Nothing bolder, more incalculable, was ever done by a poet in the period of his storm and stress.

The boundless and to express it, was never sought with more audacity.

It was impossible, in this effort, for him to be clear, and we need not be vexed with him.

The daring, the rush, the unconsciousness and the youth of it all, are his excuse, but not his praise.

And when the public comes to understand that the dimness and complexity of _Sordello_ arise from plenteousness not scarcity of thought, and that they were not a pose of the poet's but the natural leaping of a full fountain just let loose from its mountain chamber, it will have a personal liking, not perhaps for the poem but for Browning.