"To his simplicity " By Emily Dickinson [Analysis]

To his simplicity [1] To die was little Fate [2] If Duty live contented [3] But her Confederate. [4]
Poem 1352 [F1387] "To his simplicity" Analysis by David Preest [Poem]

Emily ends a letter (l449) of January 1876 to Thomas Higginson with this quatrain, introduced by the sentence, 'Mr Bowles lent me flowers twice, for my Father's Grave.' The poem nobly declares that her father regarded dying as a 'little fate,' if it was his duty to do so. As Richard Sewall remarks, 'The sense of duty that kept Edward Dickinson from his children now becomes a mark of triumph over fate.' At then end of line 3 'to be' needs to be supplied.
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