The mood itself, which strengthens by using. (ll. 238-245.) The speaker is quite willing (when at a distance from the Chapel) to admit this right of attempting a reproduction of that mood in which the original conversion may have been effected. Nevertheless, he will _not_ admit the right of the flock to shut the gate of the fold in the face of any outsider seeking entrance. Still Mine's the same right with your poorest and sickliest Supposing I don the marriage vestiment. (ll. 119-120.) In _Johannes Agricola in Meditation_ this personal satisfaction of the Calvinist is presented in a still more extreme form. Ere suns and moons could wax and wane, Ere stars were thundergirt, or piled The heavens, God thought on me his child; Ordained a life for me, arrayed Its circumstances every one To the minutest. And this pre-ordained object of the Divine Love may assert with confidence-- I have God's warrant, could I blend All hideous sins, as in a cup, To drink the mingled venoms up; Secure my nature will convert The draught to blossoming gladness fast. Thus happiness assured, inevitable, for the elect. For those excluded from the sacred number-- I gaze below on hell's fierce bed, And those its waves of flame oppress, Swarming in ghastly wretchedness; Whose life on earth aspired to be One altar-smoke, so pure!--to win If not love like God's love for me, At least to keep his anger in; And all their striving turned to sin. It is difficult to believe that the author of _this_ poem, at any rate, would willingly have identified himself with the Calvinistic creed. To Caliban, a creature so largely devoid of moral sense, we have, indeed, seen him assigning a belief closely akin to that involved in the meditations of Johannes, when he refers to the difference of the fates irrevocably allotted by Setebos to himself and to Prospero; both theories in curious contrast with the reflections of the Book of _Wisdom_: "For thou lovest all the things that are, and abhorrest nothing which thou hast made: for never wouldest thou have made anything, if thou hadst hated it.... But thou sparest all, for they are thine, O Lord, thou lover of souls."[62] Thus is explained "the trick of exclusiveness." What of the "fine irreverence" of the preacher? Here the success of the sermon as a means of spiritual conviction, is held to be dependent upon the attitude of mind of the listener. 'Tis the taught already that profits by teaching. (l. 255.)