SOURCE: "With Christopher Smart," in Parleyings with Certain People of Importance in Their Day, Smith, Elder & Co., 1887, pp. 79-95.

Browning was an English poet and playwright who is considered one of the outstanding poets of the nineteenth century. Much of his poetry is expressive of his metaphysical concerns with the nature of and relationship between love, knowledge, and faith. His work greatly influenced later poets such as Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot. In the following poem, composed as an apostrophe to Smart, Browning marvels at the mind that could produce the singular achievement of A Song to David.