Get out the microscope, because we’re going through this poem line-by-line.
Lines 2725-2740
Thy voice is on the rolling air;
I hear thee where the waters run;
Thou standest in the rising sun,
And in the setting thou art fair.
What art thou then? I cannot guess;
But tho' I seem in star and flower
To feel thee some diffusive power,
I do not therefore love thee less:
My love involves the love before;
My love is vaster passion now;
Tho' mix'd with God and Nature thou,
I seem to love thee more and more.
Far off thou art, but ever nigh;
I have thee still, and I rejoice;
I prosper, circled with thy voice;
I shall not lose thee tho' I die.
- The speaker feels Arthur in every aspect of the world. Because of this, he questions the nature of his friend. Even though Arthur's being seems to be spread out among all of the elements of the natural world (this "diffusive power"), Tennyson doesn't lose any of the love he has for him.
- Arthur is now a melding of God and Nature (where previously Tennyson argued that these two were "at strife") and, because of this, Tennyson loves him even more than he did before.