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Edward Taylor, Meditation 43.2

29 Thursday Dec 2022

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Second Stanza

Nature’s corrupt, a nest of passion, pride,

Lust, worldliness, and such like bubs; I pray,

But struggling find these bow my heart aside.

A knot of imps at barley breaks in’t play.                                         10

They do enchant me from my Lord, I find

The thoughts whereof prove daggers to my mind.

Notes

He begins with the second stanza with a new sound and an accented syllable:

NAtures corRUPT  `- -`

The second line likewise begins with an accented syllable

LUST, WORLDliness,

The effect is to emphasis “nature” and the sins which compose it.

Nature refers to what a human being is by birth, after the time of Adam, one who is infected by original sin.  “By spiritual Edwards means “sanctified” in opposition to “carnal,” which signifies the natural or unsanctified man.” Smith, John E. “Editor’s Introduction.” Religious Affections, edited by John E. Smith and Harry S. Stout, Revised edition, vol. 2, Yale University Press, 2009, p. 24.

“That naturally we are not the children of God: we are not born God’s children, but made so. By nature we are strangers to God; swine, not sons, 2 Pet. 2 ult. Will a man settle his estate upon his swine? he will give them his acorns, not his jewels: by nature we have the devil for our father, John 8:44. ‘Ye are of your father the devil.’ A wicked man may search the records of hell for his pedigree.” Watson, Thomas. “Discourses upon Christ’s Sermon on the Mount.” Discourses on Important and Interesting Subjects, Being the Select Works of the Rev. Thomas Watson, vol. 2, Blackie, Fullarton, & Co.; A. Fullarton & Co., 1829, p. 294.

Taylor gives this definition of human nature aside from the work of the Spirit,

                        a nest of passion, pride,

Lust, worldliness, and such like bubs

A “nest of passion” is a striking image. It sounds like a nest of snakes.

Bub is likely here a mixture of yeast and meal to promote fermentation: Here, the concoction would be vile indeed.  

When he turns to pray (I pray), he discovers this his mind and attention are drawn elsewhere, after these sins. Thomas Manton preached a sermon, “How May we Cure Distractions in Holy Duties.” He described the problem in this manner:

First, That there is such a sin, sad experience witnesseth; vain thoughts intrude importunately upon the soul in every duty; in hearing the word we are not free (Ezek. 33:31), nor in singing; but chiefly they haunt us in prayer, and of all kinds of prayer, in mental prayer, when our addresses to God are managed by thoughts alone; there we are more easily disturbed. Words bound the thoughts, and the inconvenience of an interruption is more sensible, as occasioning a pause in our speech; and as in mental prayer, so when we join with others, to keep time and pace with the words, unless the Lord quicken them to an extraordinary liveliness, we find it very hard; but how great a sin this is, is my first task to show.

Manton, Thomas. The Complete Works of Thomas Manton. James Nisbet & Co., 1871, pp. 443–44. Nathanel Vincent preaching on prayer wrote something similar:

Take heed of distraction in prayer, and not minding what you ask, or what you are doing, when at the mercy-seat.—It is great hypocrisy, to be present only in body at the sanctuary; the heart, in the mean while, running away after pleasures, coyetousness, vanity: and this exceedingly provokes the Lord to jealousy; and “are you stronger than he?” (1 Cor. 10:22.)

Nichols, James. Puritan Sermons. Richard Owen Roberts, Publishers, 1981, p. 312.  It such a thing which troubles Taylor: he composes himself to pray,

But struggling find these bow my heart aside.

(This painting in the Getty Museum, LA. Artist, Hans Holbein, the Younger (1497-1541) The motto reads, “And so desire carries me along.” The framing for the painting is of a style used for a coat of arms, making the depiction ironic.)

These bubs of sin draw his attention elsewhere. He then goes on to describe this as cluster of devils (“knot of imps”) busy at a game:

A knot of imps at barley breaks in’t play.    

To take an image from Faust, it as if devils at hexensabbat.  The game he chose is appropriate to the imagery:

BARLEY-BREAK, an old English country game frequently mentioned by the poets of the 17th and 18th centuries. It was played by three pairs composed of one of each sex, who were stationed in three bases or plots, contiguous to each other. The couple occupying the middle base, called hell or prison, endeavoured to catch the other two, who, when chased, might break to avoid being caught. If one was overtaken, he and his companion were condemned to hell. From this game was taken the expression “the last couple in hell,” often used in old plays.   Encyclopedia Britanica, 1911 “Barley-Break” https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/bri/b/barley-break.html

The couplet scans as perfect iambs

They do enchant me from my Lord, I find

The thoughts whereof prove daggers to my mind.

Enchant here has a wholly negative meaning: to be enchanted would be to suffer from an evil spell, not a romantic glamor.

The final line returns to the paradox of his situation: These sins cause him to need a Savior. Yet, this sins draw him from his Savior. He finds a compulsion to go after these sins and simultaneously a detestation of the sins to which he is attracted.  They are “daggers” in his thinking.

This underscores a fundamental difference between Taylor’s desire for sanctification and would be recommended in modern therapy. The therapist would consider the problem to be the distress he is feeling in the conflict. Rather than feeling conflicted, he should come to terms with and accept “nature.”

Taylor’s desire to to transcend these desires to seek something better. He wants to “overcome” and receive a crown.

In this sense, we can see that the common therapeutic model and desire to alleviate distress by refusing to reject nature is, at least on the terms laid by Taylor, a religious decision.

The imps of the therapeutic model would be contesting the impulse and thinking of such things as “sin”.

Edward Taylor, Meditation 37.2, My soul, Lord, quails

14 Friday Jan 2022

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Shall I thy vine branch be, yet grapes none bear?

Graft in thy olive stand; and fatness lack?

A shackeroon, a rangel, yet an heir?

Thy spouse, yet, oh! My wedding ring thus slack?

Should angel-feathers plume my cap, I should

Be swashed? But oh! My heart hereat grows cold.

The words:

Daniel Patterson assumes shackeroon  to be a variant on “shackerell,” an obsolete word for vagabond.

Swash is to be worthless.

A rangel must obviously be something of a similar sort. Rangle is gravel fed to hawks to help with digestion, so perhaps this is an alternative spelling.

Summary: Should I be a fine thing in name and yet a wretched thing in actuality? This idea chills my heart.

The Comparisons:

He gives a series of six images in contrast: grape vine, olive tree, heir, spouse, dressed with angel-feathers in his cap.

With the exception of the final image, the images are all important pictures of the way the Christian is said to relate to God.

The Grape Vine

This image comes from John 15, and has particular poignancy here. The nature of the image is that the believer is said to abide as a branch in the grape vine of Christ. Christ provides growth and fruitfulness. If one lacks fruitfulness, it is a dead vine to be pruned.

The passage reads:

 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. 2 Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. 3 Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. 4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. 5 I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. 7 If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.”

John 15:1–8 (ESV)

The Olive Stand

This image comes from the 11th Chapter of Romans, and concerns the complicated issue about the relationship of the Covenant People of Israel from before the coming of Christ with the current church. The details of that theological dispute are not critical for this poem. What is important is that God broke off branches and then grafted in branches onto the olive tree. Someone like Taylor would be a wild branch grafted into the tree. But that grafting again comes with a warning (which I have highlighted):

17 But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although a wild olive shoot, were grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing root of the olive tree, 18 do not be arrogant toward the branches. If you are, remember it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you. 19 Then you will say, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.” 20 That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. 21 For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. 22 Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off. 23 And even they, if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them in again. 24 For if you were cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, be grafted back into their own olive tree.

Romans 11:17–24 (ESV).

Thus, the first two images do not convey merely the idea that he is not living up to the ideal; they also convey that he may be an imposter. Although not explicitly alluded two in this stanza, there is an idea from the Sermon on the Mount which may be lurking in the choice of these allusions:

21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’

Matthew 7:21–23 (ESV)

An Heir

This is a substantially more encouraging image. In the 8th Chapter of Romans, Paul refers to believers as “joint heirs with Christ”; and this is made as a matter of comfort and assurance:

15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” 16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

Romans 8:15–17 (ESV)

A Spouse

While the language of heir includes a conditional (“if we suffer with him”), the language of the spouse, found in both Ephesians and Hosea is even more encouraging. The spouse will not be lost:

The first example comes the prophet Hosea, who refers to Israel as the Bride of God. Israel’s sin will be put away and she will be reconciled and not lost to God:

16 “And in that day, declares the Lord, you will call me ‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal.’ 17 For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more. 18 And I will make for them a covenant on that day with the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground. And I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land, and I will make you lie down in safety. 19 And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy.

Hosea 2:16–19 (ESV). There is a pun here which makes little sense in English. The words “Baal-i” mean “my Lord, master”.  This can be used as a reference to the god “Baal” or can be used of a husband. But it does create a subservient position for the wife. In place of that word, God says you will call me “husband.” Here is the more technical and detailed explanation:

The second level is that of vocabulary at home with Hosea and his audience but not so with modern readers. In classical Hebrew the familiar terms ʾîš (“man”) and ʾiššâ (“woman”) also express what modern readers understand by husband and wife. Thus in 2:2 one could translate quite literally: “She is not my woman and I am not her man.” The noun baʿal means “owner, master, lord,” and in certain contexts “husband.”12 Both senses of the word are presupposed here in 2:16. In the patriarchal, non-Western societies of ancient Canaan, a husband was the owner and master of his household, which included his wife. In a few instances in the OT the related verb bāʿal is used with the meaning “to marry, to take a wife.” A wife, furthermore, could be described as bĕʿûlâ, a feminine passive form, meaning “possessed [by a husband],” i.e., married. And as a noun, baʿal also is used for Canaanite deities. They were masters of certain powers and possessors/owners of property and people. “Baal” is not a proper name, even though in reference to deities it often functions like one. A Canaanite god called upon as Baal would additionally have one or more names and perhaps some epithets. The same thing can be said for a goddess, if called upon as baʿălâ/baʿălat. A modern parallel is the invocation of a deity as “Lord.”

The declaration in 2:16 that Israel will no longer call YHWH ba‘al presupposes that some in Israel had called upon YHWH with this common noun, a term completely at home in the eastern Mediterranean, especially in the Phoenician-influenced areas. To call YHWH ba‘al carried with it, at least in Hosea’s eyes, an unacceptable form of syncretism with the broader Canaanite culture of which Israel was nevertheless a constituent part. YHWH was worshiped as a deity in the land of Canaan, but for Hosea not all attributes of the Canaanite deities could be applied to the one Lord of Israel.

YHWH should no longer be called ba‘al, but it would be a sign of covenant intimacy to call him husband (ʾîš). It is a metaphor, signifying intimacy as well as indicating more mutuality between God and people than was found in the hierarchy and role specificity of a Canaanite pantheon. As the gracious giver of a covenant to Israel, YHWH is the father, husband, and owner of the people. These are his identities in his relationship to Israel, reflecting modes of his self-revelation. And in his household he can be known by the simplest relational term, ʾîš. Nevertheless, YHWH is no more essentially male than collective Israel or Samaria are female. In the comprehensiveness of his being, YHWH had attributes that belonged to various deities in the Canaanite world. These attributes were not uncritically assimilated to him, and as the comprehensive Lord for Israel, YHWH transcends a defining by gender.

J. Andrew Dearman, The Book of Hosea, The New International Commentary on the Old and New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge, U.K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2010), 123–124.

The second example would be from Ephesians, where Paul speaks of human marriage and the image of the marriage between Christ and the Church. What is of primary importance for our allusion is not merely the fact that spouse is appropriate, but further that the husband is love and give himself up for the wife:

28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”

Ephesians 5:28–31 (ESV)

The love of the spouse is overwhelming, unchanging, and thus should be transformative. As Paul writes in another place, “For the love of Christ controls us.” 2 Cor. 4:14

An Angel Feather

This last image has no parallel in Scripture, but would be an image following upon the first stanza’s references to “livery.”  If I graced with an Angel Feather, I am a courtier of the heavenly court, then why?

His Failures

Understanding the images we can easily see the failures:

Shall I thy vine branch be, yet grapes none bear?

A grape vine should grow grapes. If it does not, is it a grape vine?

Graft in thy olive stand; and fatness lack?

Fat would be the oil: If I am an “olive tree” and don’t bear olives, then what am I?

A shackeroon, a rangel, yet an heir?

A joint heir with Christ would own all things. This is underscored by the passage upon which the poem is based, “All things are yours … Christ is yours.” If I have an heirship in all things, then how could I be dressed a homeless vagrant?

Thy spouse, yet, oh! My wedding ring thus slack?

If I am a true spouse, why have I lost my wedding ring?

Should angel-feathers plume my cap, I should

Be swashed?

If I am a courtier of heaven, then why am I worthless?

The conclusion

But oh! My heart hereat grows cold.

The first two images came with startling warnings (You will be burned). The third image came as a conditional. The fourth image came with a promise (but does not that promise apply to me?). The final image comes as a confession by a traitor.

As he contemplates this, it freezes him: am I being judged?

Edward Taylor, Meditation 36.6 What a strange stringe thing am I

24 Wednesday Nov 2021

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The previous post on this poem may be found here.

How wond’rous rich art thou? Thy storehouse vast

Holds more ten thousand fold told ore and ore

Than this wide world can hold. The door unhasp.

And bring me thence a pardon out of therefore.

Thou stuffest the world so tight with present things

That thing to come, though crowd full hard, can’t in.

These things to come, tread on the heels of those.

The present breadth doth with the broad world run.

The depth and breadth of things to come out goes

Unto Time’s end which bloweth out the sun.

These breadth and length meet out eternity.

These are the things that in thy storehouse lie.

The Praise: Having come to the conclusion that he should marvel at the grace of God and thus seek a pardon for his continuing, Taylor now turn to praise the vastness of the God’s grace.  In these stanzas there seems two allusions to Paul. 

There are two general aspects of the wealth of good things God has to bestow. First, there is the matter of the sheer size:

            Thy storehouse vast

Holds more ten thousand fold told ore and ore

Than this wide world can hold….

Thou stuffest the world so tight with present things

That thing to come, though crowd full hard, can’t in.

…. The present breadth doth with the broad world run.

The depth and breadth of things to come out goes

Unto Time’s end which bloweth out the sun.

These breadth and length meet out eternity.

Of particular interest is the phrase “breadth and length”. In a notable passage from Ephesians, Paul prays that his readers will obtain some experience and knowledge of the “breadth and length” of God’s riches:

14 For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 15 Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, 16 That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; 17 That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; 19 And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God. 

Ephesians 3:14–19.  One can understand these stanzas of Taylor’s poem as in a sense being an answer to Paul’s prayer. Taylor is meditating upon the great riches of God and is seeking to “comprehend” this wealth.

The knowledge here is the knowledge of “love of Christ” which is a redemptive love. The pardon which Taylor seeks is the wealth of God on display.

The general tenor of the Ephesians passage as well as the unusual phrase “breadth and length” form a basis for Taylor’s language in these stanzas. 

Second, there is a distinction between present thing and things to come. The “things to come” might be eschatological; but it is also possible that the “things to come” may only be what God has for us tomorrow. It is potentially a simple future. 

The allusion here comes from 1 Corinthians:

21 Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are yours; 22 Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; 23 And ye are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s.

1 Corinthians 3:21–23. The basis of the allusion is found in (1) the giving of good things by God; and (2) the division between things present and things to come. Again, the good is the reconciliation, the forgiveness of God in Jesus Christ.

The stanzas, together with their allusions, constitute praise for the unfathomable goodness of God in giving good gifts to Taylor. He cannot comprehend the goodness of God, which matches with confusion over his own wretchedness. As explained previously, his continued wretchedness perplexes him, how can this be possible?

Finding no direct answer, he sees the problem in a new light, How unbelievably gracious God is to tolerate such sin!

And so here, he praises the unfathomable grace of God will extend through the ages until the sun, itself, is “blown out”.

God gives such abundant goodness, that the things which will come cannot find room, so full is the present with God’s goodness.

The prayer.

Within this effusive praise is one prayer: 

                        The door unhasp.

And bring me thence a pardon out of therefore.

Unlock the door and take out a pardon for me. You, God, have such wealth pardon me and I will praise you. In this, Taylor is following the pattern of Psalm 50:

      And call upon me in the day of trouble:

      I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me.

Psalm 50:15. Far from sounding like an impolite demand, the prayer for God open his storehouse and deliver a pardon to Taylor is encouraged by God. 

A father who loves his child desires to give good things to the child. It is not a burden but a joy:

remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, It is more blessed to give than to receive. 

Acts 20:35 God loves and desires to show love. The prayer for pardon is a prayer which God has promised to answer:

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 

1 John 1:9

Edward Taylor, Meditation 33 Stanza Two

04 Tuesday May 2021

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Stanza Two

Oh! What strange charm encrampt my heart with spite

Making my love gleam upon a toy?

Lay out cartloads of love upon a mite?

Scarce lay a mite of love on thee, my Joy?                             10

Oh, lovely thou, shalt not thou loved be?

Shall I a-shame thee thus? Oh! Shame for me!

Summary: 

The argument of the poem begins to come more in focus here:  The poet demands of himself, why do I so love this thing so unworthy of love, a “toy”.

Notes:

The concept of “toy” here emphasizes unimportance or triviality far more than a plaything which might be precious to a child. For instance, Shakespeare, has Macbeth upon “hearing” that the king has been murdered, say with multiple levels of irony:

Had I but died an hour before this chance,
I had lived a blessed time; for, from this instant,
There ‘s nothing serious in mortality:
All is but toys: renown and grace is dead;
The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees
Is left this vault to brag of.

That is, “life is meaningless” it is but a toy.

His love “gleams” upon the toy. His love produces a light which makes the toy visible. It is a striking image of love enlightening an object. Coupled with “strange charm” in the first stanza, we have an image of some sort of witchcraft:

Oh! What strange charm encrampt my heart with spite

Making my love gleam upon a toy?

Although not a direct allusion, there seems to be something in the background here of Paul to the Galatians, “Who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth” (Gal. 3:1) Something so inexplicable must be the result of a spell. Remember, that while our public culture has either a bemused or a sort of positive view of such things, Taylor would have found the idea horrifying and wicked. 

Encrampt: His heart is brought under the control of something foreign (the spell) and thus does not function rightly. His heart is unnaturally constrained.

This brings us to the “spite” lying at the source of this spell which constrains his heart to fix its attention upon a pointless object. 

[Midsummer night's dream, IV, 1, Titania adorns Bottom with flowers] [graphic] / [Alexandre Bida ...

Another image from Shakespeare helps, where the Tatiana Queen of the Fairies falls in love the imbecile Bottom whose human head has been replaced with a donkey head. She has fallen in love by means of a spell meant to humble her.

This brings us to the incredulous irony: 

Lay out cartloads of love upon a mite?

Scarce lay a mite of love on thee, my Joy?     

We have here a biblical allusion: Cartloads of treasure were brought to Moses by the leaders of each tribe at the setting up of the tabernacle. A mite reminds us of the widow who could only give a mite. It was an insignificant offering. And so a treasure of love is being loaded upon something meaningless, which his “joy” is being neglected.

The joy is identified in the first line of the poem as “My Lord, my life.” He has fallen profoundly in love with something which is utterly valueless and has in the same moment neglected his Lord and life. The only explanation can be some hideous spell.

We then end with the couplet providing a judgment upon the situation: 

Oh, lovely thou, shalt not thou loved be?

Shall I a-shame thee thus? Oh! Shame for me!

He is shaming the true object of his love by withholding honor to whom honor is due and showering that upon a trifle. It is a shame, because the it is a deliberate dishonor. But in the end, it is the poet who is in shame by loving something so valueless.

Prosody:

Oh! What strange charm encrampt my heart with spite

Making my love gleam upon a toy?

Lay out cartloads of love upon a mite?

Scarce lay a mite of love on thee, my Joy?                             10

Oh, lovely thou, shalt not thou loved be?

Shall I a-shame thee thus? Oh! Shame for me!

An interesting aspect of this stanza is the accent of the first syllable of every line (except the last). Also note the trochees as well as the repeated L alliteration: love/lay

OH what STRANGE CHARM

MAKING my LOVE GLEAM

LAY out CARTloads of LOVE

SCARCE LAY a MITE of LOVE

OH LOVELY thou, shalt not THOU LOVed BE?

There is the fine wordplay in the last line on a-shame/shame which works with the internal rhyme on “thee/me”.

Notes Shakespeare Sonnet 11

28 Monday Oct 2019

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Sonnet 11:

[1]       As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow’st

[2]       In one of thine, from that which thou departest;

[3]       And that fresh blood which youngly thou bestow’st

[4]       Thou mayst call thine when thou from youth convertest.

[5]       Herein lives wisdom, beauty, and increase;

[6]       Without this, folly, age, and cold decay.

[7]       If all were minded so, the times should cease,

[8]       And threescore year would make the world away.

[9]       Let those whom nature hath not made for store,

[10]     Harsh, featureless, and rude, barrenly perish;

[11]     Look whom she best endowed she gave the more,

[12]     Which bounteous gift thou shouldst in bounty cherish.

[13]     She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby

[14]     Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.

Summary

Again, the poem contends for the object of the poem to marry and have children. The variant in this instance is that “nature” has given him something which has a duty to reproduce. It is a good to you and a proper response to what you have received. The poem works by means of balance and order.

First Stanza
[1]       As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow’st

[2]       In one of thine, from that which thou departest;

[3]       And that fresh blood which youngly thou bestow’st

[4]       Thou mayst call thine when thou from youth convertest.

Even though Shakespeare writes well before Isaac Newton announcement of an “equal and opposite reaction”, he uses that idea of a balance in nature itself. The speed by which you should see to your reproduction is marked by the speed by which you are dying. You should be bringing a child into this world from which you are “departing.” Then as you are leaving youth, you can look back to your child who will be in youth while you are departing youth; he will then be in life, when you depart life. Thus this is a balance in speed and position.

Second Stanza:

[5]       Herein lives wisdom, beauty, and increase;

[6]       Without this, folly, age, and cold decay.

[7]       If all were minded so, the times should cease,

[8]       And threescore year would make the world away.

This stanza is evenly balanced between two pairs of line. First is the distinction between wisdom and folly; between increase and decay: to bear a child is wisdom, beauty and increase. To refuse this is “cold decay”.  If you will think of where he lives and the quality of insulation and clothing, you can understand why cold is a serious negative for Shakespeare. He lived during the “Little Ice Age” (look it up).

Shakespeare then notes the result of such an idea: If everyone thought as you did, then a short number of years, there would be no people left. Anti-natalism and the idea that human beings were someone unnatural and a blight upon the earth was obviously not a thought of Shakespeare.

Third Stanza:

[9]       Let those whom nature hath not made for store,

[10]     Harsh, featureless, and rude, barrenly perish;

[11]     Look whom she best endowed she gave the more,

[12]     Which bounteous gift thou shouldst in bounty cherish.

Perhaps there are people whom it would be best if they did not reproduce: “harsh, featureless, rude” should not have children. We will meet these monsters in Shakespeare’s plays.

But as for you: Nature has given to you the best, which entails in you a duty to reproduce that gift. You have a duty to “cherish” that “bounty” which was given to you.

Couplet

[13]     She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby

[14]     Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.

“She” is nature: the seal she carved is the beauty of the poem’s object. A seal was used to produce a print: think a seal pressed into wax. The wax reproduces the seal. He was given the seal to print copies of that seal, not to permit that copy to cease with him.

The duty of marrying and having a child is a duty to nature. When a woman is pregnant or when we see a couple pushing their baby in a stroller, there is a sort of affinity which is different than when we are one alone. I noticed it often in my wife’s pregnancy, the way people who speak, the people who wished to see the baby. There is something lovely and joyous in that. It is that affinity which Shakespeare is seeking to awaken in his friend.

 

 

 

Some observations on Shakespeare Sonnet 6 (“Make worms thine heir”)

07 Saturday Sep 2019

Posted by in Shakespeare, Uncategorized

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[1] Then let not winter’s ragged hand deface
[2] In thee thy summer ere thou be distilled.
[3] Make sweet some vial; treasure thou some place
[4] With beauty’s treasure ere it be self-killed.
[5] That use is not forbidden usury
[6] Which happies those that pay the willing loan;
[7] That’s for thyself to breed another thee,
[8] Or ten times happier, be it ten for one.
[9] Ten times thyself were happier than thou art
[10] If ten of thine ten times refigured thee;
[11] Then what could death do if thou shouldst depart,
[12] Leaving thee living in posterity?
[13] Be not self-willed, for thou art much too fair
[14] To be death’s conquest and make worms thine heir.
This sonnet picks up immediately upon the imagery of the preceding sonnet: summer must be “distilled” to last into the winter. It also picks up on the general theme of this series of sonnets, in calling upon the object of the poem to have a child. The distinction in this sonnet is in its monetary/investment imagery. The child is seen as an investment and an inheritance.

First Stanza
[1] Then let not winter’s ragged hand deface
[2] In thee thy summer ere thou be distilled.
[3] Make sweet some vial; treasure thou some place
[4] With beauty’s treasure ere it be self-killed.

You will die. Winter will kill, or you will kill yourself (in killing your own beauty)

Winter is an actor who will deface your summer (your beauty, your youth). The language of “deface” puts an emphasis upon appearance rather than existence. Winter is vengeance that will come and will deface you. The fact of winter’s work is not question. Winter’s existence gives intensity and necessity to the task at hand:

When winter has come, it will be too late. Therefore, you must now distill you beauty, make a vial of this perfume of beauty (have a child)

Ere: before, archaic.

The poet uses treasure as a noun and a verb: first, “treasure thou some place”: make a place where treasure is kept. In your treasure, place your treasure.

In speaking of coming age taking away your treasure, you do not treasure your Shakespeare uses an idea which he will develop elsewhere; such as in Sonnet 75, “Doubting the filching age will steal his treasure”

Second Stanza
[5] That use is not forbidden usury
[6] Which happies those that pay the willing loan;
[7] That’s for thyself to breed another thee,
[8] Or ten times happier, be it ten for one.

Usury is charging interest on a loan. The legal conception is with us in the principle limiting the amount of interest one charge for a loan. The line contains a fine pun on “use” and “usury” must like treasure and treasure in the preceding stanza.

It is not an illegal act when you make a loan which causes happiness (“Happies”) in the one who pay the loan.

It is not wrong to lend yourself to the future when you willing to do so. In fact, the return you make on making this loan will exceed any cost. In fact, you will receive a ten-to-one return on bearing a child.

Third Stanza
[9] Ten times thyself were happier than thou art
[10] If ten of thine ten times refigured thee;
[11] Then what could death do if thou shouldst depart,
[12] Leaving thee living in posterity?

A desire for happiness routinely controls our decisions: it keeps us from acting and causes us to act. We value our own happiness.

So in this stanza the controlling concept is no longer interest on a loan, it is return on our action: this will pay us back in happiness.

Now we are back to the image of “winter” here called “death”.

Death obviously cannot cause you injury if you have left and are beyond death’s action “if thou shouldst depart”. The idea here is that once you have departed you are in fact dead.

The conception comes from Romans 7 where Paul explains that that the law (and death is the sergeant who enforces the law of God):

Romans 7:1–3 (ESV)
7 Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2 For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. 3 Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.

Death can only enforce its demands on you so far. But there is a way to surpass death.

Shakespeare takes this idea and applies it to children: if you have a child, you have (in a manner) bypassed death.
Couplet
[13] Be not self-willed, for thou art much too fair
[14] To be death’s conquest and make worms thine heir.

The trouble which will destroy the object is his own pride: Be not self-willed.

Why should you not be so? You are too fair.

You must face this truth: you will die. Do not be conquered by death.

The poem end with a certain irony: if you do not have heir by birth, you will have an heir death. But this heir will not save you from death but will rather make you a prey to death. And thus, you will have an heir and you have face death.

This image of worms is used to good effect in Hamlet, where Hamlet speaks with the King about the King’s counselor – whom Hamlet has just killed:

Now, Hamlet, where’s Polonius?
At supper king
At supper where?
Not where he eats, but where he is eaten. A
certain convocation of politic worms are e’en at
him. Your worm is your only emperor for diet. We
fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves
for maggots. Your fat king and your lean beggar is
but variable service—two dishes but to one table.
That’s the end.
A man may fish with the worm that hath eat
of a king and eat of the fish that hath fed of that
worm.

The imagery of worms puts a certain bite upon the concept of death. The idea of “death”. One’s own death is an abstraction: but to make it concrete, the idea of one’s body being eaten makes death a more “real” thing.