Spiritual Quote of the Day (George Herbert, on Prayer, ‘The Church’s Banquet’)

“Prayer the church’s banquet, angel’s age,
God’s breath in man returning to his birth,
The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav’n and earth.”—English “metaphysical poet” and Anglican minister George Herbert (1593-1633), “Prayer,” in The Complete Poetry, edited by John Drury (2015)

Spiritual Quote of the Day (George Herbert, on the Resurrection)

“Arise, sad heart; if thou dost not withstand,
    Christ's resurrection thine may be;
Do not by hanging down break from the hand
    Which, as it riseth, raiseth thee:
                                            Arise, Arise;
    And with His burial linen drie thine eyes.
Christ left His grave-clothes, that we might, when grief
Draws tears or blood, not want a handkerchief.”—English poet and Anglican minister George Herbert (1593-1633), “The Dawning,” in The Poems of George Herbert, edited by Ernest Rhys (1885)

The image accompanying this post, The Resurrection, was painted by the Italian Renaissance artist Sandro Botticelli (ca. 1445-1510) around 1490.

Spiritual Quote of the Day (George Herbert, on God’s Love Shown on the Cross)

“Who knows not Love, let him assay
And taste that juice, which on the crosse a pike
Did set again abroach; then let him say
  If ever he did taste the like.
Love is that liquour sweet and most divine,
Which my God feels as bloud; but I, as wine.”—English poet and Anglican minister George Herbert (1593-1633), “The Agonie,” in The Works of George Herbert: Poetry, Prose and Proverbs
 
The image accompanying this post, a detail of the painting Christ Crucified, was part of the Scuola di San Rocco in Venice, by the Italian late Renaissance master Jacopo Tintoretto (1518-1594).

Spiritual Quote of the Day (George Herbert, on Writing, Gardens and God)

“And now in age I bud again,
After so many deaths I live and write;
            I once more smell the dew and rain,
And relish versing: O, my onely Light,
                        It cannot be
                        That I am he
            On whom Thy tempests fell all night.
 
            These are Thy wonders, Lord of love,
To make us see we are but flow’rs that glide;
            Which when we once can find and prove,
Thou hast a garden for us where to bide.
                        Who would be more,
                        Swelling through store,
            Forfeit their Paradise by their pride.” —English poet and Anglican minister George Herbert (1593-1633), “The Flower,” in The Poems of George Herbert, edited by Ernest Rhys (1885)

Spiritual Quote of the Day (George Herbert, on Prayer as the ‘Heart in Pilgrimage’)

“Prayer the church’s banquet, angel’s age,

God’s breath in man returning to his birth,

The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,

The Christian plummet sounding heav’n and earth

Engine against th’ Almighty, sinner’s tow’r,

Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,

The six-days world transposing in an hour,

A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;

Softness, and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,

Exalted manna, gladness of the best,

Heaven in ordinary, man well drest,

The milky way, the bird of Paradise,

Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the soul’s blood,

The land of spices; something understood.”—English poet-clergyman George Herbert (1593-1633), “Prayer”

Quote of the Day (George Herbert, With the Music of Easter)

“Awake, my lute, and struggle for thy part

                                                  With all thy art.

The crosse taught all wood to resound his name,

                                                  Who bore the same.

His stretched sinews taught all strings, what key

Is best to celebrate this most high day.”—British poet George Herbert, “Easter,” in The Temple (1633)

The image accompanying this post is the painting The Resurrection of Christ, by Raphael (1499-1502).

Quote of the Day (Elizabeth Jennings, on George Herbert)

“Your emphasis

Is on the drama lived in each man’s soul,

His battle with his flawed

Aspirations and you make him whole

Telling of his Lord

Who battled too though God in every pore

And pity. No one wrote like this before.”—Elizabeth Jennings, from The Collected Poems, edited by Emma Mason (2012)

British poet George Herbert died of tuberculosis on this date, just short of his 40^th birthday. Twice elected to Parliament, he spent his last three years as a rector near Salisbury, at an Anglican church he helped rebuild from his own funds. On his deathbed, he sent a group of poems to his friend Nicholas Ferrar, requesting only that they be published if it was believed they might do good to “any dejected soul.”

They were, and they did, earning a wide following even beyond that. He is now included with John Donne and Andrew Marvell among a group of British “Metaphysical Poets.” (The closest equivalent we have in America is the Puritan poet Edward Taylor.)

The fine set of above lines about Herbert comes from an interesting subset of poetry: poets’ tributes to other poets. Leave aside (if you can) Virgil’s appearance as guide in Dante’s Inferno and Purgatorio. You can also look to the likes of Robert Lowell on another Puritan, Anne Bradstreet, Shelley on Keats (“Adonais”) or W.H. Auden’s magnificent “In Memory of W.B.  Yeats.”

I had never heard of British poet Elizabeth Jennings (1926-2001) until a couple of weeks ago, when a review of her Collected Poems—along with a summary of her career—appeared in The Weekly Standard. It sounded from Edward Short's review that Jennings was the kind of God-haunted person who would indeed, as Herbert had hoped on his deathbed, be the kind of “dejected soul” who would find solace in his work.

The “drama lived in each man’s soul” in the search for God may be found in this Herbert poem, “The Pulley”:

    When God at first made man,

Having a glass of blessings standing by,

    "Let us," said he, "pour on him all we can.

Let the world's riches, which disperséd lie,

    Contract into a span."

    So strength first made a way;

Then beauty flowed, then wisdom, honor, pleasure.

    When almost all was out, God made a stay,

Perceiving that, alone of all his treasure,

    Rest in the bottom lay.

   "For if I should," said he,

"Bestow this jewel also on my creature,

    He would adore my gifts instead of me,

And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature;

    So both should losers be.

    "Yet let him keep the rest,

But keep them with repining restlessness.

    Let him be rich and weary, that at least,

If goodness lead him not, yet weariness

    May toss him to my breast."

Quote of the Day (George Herbert, on Christ and Grief)

“Arise sad heart; if thou dost not withstand,
Christ’s resurrection thine may be;
Do not by hanging down break from the hand
Which, as it riseth, raiseth thee;
Arise, arise;
And with his burial linen dry thine eyes:
Christ left his grave-clothes, that we might,
When grief
Draws tears, or blood, not lack an handkerchief.”—George Herbert, “The Dawning”

This week, I thought I would conduct a little experiment with the “Quote of the Day.” For every day this week, I’ll spotlight some verses—something that this blog, I’ve come to see, does not do enough.

My experiment was inspired by two sources. One was reading, in an essay by David McCullough in an anthology called The Writing Life: Writers on How They Think and Work. The Pulitzer Prize-winning historian quotes the advice that one of his recent subjects, John Adams, gave to son and future President John Quincy: “Read somewhat in the English poets every day. You will find them elegant, entertaining and constructive companions through your whole life." And then this great line: “You will never be alone with a poet in your pocket.”

(Young Adams took his father’s advice to heart—really to heart—confessing later in life, “Could I have chosen my own genius and condition, I would have made myself a great poet.” The subject of his major poetic work, Dermot Macmorrogh, Or, the Conquest of Ireland. an Historical Tale of the Twelfth Century, has great interest for me, but it’s probably just as well that he didn’t continue in this line, as reviewers were pretty savage about his work. Like his later follower in the Oval Office, Abraham Lincoln, Adams found a more natural outlet for his writing talent in prose, particularly as exercised in the law and politics.)

The other inspiration for this experiment was a short story writer-novelist-memoirist, Chris Offutt. At a writers’ workshop I attended a decade ago, he advised members of his fiction-writing class to read some lines of poetry every day, because they made you aware of the weight of words.

For the first entry this week, I thought I would start with the above quote—in the manner that John Adams recommended—with the English 17th century “metaphysical” poet George Herbert. It fulfills my own inclination toward spiritual quotes on Sunday. Perhaps just as important, for baby boomers with aging parents, it serves as a powerful reminder of what needs to be borne in mind throughout their struggles—the enduring grace provided by Christ.