The Soul Of Christianity In George Herbert's Poetry

The 17th century England saw many great poets, among whom a special group called the "metaphysical" school is of great noteworthy. The leading figures are John Donne and George Herbert. Since its first publication in 1633, Herbert's The Temple has won enduring popularity among readers of differing creeds, non-believers, and critical practitioners of every kind. Whereas the appeal of John Donne's poetry has varied from generation to generation, and indeed suffered a radical eclipse during the 18th and most of the 19th centuries, George Herbert's poetry has never lost its audience. What is the reason for this broad and sustained appeal? Above all, the pervasive expression of Christianity in Herbert's poetry attracts readers of different ages. This essay, consisting of three chapters, explains how George Herbert achieves this goal.The first chapter, "The Making of a Christian Poet", explains how Herbert gave up his secular ambitions for the service of God, and how he expressed his love for God through his gift, writing poems. In the first section of this part, I take two sonnets Herbert wrote when he was still young as examples, in order to show that he thinks the divine love is much worthier than the woman's love. It is clear that Herbert already made up his mind to take the divine order. The second part in this chapter goes to the time after Herbert had been a priest. The 17th century is known for its religious conflicts, and Herbert could not escape the influence. The major conflict was between the ceremonialists and the puritans, who stand for two extremes. The ceremonialists stressed on the ceremony, liturgy and decoration within the church etc, while the puritans preferred the inner devotion to any kind of outer decorations. In the two poems placed just in the middle of the collection of The Temple, "The British Church" and "Sion", Herbert tries to find a balance between the two extremes. He thinks that the inner love plus some moderate outer decoration is the proper way to worship God.The second chapter studies more closely Herbert's The Temple and some individual poems in this collection with a focus on the structure. Two levels of structure are involved: the structure of the whole collection and the structure of the...