Tag Archives: Poetry

Complacency & Autonomy

02 Sunday Apr 2017

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Paraphrasing Job, Goethe begins Faust in the Heavenly Court, where Mephistopheles complains that men torment each other so thoroughly that he hardly wants to bother them. In response, the Lord asks the devil if he knows “his servant” Faust, to which the devil responds, “He serves you in a curious way; not earthly are his meat and drink . . . and everything from near and far does not requite his deeply moved heart.” The Lord counters, “Man will err as long as he strives.” Thus begins the wager over Faust’s soul.

For his poem, Goethe required a protagonist who exemplifies Augustine’s restless heart because, left to their own devices, men fall into a torpor and seek unconditional rest, as the Lord tells Mephistopheles. Complacency is the characteristically modern sin. The human condition has not changed, nor can it, so long as men must die. But modern man is more susceptible to the illusion that he can mold his own identity and make his own destiny. Modern man can persuade himself that he is alone in the universe, improvising his ethics and identity as he goes along. He can fancy himself master of the universe through science. He can even imagine that brain science eventually will resolve the existential questions that have troubled his kind for millennia. Underneath this complacency lurks an antipathy to life, articulated wittily by Goethe’s devil.

Hast Thou Considered my Servant Faust?

Edward Taylor, Would God I in that Golden City Were.3

15 Wednesday Mar 2017

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The previous post on this poem may be found here.

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I am to Christ more base than to a King
A mite, fly, worm, ant, serpent, devil is,
Or can be, being tumbled all in sin,
And shall I be his spouse? How good is this?
It is too good to be declared to thee
But not too good to be believed by me.

This stanza repeats the theme of the previous two stanzas: the wonder that God should love human beings; that Christ should join himself to such as us. There are two movements which must take place to fully appreciate what the poet does here: the first is to fully understand what he does in the poem itself. The second is to move past our natural prejudice in favor of ourselves.

The stanza breaks neatly into two; the break taking place in the middle of the fourth line (the 34th line of the poem). The first portion reads:

I am to Christ more base than to a King
A mite, fly, worm, ant, serpent, devil is,
Or can be, being tumbled all in sin,
And shall I be his spouse?

The them of this section is the sheer improbability that Christ should love the poet. There are three aspects of this: First, there is the comparison of Christ to a king and the poet to a loathsome creature. Second, the reference to “being tumble all in sin.” Third, that such a one should be brought into intimate relationship.

Technically, the second line is the key here: The first line sets up the comparison Christ equals a King. The second stays to ten syllables but then crams it full of stresses:
a MITE, FLY, WORM, ANT, SERpent, DEVil is. The lien can only be read very slowly and then tails off. The idea picks up in the third line OR can be, which comes along as an afterthought. Of these vermin, ants, worms, and serpents appeared in the previous stanza.

We miss the horror here if we don’t stop to realize what life is like without houses which are sealed against the weather, and screens, and traps, and poisons, and medicines and antidotes. Imagine being invested with mites or worms and being unable to rid your body of the beasts infecting you. Imagine ants and flies getting into and spoiling all of the food which you could have. Imagine fearing that a snake would strike unaware and kill. And most moderns could not imagine any sort of devil that did not exist only in horror movies and was capable of being driven off with a crucifix. When you read this line, you must have a sense of disgust, fear and an uncanny horror.

The purpose of this bestiary is to evoke the sensation which should be stirred by the real reason for wonder: sin. Why should God have anything to do with those in sin? We are supposed to real revulsion and then that explained by the word “sin”:

Psalm 5:4–6 (AV)
4 For thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness: neither shall evil dwell with thee. 5 The foolish shall not stand in thy sight: thou hatest all workers of iniquity. 6 Thou shalt destroy them that speak leasing: the LORD will abhor the bloody and deceitful man.
We fail to understand what is happening here as long as we think of sin solely in terms of discrete actions. Yes, sin entails discrete acts of sin. But is also a status offense (as such things are called in the law). It is like being an illegal alien in a country: the status is an offense even without additional bad acts. The Mosaic covenant aims at this concept by the matter of being ritually clean or unclean. Many things which were morally neutral were unclean. Likewise inanimate objects could be “holy” because they were dedicated to God.

To be tumbled in sin is to be subsumed it: to be repulsive, unclean.

And yet, it is precisely such repulsive people who are brought into intimate union with Christ. The poet cannot understand it, but for all that, he will not reject it but believe it:

How good is this?
It is too good to be declared to thee
But not too good to be believed by me.

We see in this a hint at why “belief” is at the core of receipt of justification, right standing with God. To believe this gift is to receive it with joy and thankfulness. It is not a bare historical opinion that some event took place. It is a joyful reception of something marvelous being offered.

Euripides, Hebuca.2

04 Saturday Mar 2017

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Lines 11-20

My father quietly sent a fortune

In gold with me, that should the Illian wall

Crash down, those living would not lack for life.

I was the youngest son of Priam’s house

And he sent me secretly from the land.

Of course, I did not carry any arms

Not even a lance, so young were my arms.

For as long as the boundaries stood secure,

The Towers of Troy upright and unshattered,

And Hector my brother’s spear saw good luck,

Then that man, my father’s Thracian friend,

Well cared for me, so I raised up like a tree.

 

πολὺν δὲ σὺν ἐμοὶ χρυσὸν ἐκπέμπει λάθρᾳ

πατήρ, ἵνʼ, εἴ ποτʼ Ἰλίου τείχη πέσοι,

τοῖς ζῶσιν εἴη παισὶ μὴ σπάνις βίου.

νεώτατος δʼ ἦ Πριαμιδῶν, ὃ καί με γῆς

ὑπεξέπεμψεν· οὔτε γὰρ φέρειν ὅπλα

[15] οὔτʼ ἔγχος οἷός τʼ ἦ νέῳ βραχίονι.

ἕως μὲν οὖν γῆς ὄρθʼ ἔκειθʼ ὁρίσματα

πύργοι τʼ ἄθραυστοι Τρωικῆς ἦσαν χθονὸς

Ἕκτωρ τʼ ἀδελφὸς οὑμὸς εὐτύχει δορί,

καλῶς παρʼ ἀνδρὶ Θρῃκὶ πατρῴῳ ξένῳ

[20] τροφαῖσιν ὥς τις πτόρθος ηὐξόμην, τάλας·

 

Euripides, Euripidis Fabulae, Ed. Gilbert Murray, Vol. 1, ed. Gilbert Murray (Medford, MA: Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1902).

 

 

Euripides, Hecuba.1

02 Thursday Mar 2017

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Here is the first lines of Polydorus’ introduction to the play Hecuba.

Polydorus

I have come, leaving the depths of the dead,

From the Dark Gates, where Hades dwells apart

From other gods. I am Polydorus

The son of Hecuba, of Cisseus;

Priam my father. After Priam feared

That danger from the Hellenes spear would fall

Upon the Phrygian City of Troy,

He secretly sent me from our land

To the home of his Thracian guest-friend

Polymenstor, who farms Chersone’s fair plain

And rules a horse-loving people by spear.

 

Πολυδώρου εἴδωλον

Ἥκω νεκρῶν κευθμῶνα καὶ σκότου πύλας

λιπών, ἵνʼ Ἅιδης χωρὶς ᾤκισται θεῶν,

Πολύδωρος, Ἑκάβης παῖς γεγὼς τῆς Κισσέως

Πριάμου τε πατρός, ὅς μʼ, ἐπεὶ Φρυγῶν πόλιν

[5] κίνδυνος ἔσχε δορὶ πεσεῖν Ἑλληνικῷ,

δείσας ὑπεξέπεμψε Τρωικῆς χθονὸς

Πολυμήστορος πρὸς δῶμα Θρῃκίου ξένου,

ὃς τήν<δʼ> ἀρίστην Χερσονησίαν πλάκα

σπείρει, φίλιππον λαὸν εὐθύνων δορί.

 

Euripides, Euripidis Fabulae, Ed. Gilbert Murray, Vol. 1, ed. Gilbert Murray (Medford, MA: Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1902).

 

 

The Faerie Queene: The Temptation of Mammon

28 Tuesday Feb 2017

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Book II of the Faire Queene concerns the Knight Guyon, who represents the virtue of temperance. In Canto VII he comes upon an “uncouth, salvage, and uncivile wight”. Spenser describes him as follows (the strange spelling goes away when you read it out loud):

 

His iron Coat all overgrown with Rust,

Was underneath enveloped with Gold,

Whose glistring Gloss darkned with filthy Dust,

Well it appeared to have been of old

A Work of rich Entail, and curious Mold,

Woven with Anticks [fantastic figures] and wild Imagery:

And in his Lap a Mass of Coin he told,

And turned upsidown, to feed his Eye

And covetous Desire with his huge Threasury.

 

And round about him lay on every side

Great Heaps of Gold that never could be spent;

Of which, some were rude Ore, not purifide

Of Mulciber’s devouring Element;

Some others were new driven, and distent [beaten out]

Into great Ingots, and to Wedges square;

Some in round Plates withouten Monument;

But most were stamp’d, and in their Metal bare

The antique Shapes of Kings and Kesars strange and rare.

 

This strange evil beast cluttered and covered with money, is covetous Mammon, as Guyon discovers. Although freightened at first, he speaks to the beast:

 

 

What art thou Man (if Man at all thou art)

That here in Desart hast thine Habitaunce [dwelling]

And these rich Heaps of Wealth dost hide apart

From the World’s Eye, and from her right Usaunce?

The beast answers:

 

Thereat, with staring Eyes fixed ascaunce,

In great Disdain, he answered; Hardy Elf, [the Knight is referred as an elf]

That darest view my direful Countenaunce,

I reed thee rash, and heedless of thy self;

To trouble my still Seat, and Heaps of precious Pelf. [a negative word for wealth]

 

God of the World and Worldlings I me call,

Great Mammon, greatest God below the Sky,

That of my Plenty pour out unto all,

And unto none my Graces do envy:

Riches, Renown, and Principality,

Honour, Estate, and all this Worldes Good,

For which Men stink [labor] and sweat incessantly,

Fro me do flow into an ample Flood,

And in the hollow Earth have their eternal Brood. [Wealth comes from the earth]

Here comes the temptation: If you bow down and serve me, I’ll give you all this world:

 

Wherefore if me thou deign to serve and sew,

At thy Command lo all these Mountains be;

Or if to thy great Mind, or greedy View,

All these may not suffice, there shalt to thee

Ten times so much be numbred frank and free.

Mammon, said he, thy Godhead’s Vaunt is vain,

And idle Offers of thy golden Eee;

To them that covet such eye-glutting Gain,

Proffer thy Gifts, and fitter Servants entertain.

 

Guyon rejects the temptation, because mere money is not befitting a knight who seeks honor:

 

 

Me ill befits, that in der-doing Arms, [brave acts]

And Honour’s Suit my vowed Days do spend,

Unto thy bounteous Baits, and pleasing Charms,

With which weak Men thou witchest, to attend:

Regard of worldly Muck doth foully blend

And low abase the high heroick Spright,

That joys for Crowns and Kingdoms to contend;

Fair Shields, gay Steeds, bright Arms be my Delight:

Those be the Riches fit for an advent’rous Knight.

 

And here the tempter responds: Ah, I can give you what you want (you’re mistaken):

 

Vain-glorious Elfe, said he, dost not thou weet, [don’t you understand]

That Money can thy Wants at will supply?

Shields, Steeds, and Arms, and all things for thee meet

It can purvey in twinkling of an eye;

And Crowns and Kingdoms to thee multiply.

Do not I Kings create, and throw the Crown

Sometimes to him that low in Dust doth lie?

And him that reign’d, into his room thrust down,

And whom I lust, do heap with Glory and Renown?

 

Edward Tailor, Would God I in that Golden City Were

26 Sunday Feb 2017

Posted by in Edward Taylor, Eschatology, Literature, Uncategorized

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The prior post on this poem may be found here.

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I know not how to speak’t, it so so good:
Shall mortal and immortal marry? nay
Man marry God? God be a match for mud?
The King of Glory to wed a worm? Mere Clay?
This is the case. The wonder too in bliss.
Thy Maker is thy husband. Hearst thou this?

My maker, he my husband? Oh! strange joy!
If kings wed worms, and monarch mites wed should,
Glory spouse shame, a prince a snake or fly
An angel court an ant, all wonder would.
Let such web worms, snake serpents, devils, flies.
Less wonder than the wedden in our eyes.

Paraphrase: The poet struggles for a comparison which could match the wonder he discovers in heaven: God loves human beings. In fact, the degree of intimacy is so profound that it can only be understood as a marriage.

Reference: These two stanzas introduce an idea which lies at the heart of Christian eschatology and the biblical narrative: the figure of the marriage between God and his people.

The primary reference here is to Isaiah 54:5. The entire passage reads as follows:

Isaiah 54:4–8 (AV)

4 Fear not; for thou shalt not be ashamed: neither be thou confounded; for thou shalt not be put to shame: for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more. 5 For thy Maker is thine husband; the LORD of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called.
6 For the LORD hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth, when thou wast refused, saith thy God. 7 For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee. 8 In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment; but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the LORD thy Redeemer.

The concept here is that the degree of love God has for his people is figured in the love which a husband has for his wife. The idea is not there is any actual merger of God and humanity, but rather that marriage is an illustration to make plain the nature of God’s love for his own:

Understanding this explains a great of Christian conduct and language which may seem baffling to non-Christians. Notice how Paul weaves human marriage with the theology:

Ephesians 5:25–33 (AV)

25 Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; 26 That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, 27 That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish. 28 So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself. 29 For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church: 30 For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. 31 For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. 32 This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church. 33 Nevertheless let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband.
It is for this reason that Christians cannot reduce marriage to a personal contract: it is a means given to us to begin to learn what it is to be in relationship with God.

It is this degree of intimacy (an idealized marriage) which amazes the poet.

Moreover, the culmination of Christian hope is to be called to “the marriage supper of the Lamb” (Rev. 19:9).

Meter:
This line helps to underscore the stark wonder of the poet:

MAN MARry GOD? GOD be a MATCH for MUD?

The accent on the first syllable “MAN” requires one to slow down and pay attention. The back-and-back accents on the word “GOD” pivots the line into directions creating a chiasmus: Man God God Man.

A similar move happens here: Glory spouse shame, a prince a snake or fly, with the accent falling on three consecutive syllables GLORY SPOUSE SHAME.

Iphigenia in Aulis (Euripides)

25 Saturday Feb 2017

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In this scene, the slave of Agamemnon is carrying a letter which could jeopardize the progress of the Greek armed trip against Troy (it is to stop the sacrifice of Agamemnon’s daughter to satisfy Artemis). Menelaus, the husband of Helen, and thus the one who most personally desires the war against Troy, stops the slave and tries to take the letter away from him.

It is interesting how strong the slave stands against a king in this short scene. The original Greek is set forth below the translation. As the original is verse, I worked the translation out as blank verse. I have tried to maintain some of the wordplay of Euripides.

 

Slave:

Menelaus, dang’rously you dare

Such things as you should never dare.

 

Menelaus

Back off: you’re far too loyal to your lord.

 

Slave:

Honor for me by your spite to be despised

 

Menelaus:

Tears for you if you do such things as you

Should never do.

 

Slave:

                                    It’s not for you to pry

Into this message which here I bear.

 

Menelaus:

Nor you to bear this evil for the Greeks.

 

Slave:

Others will contend about these things

But you, release this scroll to me.

 

Menelaus:

I will never move.

 

Slave:

                                    I will never go.

 

Menelaus:

Well then, my scepter soon will bleed your crown.

 

Slave:

What fame to die in service of my lord.

 

Menelaus:

Such big words for such a slave to spout –move!

 

Slave:

O Master, we shall be defamed — the letter!

By violence torn, without the will of right,

From out my very hand, Agamemnon.

 

 

Πρεσβύτης

Μενέλαε, τολμᾷς δείνʼ, ἅ σʼ ουʼ τολμᾶν χρεών.

Μενέλαος

ἄπελθε· λίαν δεσπόταισι πιστὸς εἶ.

Πρεσβύτης

[305] καλόν γέ μοι τοὔνειδος ἐξωνείδισας.

Μενέλαος

κλαίοις ἄν, ειʼ πράσσοις ἃ μὴ πράσσειν σε δεῖ.

Πρεσβύτης

ουʼ χρῆν σε λῦσαι δέλτον, ἣν ἐγὼ ʼφερον.

Μενέλαος

οὐδέ γε φέρειν σὲ πᾶσιν Ἕλλησιν κακά.

Πρεσβύτης

ἄλλοις ἁμιλλῶ ταῦτʼ· ἄφες δὲ τήνδʼ ἐμοί.

Μενέλαος

[310] οὐκ ἂν μεθείμην.

Πρεσβύτης

οὐδʼ ἔγωγʼ ἀφήσομαι.

Μενέλαος

σκήπτρῳ τάχʼ ἆρα σὸν καθαιμάξω κάρα.

Πρεσβύτης

ἀλλʼ εὐκλεές τοι δεσποτῶν θνῄσκειν ὕπερ.

Μενέλαος

μέθες· μακροὺς δὲ δοῦλος ὢν λέγεις λόγους.

Πρεσβύτης

ὦ δέσποτʼ, ἀδικούμεσθα. σὰς δʼ ἐπιστολὰς

[315] ἐξαρπάσας ὅδʼ ἐκ χερῶν ἐμῶν βίᾳ,

Ἀγάμεμνον, οὐδὲν τῇ δίκῃ χρῆσθαι θέλει.

 

Euripides, Euripidis Fabulae, Ed. Gilbert Murray, Vol. 3, ed. Gilbert Murray (Medford, MA: Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1913).

Edward Taylor, Would God I in that Golden City Were.1

19 Sunday Feb 2017

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14764489751_d8dc35e816_o

(Jasper)

Would God I in that Golden City were,
With jasper walls all garnished and made swash
With precious stones, whose gates are pearls most clear
And street pure gold, like to transparent glass.
That my dull soul might be inflamed to see
How saints and angels ravished are in glee.

The reference here is the city of the New (heavenly) Jerusalem:

18 And the building of the wall of it was of jasper: and the city was pure gold, like unto clear glass. 19 And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, a chalcedony; the fourth, an emerald; 20 The fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, a topaz; the tenth, a chrysoprasus; the eleventh, a jacinth; the twelfth, an amethyst. 21 And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.

Revelation 21:18–21 (AV).

Meter: Note in the first line there is the standard iamb, followed by a trochee which forces attention upon the I: would GOD I in that GOLden CITy WERE. It is his presence in the place which is emphasized in the meter.

Paraphrase: The poet wishes that he could be present in the age to come, in the heavenly Jerusalem come down to earth (for the goal of Christianity is not some far away place, but heaven and earth together). The trouble lies with his “dull soul”. This is a constant them in Taylor: the present inability to truly enjoy the glory of God. In the Ascension poems, he would that he could bare the sight of Christ entering into glory and being seated. Here, he wishes for the age to come. This tension will only be resolved by the resurrection:

42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: 43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: 44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
1 Corinthians 15:42–44 (AV).

Were I but there and could but tell my story,
‘Twould rub those walls of precious stones more bright:
And glaze those gates of pearl with brighter glory;
And pave the golden street with greater light.
‘Twould in fresh raptures saints and angels fling
But I poor snake crawl here, scare mud walled in.
Reference “I poor snake crawl here”. I an ironic reference to Genesis 3:1 where the Serpent (Satan) appears as a snake to tempt Eve. Genesis 3:15 makes reference to the “seed/offspring of the serpent”. Being subjected to the Fall and the Curse, human beings have now been brought low.

Meter: “Story/Glory”, end the first and third lines. The line scan 11 syllables with a feminine rhyme on the 10 & 11th syllables.

Paraphrase: The story of the poet’s salvation (his coming to this city) of such a marvel that if it were known, it would impart a greater glory to the place than is possible in the mere stones and gold. Those things are beautiful, but the story of the poet’s salvation is greater still.
May my rough voice and blunt tongue but spell my
My tale (for tune they can’t) perhaps there may
Some angel catch in an end of’t up and tell
In heaven when he doth return that way
He’ll make they palace, Lord, all over ring
With it in songs, they saint and angels sing.
Meter: In the first line of the phrase “blunt tongue” again creates a pair of accented syllables by running a trochee after an iamb. The effect is jarring, underscoring the bluntness of his tongue.

Reference: The purpose of salvation is bring glory to God. As Paul writes in Ephesians:

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: 4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: 5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, 6 To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
Ephesians 1:3–6 (AV)

Paraphrase: The poet is unable to sing in any manner worthy of God’s glory (much less saints made perfect or the angelic world). Therefore, he will “spell” his story: he will write it out in this poem. His hope is that by spelling it out, an angel may over his story and bring the story back to heaven where the angel’s far greater abilities will make it possible to recount the story (given in this poem) in a song worthy of God’s gory.

As Charles Wesley wrote:

O for a thousand tongues to sing
My great Redeemer’s praise,
The glories of my God and King,
The triumphs of His grace!

My gracious Master and my God,
Assist me to proclaim,
To spread through all the earth abroad
The honors of Thy name.

 

Edward Taylor, When thy bright beams

13 Friday Jan 2017

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the-last-judgment-by-michelangelo

(Judgment Day, Michelangelo)

When thy bright beams, my Lord, do strike mine eye
Methinks I then could truly chide outright
My hidebound soul that stands so niggardly
That scarce a thought get glorified by’t.
My quaintest metaphors are ragged stuff, 5
Making the sun seem like a mullipuff.

It is my desire thou should’st be glorified:
But when thy glory shines before mine eye,
I pardon crave, lest my desire be pride.
Or bed thy glory in a cloudy sky 10
The sun grows wan; and angels palefac’d shrink,
Before thy shine, which I besmirch with ink.

But shall the bird sing forth thy praise, and shall
The little bee present her thankful hum,
But I who see thy shinning glory fall 15
Before mine eyes, stand blockish, dull, and dumb?
Whether I speak or speechless star, I spy,
I fail thy glory, therefore pardon cry.

But this I find, my rhymes do better suit
Mine own dispraise than tune forth praise to thee. 20
Yet being child, whether consonant or mute
I force my tongue to tattle as you see
That I thy glorious praise may trumpet right
Be thou my song and make Lord me thy pipe.

This shining sky will fly away apace, 25
When thy bright glory splits the same to make
Thy majesty pass, whose fairest face
Too foul a path is for thy feet to take.
What glory then, shall tend thee through the sky
Draining the heaven much of angels dry? 30

What light then flame will in thy judgment seat,
‘Fore which all men and angels shall appear?
How shall thy glorious righteousness them treat,
Rendering to each after his works done here?
Then saints with angels though wilt glorify: 35
And burn lewd men and devils gloriously.

One glimpse, my Lord, of thy bright Judgment Day
And glory piercing through, like fiery darts,
All devils, doth me make for grace to pray.
For filling grace had I ten thousand hearts. 40
I’d through ten hells to see thy Judgment Day
Woulds’t though but guild my soul with thy bright rays.

Notes:
This poem begins with a familiar complaint in Taylor’s poems on the Ascension: The beauty and glory of the scene have such transcendent wonder that no word of the poet can suffice to match what is seen. In the first stanza, he complains of his ability, My hidebound soul that stands so niggardly/That scarce a thought gets glorified by’t”.

The trouble does not lie with his wish, “It is my desire”. But when he sees the glory of Christ, rather than responding with appropriate praise, repents, “I pardon crave”. This is a point which may easily lost: The glory of Christ is such that the one who sees condemns himself, such as when Peter has an inkling who Jesus is he calls out, “Depart from me, for a I am a sinful man, O Lord.” Luke 5:8.

The glory of Christ is so create that the Creation itself shrinks back at his greater beauty,
“The sun grows wan”. Even angels, the most glorious of creature, “palefac’d shrink”. If the most glorious elements of creation (the sun, angels) cannot respond to such glory, then how I how hope to do so: (“bed [set] thy glory in a cloudy sky …./ which I besmirch with ink”).

Having spent two stanzas complaining of his weakness to do this work, he notes that humbler creatures, birds and bees, do their work of praising him: then why should I “who see thy shining glory full” not respond but “stand blockish, dull, and dumb”.

And so there is no escape from the paradox: if he praises or stands quiet, he fails to respond adequately to Christ’s glory:

Whether I speak, or speechless stand, I spy [I see]
I fail thy glory: therefore pardon cry.

He then does something interesting: he comments upon his own ability and states that his best poetical gift lies in his expression of his inadequacy to respond to the glory, rather than to praise the glory:

But this I find: my rhymes to better suit
Mine own dispraise than tune forth praise to thee. [the repetition of “praise” well balances the line]

However, having gone this far, he will force himself to praise, “I will force my tongue to tattle” (here it does not have the force of “telling on someone”). And he invokes the help of Christ to praise Christ: “Be thou my song, and make Lord me thy pipe”. The image alludes to the ancient concept that the Spirit’s inspiration of the Scripture was like one playing upon an instrument.

At this point, he begins to praise Christ, but chooses an interesting subject for praise — and one that might seem out-of-place if one does not know the context (The Carmin Christi of Philippians 2): the day of Judgment: The song begins before the Incarnation. The Divine Son willingly becomes Incarnate to bear the weight of the Curse and then Ascends in glory – the God-man having been received by God [when we combine the Trinity and the Incarnation, it becomes constantly paradoxical].

But the exaltation of the Son will be not just the reception of God but the entire Creation’s proclamation of his lordship:

9 Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: 10 That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; 11 And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Philippians 2:9–11 (AV). The bended knee comes about either joyfully or involuntarily as a direct result of Christ’s glory. There is no choice in the matter, the glory of Christ will overwhelm all.

This helps explain Judgment: it is the vindication of Christ. Within Christian theology, it is a sin a to go to Hell and be condemned. Human beings are commanded to repent and be saved. God commands human beings to not go to Hell. Hell was not intended for human beings (it was created for the Devil and his angels). Christ has fully carried the weight of the Curse and will pronounce free grace and forgiveness upon all who will receive it. Thus, it is only continued rebellion against Love which results in damnation.

The great exaltation of Philippians 2 takes place in the vindication of Christ when all Creation (whether joyfully or not) confesses Christ’s lordship.

At this point, Taylor joins the theme of Creation blushing before the glory of Christ and Christ’s return in Judgment. He takes an image from Isaiah concerning the sky rolled upon like a scroll:

Isaiah 34:4 (AV)
4 And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll: and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree.

This image is repeated in Revelation and is again explicitly tied to Judgment:
12 And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; 13 And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. 14 And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. 15 And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; 16 And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: 17 For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?

Revelation 6:12–17 (AV)

The sky is rolled up because it cannot stand before Christ’s greater glory. Heaven will be “drained” of angels because the armies of heaven will come with Christ in his return (Revelation 19).

The scene moves from the Descent of Christ to the Judgment Seat:
11 And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. 12 And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.

Revelation 20:11–12 (AV).

In this last stanza, the glory which overwhelmed Taylor with its beauty, the glory which the Creation could not bear, now becomes an instrument of judgment for those who refused to receive the “Lord of Glory”:

One glimpse, my Lord, of thy bright Judgment Day
And glory piercing through, like fiery darts,
All devils,

Thus, the glory of Christ is a “fiery dart” which pierces “all devils”. There is a pun here based upon Paul’s characterization of the Devil’s attack upon the Saints as an assault of “fiery darts”

16 Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.
Ephesians 6:16 (AV).

Taylor ends with a prayer that the glory of Christ will be sufficient to lead him. He would willingly march through Hell to see Christ’s glory on Judgment Day.

Another note on construction: the poem begins and ends with the “bright rays” of Christ. The first rays are seen on the Ascension. The final rays are the prayed for rays of Judgment.

The Snow Man

17 Saturday Dec 2016

Posted by in Literature, Uncategorized

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Glacier National Park, December 17, 2016

aplocam-2

One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and the boughs
Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time
To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think
Of any misery in the sound of the wind,
In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land
Full of the same wind
That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,
And, nothing himself, beholds
Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

— Wallace Stevens

The Snow Man

There are no uninterpreted facts.