She waited not for his reply, But, with a downward leaden eye, Went on as if he were not by. Then, having wholly overthrown His views, and stripped them to the bone, Proceeded to unfold her own. * * * * * "Shall Man be Man? And shall he miss Of other thoughts no thoughts but this, Harmonious dews of sober bliss? "What boots it? Shall his fevered eye Through towering nothingness descry The grisly phantom hurry by? "And hear dumb shrieks that fill the air; See mouths that gape and eyes that stare, And redden in the dusky glare? "Yet still before him, as he flies, One pallid form shall ever rise, And bodying forth in glassy eyes. "The vision of a vanished good, Low peering through the tangled wood, Shall freeze the current of his blood." Till, like a silent water-mill, When summer suns have dried the rill, She reached a full stop, and was still. To muse a little space did seem, Then like the echo of a dream, Harped back upon her threadbare theme. Still an attentive ear he bent, But could not fathom what she meant: She was not deep, nor eloquent. * * * * * But, in truth, Tennyson has never failed so signally as when he has attempted to be metaphysical, and although his admirers have written many essays to explain the profundity of his ideas, and the beauties of his philosophy, their explanations seem to require some explaining, whilst it also seems that general readers fail to discern the charm in his would-be philosophical writings. The _Higher Pantheism_ may be taken as an instance. It commences thus:-- The sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills and the plains-- Are not these, O Soul, the vision of Him who reigns? Is not the vision He? tho' He be not that which he seems? Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams? Dark is the world to thee; thyself art the reason why; For is He not all but thou, that hast power to feel "I am I!" There are several other couplets which do not tend to unravel the poet's tangled web of thought, whereas if we turn to _The Heptalogia_ (Chatto and Windus, 1880), we find the whole mystery treated with much greater lucidity of expression in _The Higher Pantheism in a Nutshell_. ONE, who is not, we see; but one, whom we see not, is: Surely this is not that; but that is assuredly this. What, and wherefore, and whence? for under is over and under: If thunder could be without lightning, lightning could be without thunder. Doubt is faith in the main; but faith on the whole is doubt: We cannot believe by proof; but could we believe without? Why, and whither, and how? for barley and rye are not clover: Neither are straight lines curves; yet over is under and over. * * * * *