between the shorter and the longer poems of
our author; and, though too long for insertion entire, is yet so
important, that it seemed very desirable to give some idea of it. In
furnishing a series of extracts from this work, an attempt has been made
to reduce the disadvantage above referred to by supplying along with
them a slight sketch or “argument,” so as to give some idea, to those
unacquainted with it, of the course of thought throughout.
It is right to say that Mr. Browning has given his kind permission for
the publication in the United States of this Selection, and also of the
Notes, for which, however, as for the selection itself, he is in no wise
responsible.
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Footnote A:
It has been found necessary also to give only the latter part of the
noble poem “Saul.” A slight sketch of the part omitted is given, and
the poem is continued without interruption to its close.
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