This serious converse shows a political mind, fed on the spectacle of affairs, having in the matter of public and practical debates the superiority which the French have in speculative discussions and social conversation. So, amidst the dryness of polemics break forth sudden splendors, a poetic fount, a prayer from the heart's depths; the English well of concentrated passion is on a sudden opened again with a flow and a spirit which Dryden does not elsewhere exhibit: "Dim as the borrow'd beams of moon and stars To lonely, weary, wand'ring travellers, Is reason to the soul: and as on high Those rolling fires discover but the sky, Not light us here; so Reason's glimm'ring ray Was lent, not to assure our doubtful way, But guide us upward to a better day. And as those nightly tapers disappear When day's bright lord ascends our hemisphere, So pale grows Reason at Religion's sight, So dies, and so dissolves in supernatural light."[473] "But, gracious God! how well dost thou provide For erring judgments an unerring guide! Thy throne is darkness in th' abyss of light, A blaze of glory that forbids the sight. O teach me to believe Thee thus conceal'd, And search no farther than Thyself reveal'd; But her alone for my director take, Whom Thou hast promised never to forsake! My thoughtless youth was wing'd with vain desires; My manhood, long misled by wandering fires, Follow'd false lights; and when their glimpse was gone, My pride struck out new sparkles of her own. Such was I, such by nature still I am; Be Thine the glory and be mine the shame! Good life be now my task; my doubts are done."[474] Such is the poetry of these serious minds. After having strayed in the debaucheries and pomps of the Restoration, Dryden found his way to the grave emotions of the inner life; though a Romanist, he felt like a Protestant the wretchedness of man and the presence of grace: he was capable of enthusiasm. Here and there a manly and soul-stirring verse discloses, in the midst of his reasonings, the power of conception and the inspiration of desire. When the tragic is met with, he takes to it as to his own domain; at need, he deals in the horrible. He has described the infernal chase, and the torture of the young girl worried by dogs, with the savage energy of Milton.[475] As a contrast, he loved nature: this taste always endures in England; the sombre, reflective passions are unstrung in the grand peace and harmony of the fields. Landscapes are to be met with amidst theological disputation: "New blossoms flourish and new flowers arise, As God had been abroad, and walking there Had left his footsteps and reformed the year. The sunny hills from far were seen to glow With glittering beams, and in the meads below The burnished brooks appeared with liquid gold to flow. As last they heard the foolish Cuckoo sing, Whose note proclaimed the holy day of spring."[476]