Robert Browning (1812 – 1889)
English poet and husband of Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
'Tis not what man Does which exalts him, but what man Would do!
When the fight begins within himself,
A man 's worth something.
Every joy is gain
And gain is gain, however small.
Be sure that God
Ne'er dooms to waste the strength he deigns impart.
A minute's success pays the failure of years.
Who hears music feels his solitude
Peopled at once.
For I say this is death and the sole death,
When a man's loss comes to him from his gain,
Darkness from light, from knowledge ignorance,
And lack of love from love made manifest.
The ultimate, angels' law,
Indulging every instinct of the soul
There where law, life, joy, impulse are one thing!
I do what many dream of, all their lives,
Dream? strive to do, and agonize to do,
And fail in doing. I could count twenty such
On twice your fingers, and not leave this town,
Who strive you don't know how the others strive
To paint a little thing like that you smeared
Carelessly passing with your robes afloat
Yet do much less, so much less, Someone says,
(I know his name, no matter) so much less!
Well, less is more, Lucrezia: I am judged.
There burns a truer light of God in them,
In their vexed beating stuffed and stopped-up brain,
Heart, or whate'er else, than goes on to prompt
This low-pulsed forthright craftsman's hand of mine.
The heavens and earth stay as they were; my heart
Beats as it beat: the truth remains the truth.
Take away love, and our earth is a tomb!
Our interest's on the dangerous edge of things.
The honest thief, the tender murderer,
The superstitious atheist.
Progress is
The law of life: man is not Man as yet.
Truth is within ourselves.
One who never turned his back but marched breast forward,
Never doubted clouds would break,
Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph,
Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better,
Sleep to wake.
Any nose
May ravage with impunity a rose.
Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made:
Our times are in his hand
Who saith, "A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God: see all, nor be afraid!"
God be thanked, the meanest of his creatures
Boasts two soul-sides,one to face the world with,
One to show a woman when he loves her!
The body sprang
At once to the height, and stayed; but the soul,no!