served us so well? Infinite cruelty rather that made everlasting Hell, Made us, fore knew us, foredoom'd us, and does what he will with his own; It is the ravings of a half mad man, yet the arguments are those of many people to day and so far the poem shows English life. Crabbe made the misforunes of Sir Eustice Grey fall because he doubted God and he made Ellen Orford, who had suffered as much as mortal frame could endure, say that we should humbly take what Heaven bestowed. Enoch Arden, The May Queen, and Sea Dreams, all show that beautiful, trusting faith in devine goodness which is such a striking characteristic of people who do believe in God's mercy. These poems show that some people, at least, were unaffected by the prevailing unret rest of the age. The Church Warden, and The Northern Farmer, Old Style, we have the feeling, were at bottom as good heathens as any old norsemen though they did pay their tithes and go to church. The church warden was a Baptist Wonst but now can't abeår 'em fur a lot on 'em coom'd ta-year to my pond to wash thessens there An' I doubts they poison'd the cow. .(1) Perhaps Ternyson is expressing his own dilike of dissenters here. Science. Tennyson was more affected by the scientific investi gations and discoveries of the age than with any oth er phase of its life. We find constant allusion to astronomical discoveries, or rather constant use of new astronomical facts. Tennyson's attitude toward progress in all lines was one of hopefulness. He says We sleep and wake and sleep, but all things move; The sun flies forward to his brother Sun; The dark Earth follows wheel'd in her ellipse; And human things returning on themselves Move onward, leading up the golden year. As a whole this is the attitude of all his characters. (2) The Golden Year 94, (1)886. |