These exquisite lyrics are much more adequate expressions of Browning's faith than the dialogues which professedly embody it.

They transfer the discussion from the jangle of the schools and the cavils of the market-place to the passionate persuasions of the heart and the intimate experiences of love, in which all Browning's mysticism had its root.

Thus Ferishtah's pragmatic, almost philistine, doctrine of "Plot-culture," by which human life is peremptorily walled in within its narrow round of tasks, "minuteness severed from immensity," is followed by the lyric which tells how Love transcends those limits, making an eternity of time and a universe of solitude.

Finally, the burden of these wayward intermittent strains of love-music is caught up, with an added intensity drawn from the poet's personal love and sorrow, in the noble Epilogue.

As he listens to the call of Love, the world becomes an enchanted place, resounding with the triumph of good and the exultant battle-joy of heroes.