FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134  
135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   >>   >|  
e is no doubt that the works of man's hands will also afford many true symbols; but I do think that, in proportion as a man gives himself to those instead of studying Truth's wardrobe of forms in nature, so will he decline from the high calling of the poet. George Herbert was too great to be himself much injured by the narrowness of the field whence he gathered his symbols; but his song will be the worse for it in the ears of all but those who, having lost sight of or having never beheld the oneness of the God whose creation exists in virtue of his redemption, feel safer in a low-browed crypt than under "the high embowed roof." When the desire after system or order degenerates from a need into a passion, or ruling idea, it closes, as may be seen in many women who are especial house-keepers, like an unyielding skin over the mind, to the death of all development from impulse and aspiration. The same thing holds in the church: anxiety about order and system will kill the life. This did not go near to being the result with George Herbert: his life was hid with Christ in God; but the influence of his _profession_, as distinguished from his work, was hurtful to his calling as a poet. He of all men would scorn to claim social rank for spiritual service; he of all men would not commit the blunder of supposing that prayer and praise are that service of God: they are _prayer_ and _praise_, not _service_; he knew that God can be served only through loving ministration to his sons and daughters, all needy of commonest human help: but, as the most devout of clergymen will be the readiest to confess, there is even a danger to their souls in the unvarying recurrence of the outward obligations of their service; and, in like manner, the poet will fare ill if the conventions from which the holiest system is not free send him soaring with sealed eyes. George Herbert's were but a little blinded thus; yet something, we must allow, his poetry was injured by his profession. All that I say on this point, however, so far from diminishing his praise, adds thereto, setting forth only that he was such a poet as might have been greater yet, had the divine gift had free course. But again I rebuke myself and say, "Thank God for George Herbert." To rid our spiritual palates of the clinging flavour of criticism, let me choose another song from his precious legacy--one less read, I presume, than many. It shows his tendency to asceticism--the fancy of f
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134  
135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
George
 

service

 

Herbert

 
praise
 

system

 

prayer

 

symbols

 

injured

 

profession

 

calling


spiritual

 
conventions
 

served

 
holiest
 
manner
 

ministration

 

loving

 

soaring

 

sealed

 

unvarying


confess

 

readiest

 

clergymen

 

devout

 

recurrence

 
outward
 

daughters

 

commonest

 

danger

 

obligations


flavour

 

clinging

 
criticism
 

palates

 

rebuke

 

choose

 

tendency

 

asceticism

 

presume

 

legacy


precious
 
poetry
 

diminishing

 

greater

 

divine

 
thereto
 

setting

 
blinded
 
oneness
 

beheld