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Man and God. Herbert’s religious verse transcends the traditional view
upon the relation Man-God and goes further to build a poetic world that
between the speaker and his God as simply a kind of reconciliation at the
end of the tension. However, and from a different reading, Herbert’s verse
can be seen as a poetic text that resists closure then the release of
The artistic style of Herbert and his longing for creativity makes the
the text. Throughout his poetry, George Herbert is not only a poet but also
a theoretician of a new verse, which is the harmony between the form and
the meaning and this reconciliation allows for a unity between the speaker
and his Creator; accordingly, the poet remains faithful to his art and to his
creator of this unique style so he reflects the power of God then he yearns
for constructing a powerful poetic world. So the poetic text can be said, to
existence, here we can say that the poet is dependent to God linguistically
(i.e. within the text) and “metaphysically”. On the same way, God is
poetry since the relationship between the speaker and His God is in itself
problematic. This can be shown in the dramatic dialogue; this double voice
the tension that governs his relation with his Creator raises in the reader’s
inability to express reinforced through the loss of words but the “wings”
which are a pure creation of the poet hold the speaker and symbolically
raise him from his sins. Equally represented, the poem contains actually
Accordingly, two identities lie in the self of the poet. Apart from
being a Christian preacher, the poet is also the artist philosopher who
He reflects in his verse, the Fall which affected all human beings. The poet
mirrors the sinful aspect of Man; he admits the situation ,in which he is not
responsible. In his poem entitled “Sighs and Groans”, the poet reinforces
between the speaker and His “Lord” can be perceived from another level;
religious verse in the form as well as in the content. These aspects are
new at its age that’s why his Poetry of the seventeenth century was
“despised” at its age and then renewed at the twentieth century with T.S
obsession with tackling human universal issues make his poetry an open
text to “read”. It is similar in a way to the verse of T.S Eliot and E.E
here lies the striking paradox in his poetry: how to reconcile between
meaning and feeling governs the poetic world of Herbert’s verse. Notably,
Herbert relies on the shape of the poem to reinforce certain poetic images.
world where the speaker and the “Lord” are dependent upon each other
words: “Words without thoughts never to heaven go”. Then the human
the poetic language allows for the unfolding of Christian beliefs. Yet, what
deals with the religious verse itself. The repetition of the first line of the
last line of a stanza in the first line of the second stanza echoes the
cyclical nature of human sins. Thus, we can say that Herbert’s verse is
self-reflexive. The raised tension in the Temple, for instance, makes the
poetic text the only form adequate for constructing patterns of paradoxical
images and peculiar conceits that would not be available in the non-poetic
writings.
Herbert, innovation was quietly absent and; it was a time of reason and
embodied with the mission of prayer and devotion. Moreover, when the
poet deals with his his relation towards God, he borrows from his own
experience that is to say that his verse testifies his life or it narrates his
biography.
constructed as ‘superior’ to the sinful speaker. Yet, reversely this sacredness owes to the
In the third part of the research, a focus will be made upon the aporetic spaces in
Herbert’s poetic tradition; Herbert’s poetic text has originally moved from the orally stage to
the written stage, so we can find aporetic moments in this poetic text. In the poems where
there is a monologue, the single voice that urges for the presence of God. The voice of the
speaker is always haunted by the presence of ‘The Lord’, the poet cannot depart from the
obsessed with proving the existence of God; however, an ironical situation lies within the
secret of the existence of the protestant poet: he is free and enslaved at the same time.
Herbert’s divine poetry imitates what exists in the gospel to the extent that his poetry
becomes a parody of ‘The Sacred Book’. It builds a utopian world where the power of his
verse foreshadows reconciliation between paradoxical complex images: The sinful protestant
versus the Sacred God. Here lies Herbert’s wit to create a private world within his dependence
upon God. Therefore, the divine verse can be utopian; it proves the harmony between Man
To conclude, doing a research on George Herbert’s divine verse allows for knowing
the peculiarities of his writing as different from the other Metaphysical poets’ writings on the
one hand. On the other hand, Herbert’s verse is universal as well as questionable; Christianity
Herbert’s verse is well linked to the modern man who questions his existence and his
relation towards the world. Thus, Herbert’s verse immortalizes itself since human being’s
existence coexists with sins. In the utopian world there are no tensions, and Herbert
he employs one rhetorical figure to ascribe a coherent structure to his poetry then to attribute a
harmony between the text and the world delineated. So we can consider his verse as utopian,
like a musical composition and the tackled themes are lyrical, they are
put his eloquence on. The form is as important as the content. At this
of the shape of the bird’s wings. This poem can exclusively be read in a
continuous way.
Till he became
Most poor:
With thee
O let me rise
As larks , harmoniously,
Fall and redemption of Man. The music is not directly shown; it is deduced
through the movement and the sound of the wings. Therefore, the impact
does not stop, it is continued in “Easter wings” (II) since the bird has two
wings so one poem does not fit for the theme of redemption which is
That I became
Most thin.
With thee
Let me combine,
One interpretation is that in The Temple as a whole, and for the aesthetic
purpose, Herbert composed two “Easter wings”. The first one begins with
“Lord” however the second one starts with “My tender” so a more
between the two wings as well as to construct a kind of unity between the
that the repetition of some phrases differently with the emphasis on the
Lord in the first poem (“Till he became”). And then in the second poem,
the poet’s aim to highlight the true protestant’s longing for redemption
The last line in both poems is almost repeated in order to emphasize that
redemption.
shaping the full sense of the poem as a whole. We cannot also separate
the two “Easter wings” for the meaning of each one depends on the other,
the church are echoed on the aesthetic characteristics of the poems thus,
there is interdependence between the form and the meaning, hence for
Herbert between the musicality of the poem and its impact in shaping the
style as well as in the way of constructing his verse so that he does not
trained artistically since the Bible cannot be read for its prose; accordingly,
in “Prayer I”:
The elegance of the poem does not minimize its seriousness, since the
the poem. A true poem should be embodied with a lyrical, musical form.
Here we can refer to Shakespeare’s “As you like it” when Touchstone’s
Credo was explaining poetry to Yokels: “the truest poetry is the most
feigning”.
Scrutinizing deeply the poem, one can notice the speaker’s yearning
God for accepting his verse (at a time when art was not religious), There
is a wit in telling his Lord that he is writing for him and not just meditating
the “ sacred will”, thus writing is no more a speech only but it is rather an
close to God.
to say and what he has to say since the religious values are stable.
mysterious power), then his verse allows also for immortalizing his sacred
his torments so there is a clear separation between the poet and his God,
the tension is thus evident. Yet, one can admit that Herbert’s construction
of his “self” unites him with God’s voice, accordingly; the speaker’s aim is
likely to eradicate the existent tension between Man and God. However
in order to reflect the restfulness that should govern the relation between
the speaker and his God. “Redemption” illustrates this “inner paradox” of
relation between the form and the content since the aim of the speaker is
Herbert’s divine verse cannot depart from the form of the secular
verse of Donne for instance. The speaker’s direct speech to his God and
forms that serve for emphasizing the poet’s views towards his relation
with God and this is evident in “Easter wings” and in “The Altar”. I am
trying to heed at this point a semiotic reading of the two “Easter wings”, it
Moreover, the major theme of the poem that is the decay of Man is
the Fall. The farther you are from God the more sinful you are. In addition,
the more the wings contracted the more the realization becomes.
Therefore, the loss of words reflects the loss of Man and the action of rise
image; the two birds may represent may represent both Christ and the
poet so words are not enough to be gifted to God ; they were marked by
the importance of the form to make sense to his poems. The alliteration
furthermore, the two poems are also mimetic of the circularity of the
his passion by the ornaments of the church. The title of his poems “The
poems is like the construction of a religious truth that lies in the church,
hence the poet makes a parallelism between himself and Christ. Herbert
Walton), he explains to his friend that his poems seek are similar to the
temple to the extent that he seeks to make a temple in his readers’ minds:
“…tell him he should find in it a picture of the many spiritual conflicts that
have passed betwixt God and my soul, before I could subject mine to the will of
Jesus my Master; in whose service I have now found perfect freedom; desire him to
read it; and then, if he can think it may turn to the advantage of any dejected pour
soul, let it be made public; if not, let him burnt…”
aspect. Herbert’s status as a parish priest does not prevent him from
constructing a poetry that deals with the ordinary human concerns, men’s
against some poetic forms for instance the carpe diem and the love verse.
Moreover, Herbert tackles the issue of the position of Man in the universe
as well as the power of God over the human being. In his introduction to
completely sure about his relation with God; however, his verse
yet, in the tormented verse, this torment urges for the dramatic. The
modernist poet in two ways: the poem points out the blurring line
in a poetic style, once again, the poet proves that the verse is the
adequate style to show the mysterious relation with God. Then Christ
is given a voice to make his presence real, he makes him speaks for
Collar” is another poem that expresses its meaning through its form.
The title contains two basic ideas: the first one is that Jordan is
he left his father and crossed the Jordan then after many years he
prospered. In another level, Jordan is the land where John the Baptist
baptized Christ and then his mission started. In the Book of Common
Prayer (cf.also 2 Kings 5:9-10), it was said: “Thou didist safely lead…
thy people though the Red Sea, figuring thereby the Holy Baptism
of…Christ did sanctify the flood Jordan, and all other waters to the
the sacred act of writing and considers it as the right way to gain
show his theory towards Writing, it is one of the first poems in “The
is the land where the poet can fulfill his sacred mission of praying
distinct verse that brings its divinity from a projection of the sacred
closing lines of the second stanza: Must all be veiled, while he that
Eventually, this poem speaks for all the other poems in The
Temple and theorizes the poet’s view towards art. According to him,
way of veiling the truth. For Herbert, truth must be beautiful that is
beauty” this rhetorical question points out the link between truth
and beauty.
stanza. At the end the poet reflects, calmly the outcome of the
clear view towards poetry; one feels that this poem is a declaration
against the other verse because it does not contains truth. Herbert
sacred Christ and his mission, the title suggests both the crossing
from the futility and the hollowness of the rest of the world into the
truth and holiness of the land of promise as the Jordan was crossed.
verse is no longer “the only” one, Herbert challenges the style of this
verse: “Is all good structure in a winding stair?” He calls for another
type of verse; he valorised the shepherds and does not accuse them
for “riddle” writing nor for “pull for a prime” since they are “truthful
only speak about the literary influence of his precursors such as John
Donne and Sir Philip Sydney but also about “Intertextuality”, which is
the lover verse is replaced by God. Remarkably, the lover does not
often respond to the speaker, yet God is present as part of the divine
discourse of the poem with the sacred verse of Herbert. The poet
the human language is not so pure but the divine poetry is unique
the sacred tradition and then transcends his precursors, the true
protestant poet should write wittily only to praise God therefore this
critical. In this way the wittiness of the verse lies in the ability of the
and also the rejection of God’s power. This poem extends the
Christ and Man. Its conceit is typological; the full sense is required
through the exegesis of the binary form of the images in the poem.
parsons who can see Man’s sin and then rectifies it with the calling
passion since Christ describes Himself as “the true vine”; and then
grapes and wine reflect sacred images. In this way, “The Agony” is a
Gethsemane just before his arrest which led to his trial and
when he says in the final lines: “Love is that liquor sweet and most
The poet is able to make concise poems in terms of form but the
well created yet beyond this creation lies the power of God which is
of writing poetry and Man’s love. The poem’s three stanzas are
end; and then this form echoes the trinity shape so that it reinforces
delineation.
thematic nature of his poems belies this claim for dealing with the human
with the Divine and with the Self as well. There is a dramatic moments
behind the quiet image. Accordingly, the major paradox in The Temple is
that Herbert’s urge for making a clear relation with God entails a deep
conflicts are present from one poem to another in different ways, despite
the fact that they end in resolution the recurrence of the conflict makes
the uneasiness of the rest and the failure to find a definite fixed truth.
the religious experience. In this way, The Temple becomes the story of a
reflect the beauty of the sacred truth as in his poem “Easter” when he
calls for admiring the sacred spirit: “O let thy blessed Spirit bear a part, /
and make up our defects with his sweet art.” We can read “Sweet art” as a
perfect image of the divine soul; contrastingly, with the “real” image that
Donne is yet, his searching for rest shows an intellectual power that makes
the reader himself an investigator for the validity of the truth. The way to
reach ease becomes more valuable than the truth itself. The truth is fixed
Herbert finds his self in his expression of spiritual humility for God
this is clearly shown in his poem “Humility” in the last emblematic stanza:
Man. Herbert does not make a passive voice; the speakers’ voices are
fragmentation of the self makes its unity and then the delineation of a
his religious faith but also his reflection upon the divine subject and then
how shall poore wretches brook/ Thy dreadfull look”. However, in the final
attributed with sense of ease and familiarity though in the presence of the
Lord:
That to decline,
the doctrine that Christ has taken upon himself all the sins of the world.
Christian and that all his verse is the outcome of a strong religious faith.
search. Yet, the verse resists closure in terms of reaching the wholeness of
the divine subject therefore despite the stability of the religious discourse;
following:
subject and God the power is present before the poet would identify
voices and so the poet urges for settling the rebellious Christian self.
“Yet all these fences and their whole aray/ one cunning bosome-
sinne quite away.” One may also consider the well-known “The
able to end his torments and accept the divine will. Thus, there is a
praising Him. We can here refer to T.S Eliot critical book George
“Herbert is not a poet whose work is significant only for Christian readers;
that The Temple is not to be taken as simply a devotional handbook of meditation
rather than religious, and then he displays the complexity and the
absurdity of the futile quest. Here lies the beauty of the poetic
truths are already present then the sweetness of the search lies in
tormented self, which it will never reach an end: “My searches are
of the sign system leads to the assumption that the search requires
The recurrence of the questions continues until the end of the poem.
Despite the stability of the divine subject, the speaker is searching for
being close to God despite His absence. The divine exists at the very
moment of admiring the nature and since man is part of the created world
he does not have to search for the Almighty existence, yet he has to make
himself present with God. After the long search, the speaker concludes
reinforces implicitly that God is present in him and then the search is not
When he assumes at the sixth stanza that “the search was dumbe
before:/ But all was one.” He makes the search now “speaking” in order to
unfold his closeness to God; for at the end he reinforces the result of his
quest:
The poem is wavering between hope and despair until the final stanza
when he employs the bell as an emblem of the church for the unity that
he knows that he is near to God and that he dwells in the church. In this
Eventually, the circularity of the poem does not reflect the futility of
the search; it is rather a reflection upon the unity between the speaker
and his God and the absence of the distance. Furthermore, the poem can
reflect the complexity of the theme despite its final simple resolution.
cultural and the historical background of the verse. The Temple is written
existing tensions within the different branches. For instance, there are
references to Anglo-Catholicism:
So void of sinne,
Yet, some critics, like Joseph Summers, argue in favor of the poet’s
conflicts: how to adjust faith with reason. The speaker presents from the
beginning an absurd image of astrology: “As men, fear the stares should
sleep and nod, / And trip at night, have suppli’d;” then he constructs a
transcendent skie:/ which with the edge of wit they cut and carve./ Reason
triumphs, and faith lies by.”Strikingly, the speaker does not end the quest
Accordingly, this poem can be divided into two parts. The first one
presents the question of the relationship between faith and reason. In the
second part, there is a recurrence of the word “But” which reinforces the
faith as a resolution to his dilemma for he believes that faith does not
require any quest. The reciprocal love between the Creator and the
with reason, since the true way to reach heaven is to believe in God:
“Faith needs no staff of flesh,/ To heav’n alone both go, and leade.”
“The Method”, “Divinity” and “Ephes 4.30 Grieve not the Holy Spirit”. The
outside the divine realm. The religious verity is put into question in a
recurrent way; the truth is no sooner given than questioned from another
occurs three times and there is two “Jordan” poems. At this point, one he
following:
“…this notion seems especially important in the work of the poet George Herbert,
for the poems in “The Temple” are often self-conscious and critical to a fault about
the process of their own production. The moment when a poem’s speaker doubles
back upon his text provides the occasion for significant exploration.”
delay. Each poem offers a kind of tension. The continuation of the inquiry
dismisses any sense of closure to the divine experience and to the text
verse is ambivalent not because of its subject but also for its poetic
originality.
Herbert’s search for a truthful relation with the Sacred roots him in
the concerns of the ordinary Christian concerns. Herbert, the priest, is also
also a world of reflections upon the divine and then the verbal art
between God and Man does never end; it is a continuing process of search.
Thus, the poet strongly believes in the adequacy of Rhetoric to fill the gap
between the human and the sacred. In “Quidditie”, he defines poetry as:
“But it is that which while I use./ I am with thee, and Most take all.”
transmit the divine experience. This search is aimed to fill the gap
between the divine search and the ability of the verbal art to make this
search true.
between Man and God. Notably, the recurrence of the line: “Yet I love
thee” reinforces the deep relation between the verse and the divine
subject, the speaker finds God’s love in his lines and so he constructs the
“Silk twist”. The pearl is thus present despite its absence. It owes its
worthiness to the long silk twist, which stands metaphorically for the
equivocal relationship between “to love” and “to climb” for there is a
that the speaker wants to reach. Then, love lies in climbing the silk twist
thee”. The precious pearl is unreachable since the end of climbing the silk
The internal logic of the poem shows that the precious worldly
offers them; so that he writes a whole stanza for each one. They are
precious to the point that the speaker neglects them for the sake of God’s
love but they are transformed into precious expressions of divine love. In
the last stanza, there is no worthy thing yet it represents the most
important stanza because the reader becomes acquainted with the true
way to reach the pearl of great price. Eventually, the speaker is fully
aware of the assertion of significant words of love in the last stanza yet it
escape from his torments in the church, the space of reflections. In her
“None of George Herbert’s poems was published until after his death. Then, at the
poet’s request, his friend Nicholas Ferrar published them in a volume called The
Temple. They are all religious verses, but Herbert, like John Donne, whom he
knew, did not find his religious vocation until relatively late in life. The posthumous
publication of his poems, and subsequent biographies, turned Herbert into an
Anglican proto-saint, and until comparatively recently his poems were studied as
examples of perfect piety, compared with the Psalms of David in the Bible, rather
than in literary terms at all. The real story of Herbert’s life and probable religious
views is both more complicated than this suggests and ultimately more
unknowable.”
In this way, The Temple reflects some hidden conflicts in his life then after
uses colloquial, concrete image from the daily life as a way to reach higher
was sick. One may refer here to Izaak Walton’s biographical writing about
George Herbert, he narrates: “About the year 1629, and the thirty-fourth
of his age, Mr. Herbert was seized with a sharp quotidian ague.” Then he
adds
“And it is to be noted that in the sharpest of his extreme fits he would often say,
‘Lord, abate my great affliction, or increase my patience; but, Lord, I repine not; I
am dumb, Lord before thee, because thou dost it.’ By which, and a sanctified
submission to the will of God, he showed he was inclinable to bear the sweet yoke
of Christian discipline, both then and in the latter part of his life, of which there will
be many true testimonies.”
some of his poems. Thus, his verse becomes a shelter to improve his artful
life. From the beginning of The Temple, in “The Sinner” for instance,
Herbert unfolds that ague, which is his illness, and its implicated meanings
will be part of the discourse between him and the Sacred. There are three
main puns in the poem; “When I seek” can be read as pun of “sick”, “the
the diction of the poem turns around the physical suffering and so one can
assume the deep relation between illness and the speaker’s urge for
vein.” And also followed by “Good Friday” in which the speaker is certain
that:
can only engender sweetness. The poet makes from the religious facts his
own verity so that the poetic work guarantees his redemption then he
feels at ease when he addresses God. Moreover, one may deduce the
parallel construction between Christ and the poet; the fact of salvation is
fulfilled at the very act of suffering. Yet, this image is reminding of the
lover’s seek at the end of his suffering. Eventually, The Temple begins with
the fact of redemption and ends with God’s love so this circularity
Christian who is fully certain about the validity of death due to his illness.
Thus, he is different from the other divine poets in terms of employing his
that reflects the deep yet complex relation with the divine. At this point, a
“The Cross”.
The three poems turn around the same idea that illness redeems the
sins this is a common Christian idea so that the speakers are certain about
the fact of redemption. “The Sinner” and “Affliction” are situated in the
opening of the Temple, and then the mentioning of his illness at an early
position of greatness. The speaker plays upon “the ague” and makes its
dependent on his religious use of the term. In 1609, Herbert wrote to his
mother
“…But I fear the heat of my ague hath dried up those springs by which scholars
say the Muses use to take up their habitations. However, I need not their help to
reprove the vanity of those many love poems that are daily writ and consecrated
to Venus, nor to bewail that so few are writ that towards God and heaven”
literary struggle to show the power of the divine verse and its opposition
to the triviality of the secular verse. In the same letter to his mother,
mission as praising God and then he draws upon the complexity of this
mission
He comments on his verse at the end of the sonnet: “open the bones, and
you shall nothing find/ In the best face but filth; when Lord in thee/ the
reciprocal among all men. In this way, the particular for Herbert becomes
general simply to insist on the existence of God as One for all humanity.
Herbert makes the religious discourse pliable to his own experience and
goes further to make it evident for all Christians. Here, one may heed
cannot be easily felt by the reader that is why he insists upon it and makes
another, the quest for grace is deeply related with a feeling of hope
suffering; after nine poems from “The Sinner”, Herbert insists again on the
shows a serious spiritual crisis when the poet is questioning God. The title
In my happiness,
affliction; it is the suffering cry of Job: “My bones cleaveth to my skin and
consideration of the relation of the poem to the book of Job and the
Psalms: “To intensify the imagery of physical suffering borrowed from Job,
the speaker recasts his own affliction as a dialogue between his suffering
which affects its whole meaning. in the last two stanzas, there is a direct
another dilemma:
At the end, the speaker becomes conscious about his betrayal. The poem
speaker’s movement from despair to joy but the last line is too complex
poem subverts itself when it ends with an equivocal line. Barbara Leah
“The Cross”, the speaker insists on his physical disabilities, which lead to
I”
because he shows the weakness of the human being and then the power
logic of justice in the poem therefore; when the speaker is certain about
is now more aware of the vanity of his challenge. He proves the Christian
“he seeks before” so that the human deficiency plays as a sign of the
poems “The Sinner”, “Affliction I” and “The Cross” there is the delineation
image of the Sacred. God causes illness but at the same time, he assures
forgiveness to the weak creation thus the complex relation between God
and Man.
proves the truthfulness of his relation to the Sacred when he makes the
transfigured into sweet relation with The Sacred. Yet, an inner paradox lies
multiplicity of interpretation.
situation between the true praise to God and the pitiful struggle within the
Self. Evidently, Herbert describes his work as: “...a picture of the many
spiritual conflicts that have passed betwixt God and my soul, before I
could subject mine to the will of Jesus my Master: in whose service I have
Herbert’s poetic text is not as plain as it is described for his use of poetic
image and this what makes the religious verse peculiar from the other
metaphysical verses.
seeks to make the concept of God unified with “God-the-word” for the idea
reader feels that the speaker is unable to fulfil this sense of wholeness; the
the two “Jordans” the speaker unfolds that his verse is adequate to tell all
what desires: “Must all be veiled, while he that reads, divines/ catching the
sense at two removes?” then the poet is conscious that his verse is
describes the verbal art as easy as to “Copy out only that, and save
religious matters. Our poet raises more questions about God to the extent
that we do not have a single image and then the relationship with God
tension. Unfolding his spiritual conflicts with God, his verse becomes the
equivocal relationship.
priest, and God may lead to read this relation in the light of its cultural
context. God is the religious ideology that the poet “speaks”, he speaks
the language of his Divine and he cannot depart from from it. The
procures a sense of freedom and more importantly asserts his Self within
the foundation of his presence. Herbert seeks existence in the realm of the
God is “The Big Other” to employ Jacques Lacan concept. Herbert uses the
verbal art to re-make the divine and to represent his struggle with Him as
an “Other”. Lacan views language as the system by which Man can speak
the Other and then it is irretrievably Other; he defines “The Other” (or
founded on the existence of the world of the symbol, namely on laws and
contracts”. In this way, Herbert’s language is to speak God who is the “Big
divine power. Alienating from the presence of God; the poet searches for
overwhelms his voice and influences his id. Strikingly, Herbert is conscious
make oral presentation in which one should be well skilled in how to attack
display an intellectual who seeks to gain a distinct identity; for him Man is
in conflict with with nature. However able to control his destiny and to
this point, the question that imposes itself is: the religious experience is a
separate self, different from the Other (God), in this way the
escape the Sacred presence within his self. Religiously speaking, because
unified.
search for the presence of the Self ; ending the contest with a sense of
rest shows the longing for freedom thus it is a search for an authentic self.
The essential dilemma of the poet is to transmit a true image of God and
to fill the gap between God as a concept and his presence within the
religious experience. Yet, Herbert’s search for his self is paradoxical since
Sacred is too complex to the extent that the poetic text becomes
fundamental role in delineating the “play” between the speaker and his
God. In the ending lines of “The Altar”, he says: “O let thy blessed sacrifice
be mine/ and sanctify this altar to be mine”. The speaker insists on the
separation between his self and God’s Self: the sacrifice is human but the
altar, which is purely divine, exists “wordily” in The Temple and then the
poet has his “own” altar. Accordingly, he projects Christ’s sacrifice to his
self, which is the subject of the next poem immediately after “the Altar”,
“The Sacrifice”.
titles and tensions foreshadow the failure of the poet to satisfy his lost self.
We can notice the feeling of desire to fulfil this loss as if the poetic text (as
self aware that he cannot betray God with language. He wants to be loyal
says: “Thy art of love, which I will turn back to thee/ Oh my dear saviour
victory” but this victory is too early in the beginning of The Temple for;
later on, he will discover that his complete satisfaction cannot be fully
achieved. From one poem to another, the reader discovers with the
multiplicity of different speakers that there are many selves: a sinner self
Collar”. These selves are either opposite to the God will or in harmony with
poet’s Christian self; he is self-contained and can only exist within God
“the other” hence we can find this idea in his confessing voice in
“Reprisal”:
At this moment, we feel that the speaker is united with God and
even he points himself as part of God and then fights against his sinner
sins and then a sign of redemption. When he retells the Easter story, he
Therefore, “The Temple” does not question the old religious story; it is
between God and the poet for the sinful self is that “enemy” who should
can confirm that God’s voice exists as an internal self within the speaker,
he speaks for God and with Him at the same time. In “The Pulley” for
instance, the speaker presents the image of God (the creator) as opposed
to the image of Man (the creature); here the poet tells the story of a
between the two. Remarkably, the poet makes God speaks and He even
uses the “I” pronoun: “for if I should (said he)” so he is fully aware and
even certain about the true voice of God. Actually, there is a game in the
internal logic of the poem: God’s aim is to draw Man towards Him in order
to reach “rest”, the central pun which points also to the end of the
dilemma. Here God “is planning” to make the end of the game as the
pleasure so that both will become “winners” he writes: “Yet let him keep
the rest/ But keep them with repining restlessness.” (Emphasis added).
Consequently, both Man and God have to gain each other in order to “pull
through the journey of love shred between the two “players”. The image
the sacred.
When we examine the deep relationship between the poet and God
we cannot separate between the two for this interdependence is not only
when God is attributed with His religious constraints the dilemma becomes
alienated self and God seems to be the tension that governs his verse so if
we formulate the problematic situation we can say: the poet wants to gain
opposed to God or being part of God’s wholeness and loosing oneself. The
poet’s verse is the space of freedom but at the same time to make this
The resolution of the tension at the end of the poems ends before it
even starts and Herbert is very conscious about this ironical situation.
However, what matters is to show the journey towards this end and then
The poetic experience allows for the discovering of oneself and also the
writing. In the final poem, “Love III” the speaker asserts the fact of rest.
the previous tensions and then yearns for a sense of rest. Nevertheless, he
remembers that his soul “drew back, guilty of dust and sin”; therefore, the
sinful self will be obliterated since it finds love. Also, tired from being
fragmented the poet finally chooses to terminate the contests within his
self and to be reunited as one “I” as if the resolution of the whole dilemma
existence and refer to the love of God as a way to achieve a “true life”.
relationship” with Him and then the speaker seeks to prove that he finally
guarantees this sense of rest. However, this rest does not allows for
freedom for it is deeply connected with God’s power so that the speaker is
free but out of his love which is ironically constructed. The speaker is the
constructor of this love; he is the one who freed himself from the feeling of
and transformed into a feeling of love and ease. The move comes from the
Lord Who intervenes in the exchange of love after the recognition of the
the speaker is responsible for asserting his human existence and then he
within the self; love urges for the existence of a new relationship between
the speaker and his tormented self so that now he gains a sense of unity
within himself as soon as he is settled. This poem in not only the end of
torments, it presents the end of the book and then puts an end to the
figure of Christ. He even neglects his search for truth and then forgets
And know you not, says Love, who bore the blame?
compliant to his internal voice for love exists within himself; this power of
love can control his relation with God and asserts his existence as a
distinct individual. In her study of The Temple Helen Vendler examines the
resolution of the poems and reads the speakers’ selves as “yielding, finally
worthy to note that when the poet finally reaches love within his self he
In this way, Herbert’s verse addresses the speaker’s self more than
the Other (God). We can notice the existing gap between asserting the self
and speaking the Other. The Temple becomes this desire to fill the gap
within the poet’s self in order to gain a sense of wholeness at the expense
of praising God. Ironically constructed, the more the poet asserts his
his secular life and his divine world he finds that this separation is in no
poet and then the powerful existence of God depends upon the poet
the significant narrative poem “The Collar” which can be regarded as the
climax of The Temple. It is as a soliloquy for the speaker unfolds his story
with the self to prove the hard submission to the divine will.
that the decision is already taken “I struck the board, and cried, No more. /
the freedom of the self when surrounded by the constraints of the Other
and then how to act when this self is unable to rebel against these
the answers and then the tension does not only lie in the speaker’s
relation with his Creator, but it is also a tension between him and verse.
The lines are full of contradictions from the beginning when he declares:
“My lines and life are free; free as the road,” however, this freedom is
cannot coexist with such religious constraints, his lines cannot resist the
presence of the sacred. Even in “The Collar”, the irregular pattern of both
its rhyme scheme and its metre (diameters, trimesters, tetrameters and
The heightened crisis takes its way to the resolution for the speaker
is aware from the beginning that the only way to resolve the raised
“Call in thy death’s head there: tie up thy fears!” Again, this line reminds
the speaker is aware of the end of his poem so what is the implication of
the remarkable question. Here we can note that the release of the tension
his view through questions, and this calls up for Socrates way of reaching
truth by raising question and not giving full realities. Yet, the end of the
questions is here different when the dilemma reaches its end, the speaker
returns to his faith in Christ (“My Lord”). At this level, it is quite interesting
to note that “The Collar” is not to give new realities than to assert
Only for a didactic purpose, the speaker makes the end as easily
speaker and his self, he is not addressing God neither Christ. Yet, he
religious life he has ever lived, now his “lines and life are free”. His
that is why he “will abroad”; this new experience of rebellion may satisfy
which, can lead to a life of freedom and lessens the feelings of sufferings.
unsaid past of the speaker that we can deduce from his actual new
experience and then his present search for the “free will”. The significant
implication of his previous life shows that he had a silent voice unable to
rebellious speaking one and this revolution is twofold by both declaring the
wishes and acting through speech. As a result, the speaker becomes able
extremely important in the religious experience for the Christian Man has
of the Christian identity; yet, he makes this self search for freedom and
privacy. Thereby he shows the costs of obedience to the divine will, the
religious release. Hence, the poem narrates the Christian story with his
self, and that what makes the truthfulness of the poem, it is invaded by
changes his speech as he cries “No more!” then language becomes this
speaker insists that the originality of his experience for in the second part
these answers heighten the rebellion within the self. The supplement of
the previous life of imprisonment becomes the new status of freedom. Yet
Along the first part of real “choler”, the speaker insists on the use of
“I”; however, this “I” is not stable, it is not a self-constrained neither. The
poetic text then displays the voice of an “I” seeking separation from the
imposed self of God and this is part of the existential dilemma. Referring
to Jacques Lacan view of the other, the “I” of the speaker can only be a
reminds himself before the reader that God is “He that forbears /To suit
and serve his need/Deserves his load”. He recognizes his separation from
God not as a self-disciplined entity but as a margin and then God is not an
imposed power; it is ‘the centre’ upon which his existence depends on.
Yet, even God’s power depends upon the weakness of Man therefore their
introduced by the word “but” and this movement proves that the previous
story is only a fiction and that the true revolution is untrue. The four
ending lines put a quick end to the torments and then make the previous
story a part from the past. From this unpredicted end, we can deduce that
the poem has not a single fixed meaning and so it should be read until the
end since this end deconstructs the first long part. Furthermore, this end
reflects the different aspects of the poem as an equivocal text. It urges for
a second reading and so we do not have a stable text. It does not resist
closure and stability only, but also determinacy since the end makes the
an uncatchable dream; he feels that he does not even have the right to
change gained from the first part of the poem are the fruits of his own
speech, his experience is new and creative for it foregrounds the recovery
of the self and its existence far from the boundaries it surrounds.
Accordingly, the end of the poem does not reflect the futility of the
The centrality of God does not construct the speaker as a margin; his
speech becomes the centre of the relationship for it shows the thoughts of
a Christian man who reflects upon the religious discourse; the speaker’s
speech can never be obliterated from the mind, the idea remains in the
mind and that what makes the originality of the discourse. The tension is
not artificial for the rebellious voice remains there in the unconscious and
the unfolding of the torments shows their extremely real existence. The
experience of rebellion does not loose its validity so that we can claim that
the end of the poem is really the end of the experience. “The Collar” as an
back to the first line we find “No more” which sums up for the past life,
thus the end of the poem announces the return to the previous status. The
poem ends with “My Lord” and begins with “I struck the board, and cried
continuing rhythmically and in a circular way it may come a day when the
discourse reflects his existence as a thinking person and then destructs his
poems, “The Collar” is a speech within the self and not with the sacred.
Therefore, he gives then a free space to speak with his self so he is aware
that the religious thought comes from within and not from outside. It is
relation with God; in this way, the poet makes a reflection upon the self as
between himself and the divine in order to show the complexity of the
relation and then he feels that as long as he will depart from God he will
His calling for the “Lord” means his returning to his religious life. His
simple at the same time. His relation with the divine can be problematic
(the search for freedom) but at the same time plain (child/lord). The verse
delineates this journey of searching for truth and the play between the
sense of order to his life; Hence to re-construct his true self. When the
“struck the board” and leaves it order to establish a world of his own. Yet,
he returns in search for safety and then the interior logic of the poem
proves that the end is only an illusion hence the “illusion” of rebellion is
sufferings clearly delineated when he refers to the “thorn” which “let (him)
blood”.
language with true meanings and this is the logic of his true experience
assume that the poet plays on the centrality of his discourse in the
constructing the relation between the poet and his God. In this way “The
the title is in itself ambiguous: the collar is read as “the choler” a pun of
the French word “colère” which means the extreme dissatisfaction and
later understand from the poem that the speaker wants to break this collar
entity, Herbert’s movement from the search of his Christian self to the
celebration of the Eucharist in the final poems shows the deep reflection of
the Christian poet. The journey of the poet is from and within the self; it is
a conflict with the other as well as with God. Then the reduction of
essential testimony in showing the real Christian and his fidelity to the
divine will.
divine will:
individual speaker and his omnipotent Protestant God to the extent that
this speaker becomes a feeble subject serving a potent king. Yet, this
testimony of the power of the divine verse to allure Man and then shows
struggle but the original procedure towards resolution also delights us.
and go seek some other master out” (Lines 13/63/64). Nevertheless, this
thus the reach of heaven is not an easy journey. Herbert makes use of his
free his interior self from the omnipotence of the king God so in “The
contrarieties crush me: these crosse actions/ doe windie a rope about and
gain intimacy with God through language. The speakers in Herbert’s verse
seem to control the tension from the beginning of the poem. However,
revealing the tension is more important than the resolution itself, what
The poem, even diatactic, is a journey within the self to display the
path towards the divine will; the speaker is the teacher and the learner at
the same time. The interior story of the poem moves to a dramatic end,
which proves the death of a secular experience and the validity of the
sacred truth. In this way, the poems become that implicit conceit: they are
the sins, once they are unfolded then they become part of the past and
dimension of the verse: the truthfulness of the text and its ability to
transmit a real story especially when the reader discovers that the speaker
is conscious about the end of his hard experience and that this experience
movement of the text from its oral to its written state. The speaker has a
great torment when he is telling his story then he makes the conclusion as
an end to his written text, yet the religious experience does continue. So
for the speaker fails to fill the gap between the longing for free existence
and his achieved imprisonment. The question that imposes itself is what
the real is: his goal or the result he reaches at the end. Yet, the
more significant than the resolution itself. Yet, what is the aim of telling a
story whose end is already known, furthermore, does the poem contrasts
its logic or there is something hidden in Herbert’s discourse and that leads
to this troublesome end, then one should question the dubious reversal of
individual speaker is not the master of the discourse and this is the great
paid cost in order to gain a harmonically relation with God. In this way, the
poems become moments of recognizing “the real self” and then returning
to existence under the divine will. We can refer here to some poems of
reversal such as “The Reprisal”, “Sinnie I”, “Misery” and “The pearl” which
are retrospective accounts and can be divided into two parts: the first one
accounts is a past experience narrated in the past tense and the final part
escape his sorrows. Barely, he can choose his way, for he is not a free self,
then the dismantling of all means makes from the submission to the divine
will the only path for existence hence this is the internal logic of the divine
entangled in the world of strife/ Before I had the power to change my life”.
from his right of choice. Yet, he cannot escape to choose between the free
will or the divine will so, he cannot be in a status of “in between”. The very
assert the existence within God. In this way, he proves that he is not lost
and that the end of discovery of the true will is found in God’s faith. He
finally recognizes that: “Yet, lest perchance I should too happy be/ in my
irony of the divine existence, the speaker always proves that his existence
existence true; yet, he can achieve the divine will when he expunges
himself.
there is a moment when the speaker recognizes that he should discard his
past and make his own history so his present situation is only an illusion.
reach. God’s presence is a fact; he is the master and the true way to
happiness.
heart of ignorance lies the true knowledge. The futile search for coherence
than to make an imaginary self. In this way, the poet prefers not to know
speaker makes God the absent-present voice; the sacred power, either
God or the Lord, is foregrounded in the very act of narrating one’s story.
This divine controls the speech even when the speaker makes an
article “George Herbert’s pulling for a prime” when she maintains that
Accordingly, Herbert narrates not only his experience with the divine
but also reflects upon the relation of the divine to his creature. The voice
of God is implicitly projected when the end of the poem proceeds towards
coherence absent in his “real life”; so the collapse is only a recovery and a
way to rise again within the divine. In order to survive, the poet
“obliterates” his narrative story, to exist means for him to deny his
autobiography that fits the divine discourse. We can clarify this point
The speaker claims clearly that he would surely find rest out of
to this end is not that easy path for in the coming couple of stanzas, he
will analyse his dilemma in terms of lost- gain. Further meditation upon his
serious decision implies that the individual speaker is not very satisfied
with his present situation. The narrative story begins with a revolution, a
cease at this point, again, when he reflects upon his “new” situation he
finds himself in a more tragic situation: “then I refuse not ev’n with
ought.”
“pitiful” person yet, this individual is a “thinker”, his thought makes his
coherent existence within “the self”, the speaker is longing for a balanced
situation between his “disobedient self” and his “faithful self”. Hence, with
“contest” thus, this battle is taking place within his mind. The seriousness
of the conflict lies in the challenge within the poet himself to “win” a
constant position and to have a true way towards a real rest. Once he
invalid revolution and then reinforces another different position. Thus, the
Yet, and before he ends the poem, he views the matter from another
too/ Born where thy servants both artilleries use.” God is not the pivot of
the battle for the speaker is also a significant power; his power does not lie
suffering will:
word “hath ev’n” is notably a pun of ‘heaven’, which is the real goal of the
comes to conclude:
it proves the futility of searching for a world of freedom. The speaker does
overcome the conflicts within himself in order to gain to reach the right
status. Therefore, the narrative is led to an end, which shapes the true
simultaneously conscious that its contest would make him suffer and more
faith complete. Disobedience is in a way the true path towards the divine
satisfaction.
collapse or a failure, the speaker proves the validity of being under the
divine will. The interior logic of the religious discourse makes from slavery
the true way to rest, from sacrifice the free way to happiness and then out
of the collapse comes the real recovery. Reversely, when the speaker
thus the obligation becomes logically the only choice for gaining freedom
seems to deny itself at the expense of proving the validity of the narrative.
“end in rest” the poet retains and then supplements this story with a
“the must” and not the real fact. The text survives not because the story
exists but for the protagonist proves that he survives. He wins the battle
“logically” since, he refuses from the beginning to lose it, and hence it is
the logic of the text, which proves the victory of the speaker.
The text in this way should be read until the “real end” for the story
The speaker provides an end in the start, yet; the end of the poem does
not sign the end of the narrative. The returning to God’s faith ends the
however, the speaker returns at the end to be part of the divine, “yet
experience, yet within his discourse lies this conflict between the self-
the reader with his experience of revolution and does not end it in the
harmony with the divine, he may lose the sense of truthfulness; so, what
action and inaction. In this way, his writing becomes a way to cure his
contained individual.
The ontological movement of the text from the oral stage to the
experience so that the idea of “to re-write” the story becomes an illusion:
what is true is the text itself because the end reconstructs the whole story.
to be religiously logic.
to constitute an original way to reach the divine will and to make self-
of The Temple:
“If poetry was an imitation of God’s creation and possessed the divine power of
moving the affections, the use of it for secular ends might come near to blasphemy
(....).The ultimate method of reflecting God’s glory was the creation of a work of decency
and order, a work of beauty, whether a church, an ordered poem, or an ordered life. This
was not confined to the artist, but was the privilege and duty of every Christian.”
In order to construct a united world out of the chaos, the poet finds
in the collapse towards God the true way to reach a sense to reach
across that when he belongs to God is the best and it is even the unique
metaphorical image of the existing fight not only with God but also it is a
battle within the self. Eventually, the collapse towards God comes to
remake the unity within a tormented self. In this way, truth does not come
from outside, it emerges from the text itself hence the logic erects the
whole unity and that what constructs the true sense of the divine verse.
the church as a place of prayer, one should deeply analyse “the temple” in
terms of the major conceit in order to clarify the complex relation between
the divine and man. Notably, there is a hidden relationship between the
Entitling the collected poems “The Temple” does not only reflect the
religious aspect of the text but it also foreshadows the complex journey of
the individual Christian towards heaven. Normally, the temple is the place
where the Christian can make his prayer, yet he is also able to confess his
Christian man. Most of the poems delineate the journey of a Christian from
of resurrected ending are “Miserie”, “The Temper”, “The Collar” and “The
Pearl”. Yet, The Temple is not only a simple reflection of the Christian
equivocal text, a critical text that points to the uneasy journey of the
Christian self.
the aesthetic of the text, which lies not only in the figurative language but
also in the logical way of the poem’s end. The speaker presents the way to
reach the reversal and proves, at the same time that this relinquishment
naturally exists. This verse survives for its end constructs the wholeness of
the story; confessing his thoughts is away to prove his faithfulness to God
as the church is the place where the Christian proves his loyalty to God. In
this way, Herbert’s poems exist by the virtue of its artfulness; hence, it is
be the space of the true Christian life. In this way, the Christian self,
church is not that separated setting, it exists within the self; therefore, the
space is given a quality of life and then an immortal union between Man
The end of the poems towards reversal is natural for the settlement
search for a way out of the church. How can he escape from a place, which
exists, within his self? Therefore, the church becomes a place of sacrifice,
when Herbert writes, “Averse may finde him/And turn delight into a
sacrifice can be found in the church) the poet asserts his sacrifice in his
journey within the individual Christian; yet, the end of this spiritual journey
is the return to God’s faith. Then the starting point (the revolution) is
the goal of the journey does not lie in proving the validity of the revolution
rather, the speaker confirms that the reversal is more valid than this
The poet traveler searches for a true relationship with God while he
he finds a sense of freedom in his writing; his verse frees him from the
the Bible), when he subverts his freedom in favour of God’s faith therefore,
the divine.
On the same way, Herbert imitates the temple of God for it has a
real existence. His temple transcends the idea of the church as a building
to make it a space full of life and reflection. This trait attributes a sense of
imitation of a false copy; the poet imitates a creation of God, which is very
temple and reflection upon the religious enigma. Notably, he does not only
Defer no time;
urge for a search towards a coherent stable life so that the church
Herbert (who is also an Anglican priest) views the church as the space of
In this way, the text projects a delineation of a whole kingdom existed only
within the self and in which, it lies a deep journey so that we do not find a
pilgrimage is the major conceit of the poem for the journey towards the
is attributed with a new sense more truthful than it is. Here, the journey is
more real because it comes within the self, and then the end is achieved
from within so that the pilgrimage is not that artificial journey; it is rather a
matters is the movement of the traveller and not the story itself. Joseph
Summers says in his article Herbert’s form, “Within most of the individual
focuses more on the way of achieving such end; the important experience
of pilgrimage lies in the metamorphoses; the poet traveller is not the same
person accordingly, we can assume that the poet admires his Self when it
moment of reaching the divine will, he demonstrates that rest lies in his
strong desire to attain his faith. Being in the church allows for the
imprisoned in the church, he proves that his verse allows for discovering
the way to the divine will. Then we can call this verse the space of
cope with the dilemma he faces and then to prove that the religious art
renders truth. This sense of truthfulness yields the way for an immortal
representation:
however; the state of interdisciplinary between his art and the religious
discourse he reinforces makes his verse not only legitimate but also
laws” which govern the precarious, critical relationship between God (the
of Utopia, very different from the real life of torments. The poet proves
that the kingdom of God is the world of happiness; he makes God the
perfect leader above all the Stuart kings in the decades leading up the civil
war. The ideals of the Renaissance Era strongly exist in Herbert’s poems;
religious faith, which is extremely rooted in the Christian self. In this way,
there is an urgent need for making a utopian world that reflects the
relationship between the individual speaker and his omnipotent Protestant God in
king, so that the inner self now becomes the principal site of political power and
struggle.”
Surely, God is the governor of this world, yet He is not that tyrannical king.
There is a sharing of rules between Man and The sacred, the poet writes at
the end of his poems “Man”:“That, as the world serves us, we may serve
secular love poetry, yet; the beloved is the sacred and there is a
communicate God and to construct a united world with Him. Thus, The
Temple becomes the response to the religious faith so that the poet
this way, the importance of the divine verse lies in its religious
intersection of the political power of God (being the King) with religion and
this makes the theological covenant between Man and God. Out of his
daily experience and his plain style, Herbert delineates “the true
corruption of the humanity. He makes an art that purifies the human soul
moves from the sweetness of a heavenly day to: “the dew shall weep thy
fall to-night”. This wavering movement between life and death reinforces
the poetic transition between life and death yet; the poem calls for its
immortality when he says at the end: “Then chiefly lives.” As far as the
existence with God. Consequently, the poet is certain that death is the end
virtual world for the poem itself is a sweet instant; its romantic tone of a
soul. Though he employs earthly elements in the poem such as: “sky, day,
earth, rose, timber”, the poet goes behind the limited earthly experience
to attribute a sense of glory and then to strengthen the deep relation with
God for when death is the real end of the human “for thou must die”, the
virtuous soul resists death. Furthermore, the day is no longer that short-
on the reconciliation between the earthly world and the spiritual world.
Similarly, the poem despite its shortness it reflects the importance of the
there is a differed meaning in the internal logic of the poem. The day of
the poem shadows the experience of the speaker, the rose reflects the
beauty of the poem and the spring presents the sweetness of the spiritual
God. “Vertue” is one of the many poems that support the urgent
reconciliation with the Sacred and then ease the dramatic internal anxiety.
with God but also with his self and with the world he lives in. The
truth and to advocate that the divine will is the incentive for thriving a full
all the poems end in triumph of the divine will, this reinforces the
truthfulness of the religious over the secular. Even the poems with carpe-
diem form point that Man should only admire the Lord. “Bitter-Sweet” for
instance reinforces the deep relation between the speaker and his Lord:
world, as Herbert urges for coping with his Lord when he triumphs over his
system so that the poetic text ends in a way to fulfil this theological
agreement with God how he is faithful to the absolute agreement with God
so that the tensions prove the deep struggle to fulfil this agreement. In
weak creature, he delineates the Sacred as the powerful king. Yet, at the
into the “Lord of love”. Accordingly, the poet manipulates the relation in
order to realize his wish and then to make a harmony with his Lord.
speaker finds the signs of grace. After the “spiteful bitter thought”, he
recognizes that his devil thought would lead him to “cold despairs, and
the Lord the true and the logic way to achieve rest. He depicts clearly the
depends upon the eternal God. His feeling of pain: “so high a torture: Is
way to cure his poisoned devil thought and to confess his torment; as if he
Herbert alludes in his last stanza: “Now foolish thought go on/ Spin out thy
In fact most of the poems start with a tragic situation of anxiety then
with God’s support the speaker’s troublesome changes into a state of rest;
accordingly, the internal logic of the poems turn around dismantling the
meeting point of the religious faith with the realization of that faith; the
pain but ends with happiness. Love that arises from God is transmitted to
Man; as the poem ends with precious resolution: “What for it self love once
began, Now love and truth will end in Man”. Thus, the poem reflects the
experience of love. The speaker is assured by God’s love, what makes him
lover; in contrast, in this divine verse, the poet relies on the powerful God
divine verse originates the English covenant theology not only as a system
not emerge from the speaker, as in the secular verse, yet it stems from
connection between Man and God. At this point, we can admit that God is
no longer the addressee since he has already fulfilled His part, now that
Man becomes the addressee; he is the one who should accomplish the
covenant and achieve the sacred faith. Certainly, it is God Who sets the
covenant and then it is Him Who fulfils its conditions; therefore, Man is the
bound to his faith; the changes are to come from the human being for God
thy sacred will/ All thy delight in me fulfil” then he continues in the
following stanza:
internal torments only when he transmits his pains into words. Commonly,
he makes a unity between his lines and his pains so that he says in the
To which I do agree,
the speaker would be able to achieve the divine will. The poet is not able
of the Sacred lies in sweetness and love so that the speaker establishes a
trinity relation manipulated with this power; God is the Father, nature is
the mother and Man is the son. The poet lives in harmony naturally for he
relation with the Sacred. Man’s existence is not futile since he is a servant
of God and to nature; this existence depends upon God’s love and support.
Consequently, the tension between the Divine and Man is ended to make
the return to the natural situation of love. The influence of God, “the
in blurring the lines between a faithful Christian and the powerful God. We
may here point to Helen Vendler view; she states that God’s power:
“assuaged his anxiety by deciding that power is not arbitrary but rather
the divine will; a kind of purchase is erected not only in “Obedience” but
also in other several poems such as “Vanitie” when the poet writes: “to
transaction. Words such as “to sell”, “to buy” and “debt” shadow a
communicate with the Sacred and then it announces a more implicit deep
foreshadows Christ’s sacrifice for all humanity. Thus, it alludes that the
suffering of Man; he states in the final lines of his poem “The Holdfast”:
“What Adam had, and forfeited for all, Christ keepth now, who cannot fail
or fall”. In this way, Herbert writes the continuation of Man’s sacrifice and
Christian then the speaker announces the easiness of the relation despite
end in rest. We can refer here to the final stanza of “Trinitie Sunday”
At this point lies Herbert‘s willingness to satisfy his spiritual desire and
then to fulfil his theological covenant. He insists that his obedience to God
balanced world between the human worlds of sin and the spiritual world
the problem does not concern the covenant itself; it is rather about the
for accomplishing the covenant for Herbert reinforces the idea that his
faith is the true way to achieve rest. The human being is the sinner and
God is the forgiver and at the heart of this difference lies the internal logic
Lest want of aw
regret. The speaker in “The World” affirms that he recognizes God’s grace
only when sin entered his house; without the sins, Man cannot be a
between God, the source of grace, and Man the sinner; the grace replaces
sin and so the sin ends with grace, each one completes the other as if Man
lives with God and so God exists by his mercy and grace; this makes the
discourse between the two parts. We can refer here to the conclusive
Herbert urges for the construction of a world that unifies Man’s soul
with God then the verse becomes a way to end the feeling of alienation
with the human world and to reach God’s realm. The recognition of the
sins leads to confession and then to the request of grace. This spiritual
“catechizing the reader” and bringing “him to the self-discovery that is the
reinforces the instrumental role of the poet to depict the merciful God.
The hopeful end shadows the sweetness of the spiritual experience so that
it would influence the reader for the poet addresses the Man’s soul.
end. Hence, this end is only a beginning of a true life. The spiritual
experience does not only change the speaker’s life yet, it establishes a
converted person able to write about his torments and be closer to God. In
this way, the verse becomes a recovery of the crisis of faith and then it
Christian life. Generally, the poems consist of two parts and two persons
included in the same self. Often, the tense of the poem changes from the
simple past in the first part to the simple present or the future tense. So,
to enter the world of faith the individual speaker is aware that the change
from the state of despair to the state of complete rest and this is the “real
time”. Here we can consider the poem “The Reprisall”, a poem that
depicts the covenant between God and the speaker who makes a sharp
stanza he affirms:
moment within the speaker’s self. The poet regrets his previous life but he
between past and present engenders this originality for the present
situation depends strongly upon the past and the past becomes a past
elements such as: “The Church-porch”, “The Altar”, “and The Windows”;
The middle of the collection is a reflection upon the deep relation with the
end with “Love” which can be considered as a logical and natural end for
love comes from God and continues in the human soul hence to sign that
his poems do not end, as love is an immortal feeling. Yet, it is not that
way to reach God’s love. These moments are clear in poems such as “The
The poet’s willingness to rest makes his verse the space where he
sacred relation the Divine. Life out the temple seems to be impossible and
Herbert’s Study of the Church” Sara William Hanley insists that Herbert
synthesizes his poems around the basic metaphor of the temple. She
assumes that the speakers in The Temple, at the end of the poems move
“from activity to passivity” and then “this movement will run through the
“enters” the complex and multi-level temple, to rest in it –in God- at the
As far as time is considered, the journey within the self that starts
with revolution and ends in rest does not really a movement in time. The
notion of past and present stems from the spiritual struggle with the
In most of the poems, the narrative line can be divided into three
phases: the speaker begins with his life of stability then it comes the
moment of anxiety, which takes the most part of the poem. The restless
status ends with reconciliation; yet, this is not the end for the rest
the end of the poem becomes inherently the beginning of the “true life”.
declares the shortness of life and then the change is pivotal for eternity.
The poet examines his past life in relation to the future. Again, and for a
didactic purpose, Herbert makes a warning for the reader about time and
its reference to death. His poem “Death” is case in point, the speaker
does not fear death despite the fact it is: “Nothing but bones,” and “After
the losse of life sense,/ Flesh being turn’t to dust, and bones to sticks.”
This is the first part of the poem where the diction of death “sadder
grones”, “dust”, and “bones” makes a tragic tone to the poem. Yet the
be that transitional moment between the worldly life and the meeting with
In this way, the divine verse makes death sweet. The sacrifice of the
death is alive and makes the human being exist. Moreover, the speaker
hints implicitly, that God’s grace is what makes death, as a “sleep” and
Man will settle “Unto an honest faithful grave”. Accordingly, life ends with
which is ironically a godly action. Moreover, we can assume that the poet
the end. He knows what may come after the end of his life for he is a true
Christian and he is faithful to the Sacred God. The poet is the governor of
his self and its sinfulness. At the very moment of confessing his sins, the
speaker guarantees grace so out of his feeble self emerges the change.
Thus, the verse immortalizes the fact of grace, we may refer here to
defer no time;
In this way, Herbert makes a verse which resists time; the insurance
of God’s mercy is not delayed the speaker is able to see his will. The
request is fulfilled in the verse (“rhyme”) with God’s blessing so that God
against the human sins. Furthermore, because of its spirituality the divine
verse resists Man’s existence in time. Although, the human life is mortal,
Herbert makes it alive for his writing eternalizes his Christian beliefs.
The religious experience is paradoxical yet logical at the same time. When
the poet is aware about the mortality of his life and so, he immortalizes his
actions in this futile life. The spiritual harmony with God makes lifetime
valuable; Man must live in a sacrificial way in order to make his life true.
“Flower”;
The speaker recognizes the presence of Man in time and urges for
Christian full of power that is stimulated from God. Furthermore, the sins
are related with the physical part of the human being so it will end with his
death however, the soul remains immortal and so the body is part of the
human world that is why it is despised. After announcing that “All things
voice of his spirit is everlasting and the when the poet addresses the
Almighty, there is a dialogue between the spirits and this, what makes the
to be the movement towards heaven. “Death” and “Life” shadow forth the
interplay of man with time. In “Death”, there is a call for life in grave, and
It be as short as yours”.
The sacred verse makes a real reconciliation with the world as well as with
the Creator; it also constructs a different world where the speaker and God
share the roles for their existence depends upon each other. Life becomes
worthy when man is faithful to God and so the sacred verse is a true way
this point, it is very urgent to heed the poem “Time” where the speaker is
excludes”, but man exists with the blessing of the Lord. Paradoxically,
time, which, was considered long in the beginning of the poem, becomes
at the end short. Purposely, to convey that man wants more time to
worship God and to purify his life; so the speaker ends the poem with this
grace, Herbert calls for profiting from lifetime and to be close to God. He
declares in the same poem “Time” “And this is that makes life so long/
while it detains us from God.” Life is paradoxical for the short lifetime
verse that narrates man’s existence within the limits of time. In this way,
the sacred verse becomes the action of man to eternalize his perfect relation with
God.
implication; it is the sense of voluntarism in the acceptance of the deed. The “imposed”
covenant seems to be natural and willing, the more accepted it will be. In the same way,
fulfilling the covenant is a complex phenomenon for the enigmatic issue does not concern the
covenant rather than the nature of the human being. Thus, this divine verse shows the deep
struggle of making faith truthful. Herbert edifies the protestant thoughts; Man is faithful to his
doctrine and then he abides to God’s power. Yet, being faithful to the divine raises the
Clearly, the individual speakers in The Temple encounter a serious perplexity. When
poetry obliterates the feeling of alienation between the Self and the world, it raises existential
question: Herbert stirs the conflict between art and its inadequacy to fulfill religious
satisfaction. It is precisely to such view that Herbert alludes in his poems about poetry itself:
“Denial”, “Quiddity”, “Jordan I”, “Jordan II” and the well known “The forerunners”. These
poems are plausibly worthwhile in the analysis of the way the theology is shaped into verse
hence the affiliation of poetry and religion. Accordingly, the internal conflict is not only with
God, yet there is a tripartite contention. The poet priest is conscious that his verse is
problematic in the way that it may not satisfy the Sacred. Thus, the poet urges for a response
to his religious obligation and simultaneously to his poetic desires. Eventually, the poet
questions the ability of poetry to fulfill his religious needs as an Anglican poet; hence the
Ironically speaking, the Sacred is the cause of the dilemma but He is also the solver of
the conflict. At another level, the verse moves its center from the sacred to poetry itself; as a
result, Herbert’s verse points to itself as self-critical. His poem “Grief” witnesses the rejection
of the verse at the expense of praising the sublime God; he assumes “Verses, ye are too fine a
thing, too wise/ For my rough sorrows: cease, be dumb and mute.” Herbert artfully directs the
poem to be self-denying because at the end he describes his “rhyme” as “For mine excludes
both measure, tune, and time.” Consequently, he feels grief for the loss of rhyme; it is a poem
about the failure to write a full rhyme verse for the final line breaks the rhyme “Alas my
God”. Strikingly, “Grief” is well measured, its tune is clearly depicted and time is axcluded
because it is an enemy to the human existence so the poem is well written contrastingly to
This last line, which is separately injected, foreshadows the disturbance of measure
and then calls for a multiplicity of meanings. Moreover, it conveys the loss of rhyme in order
to show the deep dilemma of the speaker, he insists that his poem never ends. Eventually, this
last line summarizes the whole poem; it is a deep cry of sadness. The speaker vindicates his
self and makes God his final resort. As far as the circularity of the poem is considered, the
final line can be read as the first line because the opening rhetorical question “O who will give
me tears” is answered by this last line “Alas my God”. Therefore, the speaker maintains that
“Grief” is a self-consuming poem in the sense that it subverts itself in order to assume
the inability of language to convey the poet’s grief; it is a real grief that poetry does not
maintain its meaning. Richard Strier includes “Grief” in the flow literature of tears and
compunction and tears to hunger and hunger and thirst after the divine mercy.”
The strong wit to write a verse in order to praise God is in itself a sign of grace
according to the poet. This is clearly assumed in “The Thanksgiving” “If you shall give me
wit, it shall appear;/ If thou hast giv’n it me, ‘tis here.” Yet, as in “Grief”, he ends the poem
with “Alas my God, I know not what.” Despite all what he has written he does not know what
to write to show his passion for God; this ambiguous claim is a powerful rhetorical strategy to
demonstrate the uneasiness to write about religious matters. The “What” at the end is
provocative; the speaker thanks God for the powerful wit. Furthermore, the rhetorical
questions beginning with “Shall I…” and the conditional sentences prove the speaker’s
inability to thank God yet, the poem can be a true way to praise Him for at the end he comes
to an absolute truth “That all together may accord in thee,/ And prove one God, one harmony”
Notably, this poem does not only address God as it represents a message to the reader.
At the end, the speaker cries “O my dear Saviour, Victory!” he succeeds to make his verse as
natural as God’s love. As far as the process of writing is concerned, the poet makes a
parallelism when he considers that as Man is gifted by Christ’s passion, the individual poet is
gifted by wit so that he is missioner to preach God; what makes the harmony between the
Herbert employs poetry to vindicate the uneasiness to depict the sacred wholeness. Thus, the
complexity of the religious matters is echoed in the ambivalence of the poetic language. For
instance, the emblematic poems could be understood within the divine image it delineates,
The reconciliation between the poet and God exists already before it even starts. He
inspires his religious reflections from God; yet the enigmatic issue of representation hampers
the deferred Utopian world from a religious perspective so that a poetic theory from the
harmony between religion and Art. At this point, one may consider “Misery” which starts
with referring to the Renaissance view of Man “Lord, let the Angels praise thy name./ Man is
a foolish thing, a foolish thing,” so that Man cannot praise the sacred Lord because “My God,
Man cannot praise thy name:/ thou art all brightness, perfect purity.” Man is not so pure to
write a sacred verse; this claim engenders that if the poet is able to write such a praising verse
he is not an angel, yet, he reaches grace. The fact of grace is already coexisted with the very
act of writing. This interplay between poetry religion is unique to Herbert’s divine verse.
The search in The Temple is not an enquiry for new truths; it is rather a search for ways to
represent these truths. He claims in “The Thanksgiving” “’Tis but to tell the tale is told”;
therefore his mission is to rewrite the religious experience; in this way the invention lies in the
Significantly, the subtitle of The Temple is “Sacred Poems And Private Ejaculations”
which shows the interaction of poetry with the religious discourse and then the audiences of
the verse consist only in his Self and his God. To address God the poet needs to purify his
poetic language so that his verse is self-critical to the extent that he comments on poetry as the
inappropriate way to depict the sublimity of the Divine. He asks his self in “Dullness”:
These rhetorical questions emphasize the poetic plight; it is an ironical view upon the secular
verse so that the sacred verse is full of views and approaches because it is inspired from God.
his metaphysical views meet with his poetic aspirations. Accordingly, there is a presence of
two focuses; to satisfy his ambitions as a poet and to be faithful to his divine duty thus he
intentionally urges for conciliation between his private poetic experience and his serious
divine experience. Herbert is aware that Man exists in language and cannot depart from it and
then his poetry enables him to annihilate the blurring line of alienation between his aspirations
and his verse, for he sees poetry as the true way to attain a harmonious position. At this point,
one may heed the well-structured poem “The Forerunners” which is a poem about the
In poems of reconciliation, the speaker succeeds to find rest. Yet, the “Forerunners” is
a poem about writing; it resists closure for it is self-referential and foreshadows the unending
aspects of poetry. At the beginning, the speakers jot down several rhetorical questions, which
could be understood only when the reader finishes the entire poem. He shows that he is
different from those who come before him; he has a peculiar experience of writing for he
addresses language: “Farwell sweet phrases, lovely metaphors/ But will ye me thus?” then he
constructs a significant affinity between his harmonious relation with the Sacred and his
original poetic vigour. God is present in language and sacredly the speaker delineates a
Moreover, the phrase “Thou art still my God” has an emphatic effect especially when
it is repeated thrice in a trinity image. Notably, when he deals about language he does not
repeat this phrase and one may interpret it as to separate God from the impurity of language
and then resorts to His name to purify his language thus, God is the source of the poetic
In this poem “The Forerunners”, the poet gives his theory concerning poetry itself.
The series of rhetorical questions emphasize the enigma of using “enchanting language” and
then the speaker proclaims that language must dwell in the church, meaning that language
should be used for divine purposes in order to become “Lovely enchanting, sugar cane/ Honey
of roses, whither wilt thou fly?” yet, it loses its value when it “leave[s] the Church”, it even
becomes dangerous because it “ hurt thy self, and him that songs the note”. In this way, the
true lover is the one who employs pure and divine language; otherwise, he is a “foolish lover”
and so he should “speak in her native language” i.e. the language of his lover. In a
parallel way, the poet loves God so that he speaks His language.
Accordingly, we may allude that the title of the poem “The Forerunners”
Accordingly, the poet assumes that beautiful words that praise God make
the sweetness of the divine love with an esthetic way. “thou art still my
verse makes the truth more beautiful than it is when he writes, “So all
within be livelier than before”. This line may express that the speaker’s
“beauteous” words never end for there are always beautiful truths to
poem; she declares that the several explanations “which a more anxious
poet would be at pains to reconcile with each other. Herbert simply lets
language and controlling it, it is not because of his arrogance as a poet yet
for his dwelling within the divine language, he is equipped with the divine
beauty.
time and space. Now, he becomes able to resist the impurity of human
language. The divine verse allows for a sense of beauty; it is not out of the
sweet phrases and the lovely metaphors but it is the sanctification of the
subject (God) Who makes the poetic truth more truthful. So the existed
The interplay of poetry and religion is like the relation between body
and soul, and so as a way to imitate God’s power the poet writes a
powerful verse that resists closure. Poetry is a true way to praise God
represents the audience “My God, a verse is not a crown”. The speaker
seeks to make a definition to verse but he recognizes within the poem that
it is not an easy task to define poetry and the with the series of negative
existence.
sword; therefore, it has not a political dimension because God is the king
of all. Moreover, it deals with serious matters and so it resists space “it
was never in France or Spain” as he writes; yet it stands firm time for he
employs “day” to refer to its shortness; he insists upon the lifelong of his
Hall;” Art is not related to the human, it comes rather from God, it is an art
which makes God’s love more real than it is. This image is detailed in
of writing.
the divine experience his real inspiration to writing; he is able to find God
and even participates in the writing of the poem. This image reflects the
We can also find this idea in “The Quip” its refrain is “But you shall
answer, Lord for me” yet at the final stanza we find that “Speak not at
large, say, I am thine:/ And then they have their answer home.”
dwells within the poet’s self. The Lord is present as part of the audience
he speaks directly to the divine and more the conversation is very truthful
sweet relationship of love from the paradoxes of the human being life.
Eventually, God love makes the circularity of the poem; it is the starting
for God is involved in the process of writing. The speaker is aware that
human words lack sincerity when he makes a contrast with the divine
discourse:
the divine verse; yet at this level, “God doth supply the want” and this
makes the harmony between the speaker and God, the divine represents
the feelings, which become written by the poet. Accordingly, we can draw
a parallelism; God is the Maker of love and the poet is the maker of verse
The poet insists on the fact that the poetic discourse is emotional,
spiritual and made only by God. The speaker ends the poem with
love” is guaranteed in the divine dialogue between God and the speaker;
worthy to consider the circularity of the poem since the title “A true
the verse. The divine poem does not show the limits of the poetic text; yet,
it makes the strength of the poem when God contributes to the writing.
The text praises itself since it gives direct truth. In this way, Herbert’s
God and the poet. The divine verse is based upon the “already- always”
so when the poet shows his love to God, he reinforces that he is present
with God and then he eradicates his sinful human self. In this way, he
proves that his existence within a Utopian world, this presence is truthful
refer to “Praise III” in which the speaker shows the power of God as related
presence as the spiritual source of his poetic creation, he does not deny
his creative self. The divine verse is written with God’s providence
therefore, the poet guarantees the existence, the performance and then
the continuation of the verse. In this way, he proves that his creative
“Submission” and “Praise II”; in fact, they are interrelated with the aspect
According to the poet the praise and the raise are interconnected as the
Christian therefore, the poet becomes closer to God within the verse;
when he speaks about himself as a talented poet he makes his verse too
divine. God’s presence in the poem is unreachable not only for the
ambiguous relation between “praise” and “raise” but also for the
reference to the deep relation between the speaker and The Divine so that
power; despite its artistry, this sacred verse declares its inability to reach
the wholeness of The Divine. What makes the peculiarity of the verse is
The Divine (God/ Christ) is more sublime than the divine poetic
the Divine is achieved when the poet assumes the inability of language to
far as it is different from the whole trend of the metaphysical poetry; the
form of the poem reflects its deep meaning which is a modernist mark.
Poems such as “Easter Wings” and “The Altar” foreshadow the religious
same time and then he urges for an affiliation between poetry and
between Man existence and his conflict with the world. Notably, we may
assume that there is not a single conflict in the verse, there is different
levels of contest.
in the divine experience. God is not seen as an external power so that the
reconciliation within his self; he declares that his love for the Divine is a
certain fact therefore at the peak of conflict comes the rest within the
speaker’s heart; the divine love emerges from God and is extended within
The journey within the Self to find a kind of ease is more significant
than the resolution. The poet discovers that the peculiarity of the divine
experience lies in the assumption that once you reach a harmonious state
exploring the divine experience. The tormented self is present when God is
absent yet, when the speaker reminds himself of God’s presence within his
Self, the experience changes and his peaceful Self is present. Actually, the
poet searches for a united Self since he is lost, tormented and struggling.
journey.
the other hand, there is the counter discourse; the divine that is sacred
and pure. Then, these two different voices are expressed in the same
between the Human and the Divine; the verse is a discourse by which
to demonstrate the divine journey within the Self. To redeem his sins, the
poet discovers that the divine Art cures his physical sufferings as well as
his moral torments; when the speaker confesses his sins, he becomes able
to ask for forgiveness therefore the more he writes, the less sins he has. At
the very moment of preaching God, the speaker discovers that his
God gives him the power of writing so that he can redeem his sins
and then immortalizes his love for the Divine. The suffering is deeply
his physical being as it brings only suffering for him. He makes himself
irresponsible for his sins; his sinful human side is cured because Christ
suffered for all humanity. When the poet preaches Christ, he manifests His
sacrifice and then shows that the human divine experience is deeply
linked to Christ.
achieve spiritual rest is not such an easy way. The internal conficlict paves
the way to show that the Divine exists within the human self so Man
cannot escape his existence with a religious experience. In this way, the
shows that the true Christian is the person who questions the validity of
the religious experience and then proves the truthfulness of the divine
discourse.
where Man is the manipulator of his experience. The poet plays upon the
one. The suffering is transfigured into a light to cure his sins and then his
utopian world. The religious aspect is a primordial in the Christian Man life,
so that the individual is not separable from the divine and then this
journey the poet discovers that he cannot exist outside the divine; Herbert
Accordingly, the power of God dismantles all the internal conflicts. The
speaker and the Divine power. Herbert employs business imagery when he
highlights Christ’s sacrifice for all humanity; in this way, Man gains
redemption and forgiveness not only when he unfolds his sins but also if
world when he deals with his relationship with the Sacred. When the
the spiritual sense of his verse a logical manifestation of the religious. Man
can exists only when he follows the divine will; otherwise, he will suffer
from his self. In this way, God creates Man to continue the sacrifice of
Christ; conscious about this fact, the poet manifests his divine love
poets for it is self-reflexive in terms of form and content. Apart from the
mimetic poems that foreshadow the dwelling of the Christian poet in the
church, some poems reflect from their titles the manifestation of the
Divine Liturgy. In “Sin I”, for instance he declares that he makes journey
within “schoolmasters” and their “rules” and then “the rules of reason” of
lives as a Christian. At this level lies a sense of loyalty to his belief: the sin
God. Herbert reinforces that the religious has no limits as far as his great
love for the Divine is concerned yet, poetry allows for foregrounding the
God is the true writer of the poems, this declaration might be interpreted
Accordingly, Man is a creator for he is able to write such artistic verse yet,
the end of the poem when he reaches rest. He is able to exist in the
church for it is the unique peaceful space; at this point, one my heed the
poetic space, yet it foreshadows the settlement of the spirit. Hence, this
spirituality is the source of rest what calls for all humanity to share these
Accordingly, Herbert does not only address the Divine but he also
this sense of peace dismantles all the hard torments he encounters within
his self; within the church he finds his united self not only in the liturgical
creativity of in the human self; within his verse one may notice the
his sins and his torments. Yet, as a Christian rhetorician he calls for
poetry: art is God creation and so it written to preach Him. Secular verse is
disapproved since it deals with the forbidden love; this love should only be
adressed to God.
between Man and God. The sense of perfectness dominates the sacred
verse; though man is a sinful creature he has a spiritual part in his self
where God is present on him. The sinful self is present only when God is
verse foreshadows his eagerness to eternalize his self and to establish his
proves his substantial creativity; accordingly, as his love for God is great,