4 i4 LITERARY PAPERS 



Likewise, 



"You let your eyes meet mine, touch what you term 

 Quietude, that 's an universe in germ 

 The dormant passion needing but a look 

 To burst into immense life!" 



Many examples will occur to one, not only in Browning's 

 life and soul studies of those out and in soul flashes, but in 

 the lives of real men and women where this sudden and de- 

 liberate self-dedication of the person to a fixed and noble 

 course quite opposite to the one before led denotes the ap- 

 prehensiveness and readiness of the individual to respond 

 to an inspiring voice. It is the voice of God, whether sound- 

 ing within or without us. It speaks in a language all may 

 learn, and needs no interpreter beyond the individual self. 

 The sinner or saint alike may be spoken to, but the ear which 

 has once heard will be deaf no more. 



Perhaps nowhere is this responsiveness to reaction more 

 markedly portrayed than in the scene between Ottima and 

 Sebald. In that situation the voice of God, by the simple 

 instrument of a young girl's song, penetrates above the words 

 and storms of passion, and the Truth, bursting forth over 

 that scene in all its horror and bareness, strikes, destroys, 

 and creates the man and woman anew. They now possess 

 the knowledge, by Truth, of passion and of the higher Love 

 beyond the material which their own love so dimly fore- 

 shadowed. Instantly was effected the transmutation of earthly 

 love to hatred and the passing over from earthly to heavenly 

 Love and unity with God. 



The sudden flashing and forcible emanation of Truth 

 inspires as the creative God-principle held by every woman 

 and man in common with others, worlds, and universes. Man 

 the creation is also as a spark one with the Creator. 



Browning says, "Truth remains true, the fault's in the 

 prover." Perhaps it may be the fault of our methods of search- 

 ing, if Truth's light is withheld for a time. But with a clear 

 intent and as faithful workers, great or small, all ranking the 

 same before God, with God's lamp pressed close to breast, 



