Not tithed with days' and years' decease He pays thy wage He owed, But with imperishable peace Here in His own abode, Thy jealous God. _Still armed_ refers to the representation of the dead knight in full armour. Mediæval faith imagined the warrior armed in the spiritual world as he was in this life; and the ghosts of dead knights used to appear in armour. The general meaning of these stanzas is, "God now gives you the reward which he owed to you; and unlike rewards given to men in this world, your heavenly reward is not diminished by the certainty that you cannot enjoy it except for a certain number of days or years. God does not keep anything back out of his servants' wages--no tithe or tenth. You will be with her forever." The adjective "jealous" applied to God is a Hebrew use of the term; but it has here a slightly different meaning. The idea is this, that Heaven is jealous of human love when human love alone is a motive of duty. Therefore the reward of duty need not be expected in this world but only in Heaven. Outside of the sonnets, which we must consider separately, I do not know any more beautiful example of the mystical feeling of love in Rossetti than this. It will not be necessary to search any further for examples in this special direction; I think you will now perfectly understand one of the peculiar qualities distinguishing Rossetti from all the other Victorian poets--the mingling of religious with amatory emotion in the highest form of which the language is capable. III