is
needs, it was inevitable that Robert Browning should find and seize upon
as his own all that was optimistic in Christian theology. Everything
that was hopeful his spirit accepted; everything that was sunny and
joyful and good for the brave soul he embraced. What was distressing he
rejected or explained away. In the world of Robert Browning _everything_
was right.

The range of subject covered by his poems is wider than that of any
other poet that ever lived; but the range of his ideas is exceedingly
small. We need not apologize for treating Browning as a theologian and a
doctor of philosophy, for he spent a long life in trying to show that a
poet is always really both--and he has almost convinced us. The
expositors and writers of text-books have had no difficulty in
formulating his theology, for it is of the simplest kind; and his views
on morality and art are logically a part of it. The "message" which
poets are conventionally presumed to deliver, was, in Browning's case, a
very definite creed, which may be found fully set forth in any one of
twenty poems. Every line of his poetry is logically dedicated to it.

He believes that the development of the individual soul is the main end
of existence. The strain and stress of life are incidental to growth,
and therefore desirable. Development and growth mean a closer union with
God. In fact, God is of not so much importance in Himself, but as the
end towards which man tends. That irreverent person who said that
Browning uses "God" as a pigment made an accurate criticism of his
theology. In Browning, God is adjective to man. Browning believes that
all conventional morality must be reviewed from the standpoint of how
conduct affects the actor himself, and what effect it has on his
individual growth. The province of art and of all thinking and working
is to make these truths clear and to grapple with the problems they give
rise to.

The first two fundamental beliefs of Browning--namely: (1) that,
ultimately speaking, the most important matter in the world is the soul
of a man; and (2) that a sense of effort is coincident with
development--are probably true. We instinctively feel them to be true,
and they seem to be receiving support from those quarters of research to
which we look for light, however dim. In the application of his dogmas
to specific cases in the field of ethics, Browning often reaches
conclusions which are fair subjects for disagreement. Since most of our