With canvas, not with arras, clothe their shame;
Let Follie speak in her own native tongue:
True Beautie dwells on high; ours in a flame
But borrow’d thence to light us thither;
Beautie and beauteous words should go together.”
(“The Forerunners,” ll. 25–30.)
So intimately has this notion of the spiritual nature of true beauty blended with the simple experience of his devotional life that he can ask
“Is there in truth no beautie?
Is all good structure in a winding-stair?
May no lines passe, except they do their dutie