Introduction to Browning | Page 4

And then the poet's favorite art-form, the dramatic, or,
rather, psychologic, monologue, which is quite original with himself,
and peculiarly adapted to the constitution of his genius and to the
revelation of themselves by the several "dramatis personae", presents
certain structural difficulties, but difficulties which, with an increased
familiarity,
grow less and less. The exposition presented in the
Introduction, of its constitution and skilful management, and the
Arguments given of the several poems included in the volume, will, it
is hoped, reduce, if not altogether remove, the difficulties of this kind.
In the same section of the Introduction, certain peculiarities of the
poet's diction, which sometimes give a check to the reader's
understanding of a passage, are presented and illustrated.
I think it not necessary to offer any apology for my going all the way

back to Chaucer, and noting the Ebb and Flow in English Poetry down
to the present time, of the spirituality which constitutes the real life of
poetry, and which should, as far as possible, be brought to the
consciousness and appreciation of students. What I mean by spirituality
is explained in my treatment
of the subject. The degree to which
poetry is quickened with it should always enter into an estimate of its
absolute worth. It is that, indeed, which constitutes its absolute worth.

The weight of thought conveyed, whatever that be, will not
compensate for the absence of it.
The study of poetry, in our institutions of learning, so far as I have
taken note of it, and the education induced thereby,
are almost purely
intellectual. The student's spiritual nature is left to take care of itself;
and the consequence is that he becomes, at best, only a thinking and
analyzing machine.
The spiritual claims of the study of poetry are especially demanded in
the case of Browning's poetry. Browning is generally
and truly
regarded as the most intellectual of poets.
No poetry in English
literature, or in any literature,
is more charged with discursive
thought than his. But he is, at the same time, the most spiritual and
transcendental of poets, the "subtlest assertor of the Soul in Song". His
thought is never an end to itself, but is always subservient to an ulterior

spiritual end -- always directed towards "a presentment of
the
correspondency of the universe to Deity, of the natural to the spiritual,
and of the actual to the ideal"; and it is
all-important that students
should be awakened, and made,
as far as possible, responsive to this
spiritual end.
The sections of the Introduction on Personality and Art
were read
before the Browning Society of London, in June, 1882. I have seen no
reason for changing or modifying, in any respect, the views therein
expressed.
The idea of personality as a quickening, regenerating power, and the
idea of art as an intermediate agency of personality, are, perhaps, the

most reiterated (implicitly, not explicitly) in Browning's poetry, and
lead up to the dominant idea of Christianity, the idea of a Divine
Personality; the idea that the soul,
to use an expression from his
earliest poem, `Pauline',
must "rest beneath some better essence than
itself in weakness".
The notes to the poems will be found, I trust, to cover all points and
features of the text which require explanation and elucidation. I have
not, at any rate, wittingly passed by any real difficulties. Whether my
explanations and interpretations will in all cases be acceptable, remains
to be seen.
Hiram Corson.
Cascadilla Cottage, Ithaca, N.Y.
September, 1886.
Note to the Second Edition.
In this edition, several errors of the first have been corrected. For the
notes on "fifty-part canon", p. 156, and "a certain precious little tablet",
p. 232, I am indebted to Mr. Browning.
H. C.
{p. 156 -- in this etext, see line 322 of "The Flight of the Duchess", in
the Poems section. p. 232 -- see Stanza 30 of "Old Pictures in Florence",
also in the Poems section.}
Note to the Third Edition.
In this edition have been added, `A Death in the Desert',
with
argument, notes, and commentary, a fac-simile of a letter from the poet,
and a portrait copied from a photograph
(the last taken of him) which
he gave me when visiting him in Venice, a month before his death.
It may be of interest, and of some value, to many students
of
Browning's poetry, to know a reply he made, in regard to the
expression in `My Last Duchess', "I gave commands; then all smiles

stopped together."
We were walking up and down the great hall of the Palazzo Rezzonico,
when, in the course of what I was telling him about the study of his
works in the United States, I alluded to the divided opinion as to the
meaning of the above expression in `My Last Duchess', some
understanding that the commands were to put the Duchess to death, and
others, as I have