Elizabeth Barrett Browning

“ Kenyon suspected something—but if he ever did, his only reproof was a reduplicated praise of you—he praises you always and in relation to every sort of subject.
What a misomonsism you fell into yesterday, you who have much great work to do which no one else can do except just yourself!—and you, too, who have courage and knowledge, and must know that every work, with the principle of life in it, will live, let it be trampled ever so under the heel of a faithless and unbelieving generation—yes, that it will live like one of your toads, for a thousand years in the heart of a rock. ”

“ Ere he created,—leave the earth to God!
Lucifer. My foot is on the earth, firm as my sin.
Gabriel. I charge thee by the memory of heaven
Ere any sin was done,—leave earth to God!
Lucifer. My sin is on the earth, to reign thereon.
Gabriel. I charge thee by the choral song we sang,
When up against the white shore of our feet
The depths of the creation swelled and brake,—
And the new worlds, the beaded foam and flower
Of all that coil, roared outward into space
On thunder-edges,—leave the earth to God!
Lucifer. My woe is on the earth, to curse thereby. ”

“ And we would sooner vex a soul in heaven By coupling with it the dead body’s thought, It left behind it in a last month’s grave, Than, in my child, see other than ... my child. We only, never call him fatherless Who has God and his mother. O my babe, My pretty, pretty blossom, an ill-wind Once blew upon my breast! can any think I’d have another,—one called happier, A fathered child, with father’s love and race That’s worn as bold and open as a smile, To vex my darling when he’s asked his name And has no answer? ”

“ Certainly I would rather be a pagan whose religion was actual, earnest, continual—for week days, work days, and song days—than I would be a Christian who, from whatever motive, shrank from hearing or uttering the name of Christ out of a 'church.' I am no fanatic, but I like truth and earnestness in all things, and I cannot choose but believe that such a Christian shows but ill beside such a pagan. What pagan poet ever thought of casting his gods out of his poetry? In what pagan poem do they not shine and thunder? ”

“ For Dante sits in heaven and ye stand here,
And more remains for doing, all must feel,
Than trysting on his stone from year to year
To shift processions, civic toe to heel,
The town’s thanks to the Pitti. Are ye freer
For what was felt that day? a chariot-wheel
May spin fast, yet the chariot never roll.
But if that day suggested something good,
And bettered, with one purpose, soul by soul,—
Better means freer. A land’s brotherhood
Is most puissant: men, upon the whole,
Are what they can be,—nations, what they would.
Will therefore, to be strong, thou Italy!
Will to be noble! ”

“ Learn: the spirit's gravitation
Still must differ from the tear's.
Hope: with all the strength thou usest
In embracing thy despair.
Love: the earthly love thou losest
Shall return to thee more fair.
Work: make clear the forest-tangles
Of the wildest stranger-land
Trust: the blessèd deathly angels
Whisper, "Sabbath hours at hand!"
By the heart's wound when most gory,
By the longest agony,
Smile! Behold in sudden glory
The Transfigured smiles on thee!
And ye lifted up your head, and it seemed as if He said,
"My Belovèd, is it so?
Have ye tasted of my woe? ”

“ But you, at the end; this is all the harm: I wonder ... I confirm my soul in its belief in perpetual miraculousness ... I bless God with my whole heart that it is thus with you! And so, I will not even venture to say—so superfluous it were, though with my most earnest, most loving breath (I who do love you more at every breath I draw; indeed, yes dearest,) —I will not bid you—that is, pray you—to persevere! You have all my life bound to yours—save me from my 'seven years'—and God reward you! ”

“ For thus it is in heaven, that first God speaks, And then his angels. Oh, it does me good, It wipes me clean and sweet from devil’s dirt, That Romney Leigh should think me worthy still Of being his true and honourable wife! Henceforth I need not say, on leaving earth, I had no glory in it. For the rest, The reason’s ready (master, angel, friend, Be patient with me) wherefore you and I Can never, never, never join hands so. I know you’ll not be angry like a man (For you are none) when I shall tell the truth,— Which is, I do not love you, Romney Leigh, I do not love you. ”

“ This is no letter—love,—I make haste to tell you—to-morrow I will write. For here has a friend been calling and consuming my very destined time, and every minute seemed the last that was to be; and an old, old friend he is, beside—so—you must understand my defection, when only this scrap reaches you to-night! Ah, love,—you are my unutterable blessing,—I discover you, more of you, day by day,—hour by hour, I do think!—I am entirely yours,—one gratitude, all my soul becomes when I see you over me as now—God bless my dear, dearest. ”

“ But when I looked, her face was younger ... ay, Youth’s too bright not to be a little hard, And beauty keeps itself still uppermost, That’s true!—Though Lady Waldemar was kind, She hurt me, hurt, as if the morning-sun Should smite us on the eyelids when we sleep, And wake us up with headache. Ay, and soon Was light enough to make my heart ache too: She told me truths I asked for ... ’twas my fault ... ‘That Romney could not love me, if he would, As men call loving; there are bloods that flow Together, like some rivers, and not mix, Through contraries of nature. ”

“ I have your memory, the knowledge of you, the idea of you printed into my heart and brain,—on that, I can live my life—but it is for you, the dear, utterly generous creature I know you, to give me more and more beyond mere life—to extend life and deepen it—as you do, and will do. Oh, how I love you when I think of the entire truthfulness of your generosity to me—how, meaning and willing to give, you gave nobly! Do you think I have not seen in this world how women who do love will manage to confer that gift on occasion? ”

“ Good love, howe’er ill-placed, Is better for a man’s soul in the end, Than if he loved ill what deserves love well. A pagan, kissing, for a step of Pan, The wild-goat’s hoof-print on the loamy down, Exceeds our modern thinker who turns back The strata ... granite, limestone, coal, and clay, Concluding coldly with, ‘Here’s law! Where’s God?’
And then at worse,—if Romney loves her not,— At worst,—if he’s incapable of love, Which may be—then indeed, for such a man Incapable of love, she’s good enough; For she, at worst too, is a woman still And loves him ... as the sort of woman can. ”

“ And yet, forbid, That any irreverent fancy or conceit Should litter in the Drama’s throne-room, where The rulers of our art, in whose full veins Dynastic glories mingle, sit in strength And do their kingly work,—conceive, command, And, from the imagination’s crucial heat, Catch up their men and women all a-flame For action, all alive, and forced to prove Their life by living out heart, brain, and nerve, Until mankind makes witness, ‘These be men As we are,’ and vouchsafes the kiss that’s due To Imogen and Juliet—sweetest kin On art’s side. ”

“ The only teachers who instruct mankind, From just a shadow on a charnel-wall, To find man’s veritable stature out, [32] Erect, sublime,—the measure of a man, And that’s the measure of an angel, says The apostle. Ay, and while your common men Build pyramids, gauge railroads, reign, reap, dine, And dust the flaunty carpets of the world For kings to walk on, or our senators, The poet suddenly will catch them up With his voice like a thunder ... ‘This is soul, This is life, this word is being said in heaven, Here’s God down on us! ”

“ Ay, clean as Marian Erle: As Marian Leigh, I know, I were not clean: I have not so much life that I should love, ... Except the child. Ah God! I could not bear To see my darling on a good man’s knees, And know by such a look, or such a sigh, Or such a silence, that he thought sometimes, ‘This child was fathered by some cursed wretch’ ... For, Romney,—angels are less tender-wise Than God and mothers: even you would think What we think never. He is ours, the child ”