hts of the day touched into song.
He picked up his subjects as a man culls flowers in a mountain walk,
moved by an ever-recurring joy and fancy in them--a book on a stall, a
bust in an Italian garden, a face seen at the opera, the market chatter
of a Tuscan town, a story told by the roadside in Brittany, a picture in
some Accademia--so that, though the ground-thought might incur the
danger of dulness through repetition, the joy of the artist so filled
the illustration, and his freshness of invention was so delighted with
itself, that even to the reader the theory seemed like a new star.

In this way he kept the use of having an unwavering basis of thought
which gave unity to his sixty years of work, and yet avoided the peril
of monotony. An immense diversity animated his unity, filled it with
gaiety and brightness, and secured impulsiveness of fancy. This also
differentiates him from Tennyson, who often wanted freshness; who very
rarely wrote on a sudden impulse, but after long and careful thought; to
whose seriousness we cannot always climb with pleasure; who played so
little with the world. These defects in Tennyson had the excellences
which belong to them in art, just as these excellences in Browning had,
in art, their own defects. We should be grateful for the excellences,
and not trouble ourselves about the defects. However, neither the
excellences nor the defects concern us in the present discussion. It is
the contrast between the two men on which we dwell.

5. The next point of contrast, which will further illustrate why
Browning was not read of old but is now read, has to do with historical
criticism. There arose, some time ago, as part of the scientific and
critical movement of the last forty years, a desire to know and record
accurately the early life of peoples, pastoral, agricultural and in
towns, and the beginning of their arts and knowledges; and not only
their origins, but the whole history of their development. A close,
critical investigation was made of the origins of each people; accurate
knowledge, derived from contemporary documents, of their life, laws,
customs and language was attained; the facts of their history were
separated from their mythical and legendary elements; the dress, the
looks of men, the climate of the time, the physical aspects of their
country--all the skeleton of things was fitted together, bone to bone.
And for a good while this merely critical school held the field. It did
adm