Both drew mankind.
Tennyson is closer to that which is most universal in the human heart, Browning to the vast variety within it; and men in the future will find their poetic wants best satisfied by reading the work of both these poets.

Let us say then that in this matter they are equal.

Each has done a different part of that portraiture of human nature which is the chief work of a poet.
But this is not the only test we may apply to these men as poets.

The second question which tries the endurance and greatness of poetic work is this: "How far is any poet's representation of what is true and loving in itself lovely ?" Their stuff may be equally good.

Is their form equally good?
Is it as beautiful as an artist, whose first duty is to be true to beauty as the shape of love and truth, ought to make it?
The judgment of the future will also be formed on that ground, and inevitably.
What we call form in poetry may be said to consist of, or to depend on, three things: (1) on a noble style; (2) on a harmonious composition, varied but at unity; (3) on a clear, sweet melody of lawful movement in verse.