404 
LITERARY PAPERS 
In “Bifurcation” he says: — 
“ Duty and love, one broad way, were the best — 
Who doubts? But one or other was to choose, 
I chose the darkling half.” 
Where duty and sentiment conflict and duty is chosen, love 
should not be simulated. Life’s “worn causeway” should 
not be walked “arm in arm with friend,” while caressing the 
ear with words of “truth turned falsehood.” “How I loathe a 
flower, how prize the pavement!” It is right that the one for 
whom we choose duty should know how few of heart’s flowers 
we have to offer. Dead fruit as well as sacrifices are not always 
acceptable gifts: this should not be forgotten by altruists. 
The Truth is often painful to tell; it is painful to hear. 
Truth in whatsoever way it comes, even if it brings a shock, 
is better than a lie. Browning speaks of the — 
“rough but wholesome shock, 
And accident which comes to kill or cure. 
A jerk which means a dislocated joint! 
Such happy chance, at cost of twinge, no doubt, 
Into the socket back again put truth, 
And stopped the limb from longer dragging lie.” 
And for those who have grown indolent with “maws out of 
sorts” he prescribes a healthful cure. 
“ Don’t nettles make a broth — 
Wholesome for blood grown lazy and thick ? ” 
Very few pages of Browning’s works do not contain some 
reference to Truth. It is always to the same purport; death 
were better than untrue life; for death will bring the truth of 
many a thing to the surface. This is reasoned over in the poem 
“Before and After.” Willingness to die for the truth is brought 
out witlrtelling power in “Ned Bratts” and “In the Balcony.” 
To give up worldly honors for Truth is beautifully and 
simply expressed by Colombe. “I take him, — give up Juliers 
and the world.” And in “Daniel Bartoli” the wife of but an 
hour, to save her husband’s “honor” and her “soul,” gives up 
the duke, and wealth. How little are the materialities of life, 
