Page:Essays and Studies - Swinburne (1875).pdf/35



man who takes upon himself the task of commentary on a book of this rank feels something of the same hesitation and reluctance come upon him which fell upon the writer at starting. He cannot at once be sure whether he does right to go forward or not. It is not that he too feels the rising tide of the bitter waters of shame; it is not that he too sees a "star grow lesser in heaven." It is, if I may take up the poet's metaphor, that he sees the crowning star of a long night now dilated to a sun through the thunderclouds of the morning. He knows that this fire in heaven is indeed the fire of day; but he finds no fitting words of welcome or thanksgiving to salute so terrible a sunrise. Once more we receive from the hands of our supreme poet a book full of light and music; but a book written in tears and blood and characters of flame. We cannot but rejoice that it has been written, and grieve that ever it could have been. The child brought forth is visibly of divine birth, and his blood of the immortals; but he was brought forth with heartbreak and the pangs of "a terrible childbed." The delight we take in the majesty and beauty of this "mighty line" has been dearly purchased by the bitter occasion which evoked it. Yet it cannot but be with delight that we receive so great a gift as this from the chief poet of an age, and of an age