Some power there was that counter-worked my work
With hand too swift for sight, which, crossing mine,
Set warp 'gainst woof and ever with my dawn
Inwove its night. What hand was that I know not:
Perchance it was the Demon's of my House;
Perchance a Hand Divine.
But as the great silence draws upon Jerome, his voice rings out in challenge:
Paula, what is earth?
A little bubble trembling ere it breaks,
The plaything of that grey-haired infant, Time,
Who breaks whate'er he plays with. I was strong:
See how he played with me. Am I not broken?
Albeit I strove with men of might; albeit
Those two great Gregories clasped me palm to palm;
Albeit I fought with beasts at Ephesus
And bear their tokens still; albeit the wastes
Knew me, and lions fled; albeit this hand,
Wrinkled and prone, hurled to the dust God's scorners,
Am I not broken? Lo, this hour I raise
High o'er that ruin and wreck of life not less
This unsubverted head that bent not ever,
And make my great confession ere I die,
Since hope I have, though earthly hope no more.
And this is my confession: God is great;
There is no other greatness: God is good;
There is no other goodness. He alone
Is true existence: all beside is dream.
That is de Vere's high-water mark in the dramatic monologue; there are less felicitous instances. Browning's method in the soliloquy was, it will be remembered, to reproduce the broken sentences, the seemingly irrelevant thoughts, the passionate outbursts of a soul communing with itself; hence his dramatic truthfulness—hence, also, a measure of ambiguity. With de Vere the tendency was rather to be too clear, too ex-
