In everything on earth, from the Middle Ages to the amoeba, who is discussed at such length in "Mr.Sludge the Medium," he is interested in the life in things.

He was interested in the life in Italian art and in the life in Italian politics.
Perhaps the first and simplest example that can be given of this matter is in Browning's interest in art.

He was immeasurably fascinated at all times by painting and sculpture, and his sojourn in Italy gave him, of course, innumerable and perfect opportunities for the study of painting and sculpture.

But his interest in these studies was not like that of the ordinary cultured visitor to the Italian cities.

Thousands of such visitors, for example, study those endless lines of magnificent Pagan busts which are to be found in nearly all the Italian galleries and museums, and admire them, and talk about them, and note them in their catalogues, and describe them in their diaries.