he trailed off , unable to describe the change inherent in that mechanized noun , the death of the romantic and its sterile , carnal revenant , living only a forced respiration of glitter and ceremony ; the geometric steps of courtship during the easter-night dance at the great hall which had replaced the mad scribble of love which he could only intuit dimly c hollow grandeur in the place of mean and sweeping passions which might once have erased souls .