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quenched by the years that overwhelm, or made ashamed by the shadows that betray;-shall abide for us, and with us, the greatest of these the abiding will—the abiding name of our Father-for the greatest of these is Charity.

[graphic]

MR. TENNYSON AND MR. BROWNING.

BY

EDWARD DOWDEN, M. A.,

PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE,
TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBlin.

MR. TENNYSON

A

AND

MR. BROWNING.

MONG the Literary Portraits of M. SainteBeuve are two placed side by side, and distinguished by more than a common share of that writer's-should we not say, that artist's -pureness of colour and graceful animation of outline. The portraits are those of Mathurin Regnier and André Chénier. They are brought together, not to suggest a series of skilful antitheses, not to form the subject of a parallel of the academic species, but because the comparison rests on an essentially logical basis, the two poets being admirable types of two poetical spirits or systems of thought and feeling, the one of which, as soon as it is thoroughly possessed, requires the other and forms its complement.

For a similar reason, two names might be brought together, which, in a superficial or vulgar way, appear often, and almost inevitably, side by side at the present day-the names of Mr. Tennyson and Mr. Browning. As Regnier and Chénier stood over one against the other, the types of two poetical spirits,

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