Prayer (I)
Prayer (I)
Original Text
George Herbert, The temple. Sacred poems and private ejaculations, edited by N. Ferrar (Cambridge: T. Buck and R. Daniel, 1633). STC 13183. Facs. edn. Menston: Scolar Press, 1968. PR 3507 T45 1633A. Also The Bodleian Manuscript of George Herbert's Poems: A Facsimile of Tanner 307, Introduced by Amy M. Charles and Mario A. Di Cesare. Delmar: Scholars' Facsimiles and Reprints, 1984. PR 3507 T45 1984 ROBA.
1Prayer the church's banquet, angel's age,
2 God's breath in man returning to his birth,
3 The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
4The Christian plummet sounding heav'n and earth
6 Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
8A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;
9Softness, and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,
10 Exalted manna, gladness of the best,
11 Heaven in ordinary, man well drest,
12The milky way, the bird of Paradise,
13 Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the soul's blood,
14 The land of spices; something understood.
Notes
5] Engine: military machine. Back to Line
7] transposing in an hour: "an hour of prayer may affect a universe which it took six days to set in order" (Hutchinson). Back to Line
Publication Start Year
1633
RPO poem Editors
N. J. Endicott
RPO Edition
3RP 1.210.
Rhyme