primarily the spontaneous tone of a healthy, happy nature, it became the chosen key-note of all his music, and he works it out through a hundred harmonies and discords. He is “sure of goodness as of life.” He does not ask “How came good into the world?” For that, after all, is the pessimistic question; it assumes that the ground of things is evil and the good is the breaking of the rule. He asks instead “How came evil into the world?” That is the optimistic question; as long as a man puts it in that form he is an optimist at heart; he takes it for granted that good is the native element and evil is the intruder; there must be a solution of the problem whether he can find it or not; the rule must be superior to, and triumphant over, the exception; the meaning and purpose of evil must somehow, some time, be proved subordinate to good. That is Browning’s position: “My own hope is, a sun will pierce The thickest cloud earth ever stretched; That, after Last, returns the First, Though a wide compass round be fetched; That what began best, can’t end worst, Nor what God blessed once prove accurst.” The way in which he justifies this position is characteristic of the man. His optimism is far less defensive than it is militant. He never wavers from his intuitive conviction that “the world means good.” He follows this instinct as a soldier follows his banner, into whatever difficulties and conflicts it may lead him, and fights his way out, now with the weapons of philosophy, now with the bare sword of faith. VI It might seem at first as if it were unfair to attempt any estimate of the philosophic and religious teaching of a poet like Browning, whose method we have already recognized as dramatic. Can we ascribe to the poet himself the opinions which he puts into the mouths of his characters? Can we hold him responsible for the sentiments which are expressed by the actors on his stage? Certainly this objection must be admitted as a restraint in the interpretation of his poetry. We are not to take all that his characters say, literally and directly, as his own belief, any more than we are to read the speeches of Satan, and Eliphaz, and Bildad, and Zophar, in the Book of Job, as utterances of the spirit of inspiration. But just as that great dramatic Scripture, dealing with the problems of evil and suffering and sovereignty, does contain a doctrine and convey a lesson, so the poetry of Browning, taken as a whole, utters a distinct and positive prophetic message.