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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
Prologue
To sing of Wars, of Captains, and of Kings,
Of Cities founded, Common-wealths begun,
For my mean Pen are too superior things;
Or how they all, or each their dates have run,
Let Poets and Historians set these forth.
My obscure lines shall not so dim their worth.
But when my wond'ring eyes and envious heart
Great Bartas' sugar'd lines do but read o'er,
Fool, I do grudge the Muses did not part
'Twixt him and me that over-fluent store.
A Bartas can do what a Bartas will
But simple I according to my skill.
From School-boy's tongue no Rhet'ric we expect,
Nor yet a sweet Consort from broken strings,
Nor perfect beauty where's a main defect.
My foolish, broken, blemished Muse so sings,
And this to mend, alas, no Art is able,
'Cause Nature made it so irreparable.
Nor can I, like that fluent sweet-tongued Greek
Who lisp'd at first, in future times speak plain.
By Art he gladly found what he did seek,
A full requital of his striving pain.
Art can do much, but this maxim's most sure:
A weak or wounded brain admits no cure.
I am obnoxious to each carping tongue
Who says my hand a needle better fits.
A Poet's Pen all scorn I should thus wrong,
For such despite they cast on female wits.
If what I do prove well, it won't advance,
They'll say it's stol'n, or else it was by chance.
But sure the antique Greeks were far more mild,
Else of our Sex, why feigned they those nine
And poesy made Calliope's own child?
So 'mongst the rest they placed the Arts divine,
But this weak knot they will full soon untie.
The Greeks did nought but play the fools and lie.
Let Greeks be Greeks, and Women what they are.
Men have precedency and still excel;
It is but vain unjustly to wage war.
Men can do best, and Women know it well.
Preeminence in all and each is yours;
Yet grant some small acknowledgement of ours.
And oh ye high flown quills that soar the skies,
And ever with your prey still catch your praise,
If e'er you deign these lowly lines your eyes,
Give thyme or Parsley wreath, I ask no Bays.
This mean and unrefined ore of mine
Will make your glist'ring gold but more to shine. |
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Term
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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
Thou ill-formed offspring of my feeble brain,
Who after birth did'st by my side remain,
Till snatcht from thence by friends, less wise than true,
Who thee abroad exposed to public view,
Made thee in rags, halting to th' press to trudge,
Where errors were not lessened (all may judge).
At thy return my blushing was not small,
My rambling brat (in print) should mother call.
I cast thee by as one unfit for light,
The visage was so irksome in my sight,
Yet being mine own, at length affection would
Thy blemishes amend, if so I could.
I washed thy face, but more defects I saw,
And rubbing off a spot, still made a flaw.
I stretcht thy joints to make thee even feet,
Yet still thou run'st more hobbling than is meet.
In better dress to trim thee was my mind,
But nought save home-spun cloth, i' th' house I find.
In this array, 'mongst vulgars may'st thou roam.
In critic's hands, beware thou dost not come,
And take thy way where yet thou art not known.
If for thy father askt, say, thou hadst none;
And for thy mother, she alas is poor,
Which caused her thus to send thee out of door. |
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Term
| "To my Dear and Loving Husband" |
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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
If ever two were one, then surely we.
If ever man were lov'd by wife, then thee.
If ever wife was happy in a man,
Compare with me, ye women, if you can.
I prize thy love more than whole Mines of gold
Or all the riches that the East doth hold.
My love is such that Rivers cannot quench,
Nor ought but love from thee give recompetence.
Thy love is such I can no way repay.
The heavens reward thee manifold, I pray.
Then while we live, in love let's so persever
That when we live no more, we may live ever. |
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Term
| "A Letter to Her Husband, Absent upon Employment" |
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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
My head, my heart, mine Eyes, my life, nay more,
My joy, my Magazine of earthly store,
If two be one, as surely thou and I,
How stayest thou there, whilst I at Ipswich lye?
So many steps, head from the heart to sever
If but a neck, soon should we be together:
I like the earth this season, mourn in black,
My Sun is gone so far in’s Zodiack,
Whom whilst I ‘joy’d, nor storms, nor frosts I felt,
His warmth such frigid colds did cause to melt.
My chilled limbs now nummed lye forlorn;
Return, return sweet Sol from Capricorn;
In this dead time, alas, what can I more
Than view those fruits which through thy heat I bore?
Which sweet contentment yield me for a space,
True living Pictures of their Fathers face.
O strange effect! now thou art Southward gone,
I weary grow, the tedious day so long;
But when thou Northward to me shalt return,
I wish my Sun may never set, but burn
Within the Cancer of my glowing breast,
The welcome house of him my dearest guest.
Where ever, ever stay, and go not thence,
Till natures sad decree shall call thee hence;
Flesh of thy flesh, bone of thy bone,
I here, thou there, yet both but one. |
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Term
| "In Memory of my dear Grandchild Elizabeth Bradstreet" |
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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
1
Farewell dear babe, my heart's too much content,
Farewell sweet babe, the pleasure of mine eye,
Farewell fair flower that for a space was lent,
Then ta'en away unto eternity.
Blest babe, why should I once bewail thy fate,
Or sigh thy days so soon were terminate,
Sith thou art settled in an everlasting state.
2
By nature trees do rot when they are grown,
And plums and apples thoroughly ripe do fall,
And corn and grass are in their season mown,
And time brings down what is both strong and tall.
But plants new set to be eradicate,
And buds new blown to have so short a date,
Is by His hand alone that guides nature and |
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Term
| "On my dear Grandchild Simon Bradstreet" |
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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
No sooner come, but gone, and fal'n asleep,
Acquaintance short, yet parting caus'd us weep,
Three flours, two searcely blown, the last i'th' bud,
Cropt by th'Almighties hand; yet is he good,
With dreadful awe before him let's be mute,
Such was his will, but why, let's not dispute,
With humble hearts and mouths put in the dust,
Let's say he's merciful as well as just.
He will return, and make up all our losses,
And smile again, after our bitter crosses.
Go pretty babe, go rest with Sisters twain
Among the blest in endless joyes remain. |
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Term
| "In memory of my dear grand-child Anne Bradstreet" |
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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
With troubled heart & trembling hand I write,
The Heavens have chang'd to sorrow my delight.
How oft with disappointment have I met,
When I on fading things my hopes have set?
Experience might 'fore this have made me wise,
To value things according to their price:
Was ever stable joy yet found below?
Or perfect bliss without mixture of woe.
I knew she was but as a withering flour,
That's here to day, perhaps gone in an hour;
Like as a bubble, or the brittle glass,
Or like a shadow turning as it was.
More fool then I to look on that was lent,
As if mine own, when thus impermanent.
Farewel dear child, thou ne're shall come to me,
But yet a while, and I shall go to thee;
Mean time my throbbing heart's chear'd up with this
Thou with thy Savior art in endless bliss. |
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Term
| "For Deliverance from a Fever" |
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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
When sorrows had begirt me round,
And pains within and out,
When in my flesh no part was found,
Then didst Thou rid me out.
My burning flesh in sweat did boil,
My aching head did break,
From side to side for ease I toil,
So faint I could not speak.
Beclouded was my soul with fear
Of Thy displeasure sore,
Nor could I read my evidence
Which oft I read before.
"Hide not Thy face from me!" I cried,
"From burnings keep my soul.
Thou know'st my heart, and hast me tried;
I on Thy mercies roll."
"O heal my soul," Thou know'st I said,
"Though flesh consume to nought,
What though in dust it shall be laid,
To glory t' shall be brought."
Thou heard'st, Thy rod Thou didst remove
And spared my body frail
Thou show'st to me Thy tender love,
My heart no more might quail.
O, praises to my mighty God,
Praise to my Lord, I say,
Who hath redeemed my soul from pit,
Praises to Him for aye. |
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Term
| "Here Follows some Verses upon the Burning of Our House" |
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Definition
Author: A Bradstreet Genre: Poem
Poem:
In silent night when rest I took,
For sorrow near I did not look,
I waken'd was with thund'ring noise
And piteous shrieks of dreadful voice.
That fearful sound of "fire" and "fire,"
Let no man know is my Desire.
I starting up, the light did spy,
And to my God my heart did cry
To straighten me in my Distress
And not to leave me succourless.
Then coming out, behold a space
The flame consume my dwelling place.
And when I could no longer look,
I blest his grace that gave and took,
That laid my goods now in the dust.
Yea, so it was, and so 'twas just.
It was his own; it was not mine.
Far be it that I should repine,
He might of all justly bereft
But yet sufficient for us left.
When by the Ruins oft I past
My sorrowing eyes aside did cast
And here and there the places spy
Where oft I sate and long did lie.
Here stood that Trunk, and there that chest,
There lay that store I counted best,
My pleasant things in ashes lie
And them behold no more shall I.
Under the roof no guest shall sit,
Nor at thy Table eat a bit.
No pleasant talk shall 'ere be told
Nor things recounted done of old.
No Candle 'ere shall shine in Thee,
Nor bridegroom's voice ere heard shall bee.
In silence ever shalt thou lie.
Adieu, Adieu, All's Vanity.
Then straight I 'gin my heart to chide:
And did thy wealth on earth abide,
Didst fix thy hope on mouldring dust,
The arm of flesh didst make thy trust?
Raise up thy thoughts above the sky
That dunghill mists away may fly.
Thou hast a house on high erect
Fram'd by that mighty Architect,
With glory richly furnished
Stands permanent, though this be fled.
It's purchased and paid for too
By him who hath enough to do.
A price so vast as is unknown,
Yet by his gift is made thine own.
There's wealth enough; I need no more.
Farewell, my pelf; farewell, my store.
The world no longer let me love;
My hope and Treasure lies above. |
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Term
| On Phillis Wheatley's Poetry |
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Definition
At a glance:
First Published: 1773
Subjects: African Americans, Religion, God, Eighteenth century, Death or dying, Imagination, Bible, biblical imagery, or biblical symbolism, Widows or widowers, Clergy, Patriotism
When Phillis Wheatley wrote Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, the first book published by an African American, she began two traditions simultaneously: the African American literary tradition and the African American women’s literary tradition. This was a monumental accomplishment for a slave. Phillis belonged to the John Wheatley family in Boston. A letter from her owner to her publisher, also included in the book, provides the first account of her early years. It states that she was brought from Africa to America in 1761, being at that time seven or eight years old. Without formal schooling but with tutoring by the family, especially Mary Wheatley, the family’s daughter, Phillis learned the English language in sixteen months to the extent that she could read the most difficult parts of the Bible.
Wheatley started writing poetry at the age of twelve and quickly gained recognition as an occasional poet. Since the occasion was usually death, and the preponderance of her poems were elegies, she soon became Boston’s muse of comfort. Her elegy “On the Death of the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield, 1770,” gained her instant recognition in England as well as America. Sending this elegy along with a cover letter to Selina Hastings, the countess of Huntingdon, an early promoter of English Methodism who had in 1748 appointed Whitefield her chaplain, Wheatley acquired the countess’ patronage. Published first as a broadside, this widely printed elegy was also included by the Reverend Ebenezer Pemberton of Boston as an addendum to his funeral sermon for Whitefield, which was published in 1771 in London.
The publicity generated by this elegy spurred Mrs. Susanna Wheatley’s efforts in 1772 to publish Phillis’ small collection of poetry. Although proposals for the book were advertised four times, subscribers did not respond in sufficient numbers for the book to be printed. Thoroughly exasperated, Susanna Wheatley began to seek a London publisher for the poems. One was found, Archibald Bell, a printer of religious works. After being acquainted with the troubled history of the project, he insisted on a written verification of Phillis’ authorship. The Wheatleys complied by having an attestation signed by the Massachusetts governor and lieutenant governor along with sixteen other notable Bostonians, including John Hancock. Next, the Wheatleys in the spring of 1773 sent Phillis to London to superintend the publishing of the book. Accompanied by their son Nathaniel, who was going to London to expand the family’s business, Phillis sailed from Boston on May 8 and arrived in London on June 17. Phillis had also been sent on the trip because doctors thought the sea air might mitigate her chronic respiratory ailments. From her arrival to her departure on July 26, 1773, because of the serious illness of Susanna Wheatley, Phillis was lionized in London. She visited and was visited and escorted by English phi- lanthropists, statesmen, members of Parliament, abolitionists, titled men and women, politicians, merchants, a female writer, a botanist and explorer, and a fellow American, Benjamin Franklin. Clearly this was the social and professional apex of her life.
The slim volume, consisting of 127 pages, does not contain her complete canon. In addition to her twenty-two extant letters, her canon consists basically of four groups of poems: thirty-eight written by 1773 and published in her book, eight written by 1773 but not published in the book, twenty-eight or possibly twenty-nine written after 1773 but not extant, and ten written after 1773 and extant. Thirty-three poems and thirteen letters were collected for a proposed 1779 volume, but again Bostonians did not respond to advertisements for subscribers. Not only was this book not printed, but also the manuscript was eventually lost after Phillis’ death; the manuscript was probably abandoned by her improvident husband, John Peters, whom she had married on April 1, 1778.
Wheatley’s New England education, acquired through informal tutorial sessions, influenced her poetry. According to Margaretta Matilda Odell, who wrote a brief account of Phillis’ life, that education consisted of astronomy, ancient and modern geography, ancient history, the Old and New Testaments, and Greek and Roman mythology. Odell also observed that Alexander Pope’s translation of Homer was one of Phillis’ favorite books. As a consequence of this education, Phillis’ poetry emphasizes the classics and the Bible.
Phillis’ exposure to the classics influenced her to write in the neoclassical style of the time. Examples of that style abound in Poems on Various Subjects. Like other neoclassical poets, she wrote public poetry celebrating events of historical importance. In “To the King’s Most Excellent Majesty,” Wheatley expresses the nation’s gratitude to King George III for the repeal of the Stamp Act. In “To the Right Honourable William, Earl of Dartmouth, His Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for North-America,” Wheatley praises an administrative appointment to the colonies. It should be noted that in writing these and similar poems, Wheatley was the first American female poet to speak of politics.
Another example of the neoclassical influence is the personification in Wheatley’s poetry of such abstractions as virtue, recollection, imagination, and humanity. Yet another is her use of invocation to the muse. The opening lines of “Goliath of Gath” resound with an invocation, as do those of “Niobe in Distress for Her Children Slain by Apollo.” Wheatley did not restrict the invocation to these two epic-like poems; she used it in at least nine other poems in her book. Additional evidence of Wheatley’s neoclassicism can be seen in her Latinate vocabulary, circumlocution, formal tone, and closed heroic couplets.
Finally, allusions to Greek and Roman mythology abound in her poetry; classical mythology inspired her imagination and fancy, so that in rendering Ovid’s story of Niobe, for example, she added interpolations and her own interpretations.
In addition to classical and neoclassical influences, her poetry also evinces emphasis on religion and the Bible. She occasionally assumes the persona of a preacher. In “To the University of Cambridge, in New-England,” she admonishes the young men at Harvard to shun sin: “An Ethiop tells you ’tis your greatest foe.” She further evangelizes in “On Being Brought from Africa to America”: “Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,/ May be refin’d, and join th’ angelic train.”
Her elegies represent a marriage of the classical and Biblical influences on her poetry. They constitute a major genre in her canon; of her eighty-five poems, extant and nonextant, twenty-five are elegies, of which four are nonextant. Her early ones were written primarily upon request. Poems on Various Subjects contains fourteen elegies, including six on the deaths of children. Wheatley individualizes her treatment of this genre by elegizing the deaths of babies and children and by describing the grief of both parents. Although elegies for children were not unusual at that time, those for adults were more prevalent. Wheatley, however, consistently affirms the importance of children both on Earth and in an afterlife.
Although her elegies represent one of the classical genres, and although they utilize neoclassical conventions, they contain few allusions to Greek and Roman mythology. Probably Wheatley thought that paganism was not consonant with their Christian theme. Since elegies span her poetry, a comparison of her last five with her earlier ones can reveal her improvement and maturity as a poet. The later ones are less formulaic and predictable; also, they seem more sincere in the conferment of honor and in the expression of grief—in most instances her personal grief. Certainly, after the death of two of her own babies she could empathize more with other parents on the loss of theirs.
In her last poems, another change appears—Wheatley’s increased nationalism. During and immediately after the revolutionary war, “the Afric muse” wrote poems celebrating America and liberty. Her inclination to speak of politics and to celebrate liberty combine to produce the nationalistic tone in “To His Excellency General Washington” (1775), “On the Capture of General Lee” (1776), and “Liberty and Peace” (1784). In all three of these poems, she warns England to curb its thirst for power and wild ambition. In “Liberty and Peace,” Wheatley quotes her own lines from “To His Excellency General Washington”: “The goddess comes, she moves divinely fair,/ Olive and laurel binds her golden hair.” Wheatley proudly reminds the reader of her accurate prophecy that the United States or its personification, Columbia, would eventually offer peace (olive) and honor (laurel). Paradoxically, she developed her strongest nationalistic and anti-British sentiments despite the increased knowledge and appreciation of Great Britain she acquired during her trip to London.
Two arguments against Wheatley’s poetry have been discussed through the years by critics. One is that she was an imitator of imitators; the other is that she lacked interest in fellow slaves, Africa, and Africans. Much of her poetry is derivative, as was that of many poets and poetasters of mid-eighteenth century America. Like them, she used Pope and John Milton as models. Her own imagination and fancy, however, prevented her from following her models slavishly.
Early twentieth century critics discerned Wheatley’s alleged lack of interest in Africa and blacks in part in her stance and tone in poems such as “On being brought from Africa to America,” which states, “’Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land.” Several factors influenced her thoughts on the subject. She grew up among Bostonians who regarded Africa as a primitive and heathen place, and she was likely constrained as a slave writing for a predominantly white reading public. Yet she was herself a constant statement against slavery; abolitionists used her as an embodiment of their argument of what the slave could become if freed and educated. Although occasionally her poetry reveals her as more interested in slaves’ souls than in their bodies, she was, even in her early years, opposed to slavery. A growing chorus of critics, having benefited from recently discovered poems and letters, argue convincingly that Wheatley was not devoid of racial feelings. The strongest indictment of slavery in her book is in her poem to the Earl of Dartmouth:
I, young in life, by seeming cruel fate
Was snatched from Afric’s fancy’d happy seat;
What pangs excruciating must molest,
What sorrows labour in my parent’s breast?
Steel’d was that soul and by no misery mov’d
That from a father seiz’d his babe belov’d:
Such, such my case. And can I then but pray
Others may never feel tyrannic sway?
Two pivotal events in Wheatley’s life further galvanized her opposition to slavery. During the five weeks in 1773 when the poet was in London, she was legally a free woman under English law. Moreover, sometime during the fall or winter of 1773, Phillis was manumitted by the Wheatleys; she then began to write in a stronger, more confident voice. In seven of her extant letters, six written during and after the summer of 1773, she acknowledges her concern for Africans and blacks. Her strongest antislavery sentiments in a letter appear in one written to the Reverend Samuel Occom on February 11, 1774. In controlled but passionate words, she equates contemporary white racists, including Christian ministers who owned slaves, with the ancient Egyptians. By far her strongest overt statement against slavery in poetry is found in “On the Death of General Wooster” (1778). She speaks in the persona of the dying general, who in his final prayer importunes God to lead America through the revolutionary war successfully and keep it “virtuous, brave, and free”; but he deplores America’s withholding freedom from its slaves:
But how, presumptuous shall we hope to find
Divine acceptance with th’ Almighty mind—
While yet (O deed ungenerous!) they disgrace
And hold in bondage Afric’s blameless race?
While Wheatley was developing stronger antislavery feelings, she was also learning more about Africa. She writes in one of her letters that she is studying maps of Africa and a gazeteer. No more does she allude to Africa as a “pagan land” or the “land of errors, and Egyptian gloom.” Instead, she finds much about it to praise. In her “Reply to the Answer in our last by the Gentleman in the Navy,” she recalls a description of the luxuriant beauty of the Senegal/Gambia area, the land of her birth:
Charm’d with thy painting, how my bosom burns!
And pleasing Gambia on my soul returns,
With native grace in spring’s luxuriant reign,
Smiles the gay mead, and Eden blooms again.
One regrets not only that Wheatley’s poetic productivity was not greater after 1773 but also that much of what she did write during that period has disappeared. There were, of course, understandable reasons for her limited productivity: the demise of the entire Wheatley nuclear family, the revolutionary war, a disappointing marriage, three sickly children born in six years, and deteriorating health ending in Wheatley’s untimely death on December 5, 1784.
In “An Elegy on Leaving ————,” published five months before her death, she recalls when first she felt the poetic flame inspired by Cynthio (or Apollo). Prosperolike, she breaks her staff and bids farewell to her magic:
But, ah! those pleasing hours are ever flown;
Ye scenes of transport from my thoughts retire;
Those rural joys no more the day shall crown,
No more my hand shall wake the warbling lyre.
Thus was she precluded from fulfilling her desire stated in “To Maecenas”—to “mount and ride upon the wind.” Yet she was able to write poetry that nurtured and fed not only her own spirit and being but also the spirits and beings of her admirers. |
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Term
| "On Being Brought Africa to America" |
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Definition
Author: P. Wheatley Genre: Poem
Poem:
"Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land,
Taught my benighted soul to understand
That there's a God, that there's a Saviour too:
Once I redemption neither sought nor knew.
Some view our sable race with scornful eye,
"Their colour is a diabolic die."
Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,
May be refin'd and join th'angelic train. |
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Term
| "To the Right Honorable William, Earl of Dartmouth" |
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Definition
Author: P. Wheatley Genre: Poem
Summary: Wheatley, a slave, had met William Legge, the earl of Dartmouth, when she was in England for the publication of her collected poems. She knew him to be a friend of the countess of Huntingdon, a supporter of Wheatley's work. Because the countess also supported the abolishment of slavery, Wheatley's hopes were that the earl would share these abolitionist sensibilities. Putting her faith in this hope, she makes a frank personal appeal to him in this poem.
Because the earl had opposed the Stamp Act, he was considered a friend of the colonists, and the poem opens with a picture of New England's joy at his new political appointment. The reins of authority will be, in his hands, “silken,” suggesting relief from the tyranny colonists had experienced at the hands of England's monarch. Wheatley expresses her—and America's—confidence that past wrongs will be made right.
The second stanza moves from the perspective of all New England to a personal one. The poet suggests that Dartmouth may wonder about the source of her love of freedom. Her answer is uncharacteristically outspoken. She refers to the “cruel fate” of being kidnapped from her African homeland and of the anguish this would have caused her parents in losing their “babe belov’d.” As a slave, she truly knows the value of liberty. Having suffered so much, she wants to spare others the pain she has known in her loss of freedom; thus her hopes are that New England will be spared further tyranny. The emotional restraint of most neoclassical poetry is set aside in this poem, and Wheatley speaks from the heart. The decision to express her feelings about her bondage was a risky one.
Poem:
Hail, happy day, when, smiling like the morn,
Fair Freedom rose New-England to adorn:
The northern clime beneath her genial ray,
Dartmouth, congratulates thy blissful sway:
Elate with hope her race no longer mourns,
Each soul expands, each grateful bosom burns,
While in thine hand with pleasure we behold
The silken reins, and Freedom's charms unfold.
Long lost to realms beneath the northern skies
She shines supreme, while hated faction dies:
Soon as appear'd the Goddess long desir'd,
Sick at the view, she languish'd and expir'd;
Thus from the splendors of the morning light
The owl in sadness seeks the caves of night.
No more, America, in mournful strain
Of wrongs, and grievance unredress'd complain,
No longer shalt thou dread the iron chain,
Which wanton Tyranny with lawless hand
Had made, and with it meant t' enslave the land.
Should you, my lord, while you peruse my song,
Wonder from whence my love of Freedom sprung,
Whence flow these wishes for the common good,
By feeling hearts alone best understood,
I, young in life, by seeming cruel fate
Was snatch'd from Afric's fancy'd happy seat:
What pangs excruciating must molest,
What sorrows labour in my parent's breast?
Steel'd was that soul and by no misery mov'd
That from a father seiz'd his babe belov'd:
Such, such my case. And can I then but pray
Others may never feel tyrannic sway?
For favours past, great Sir, our thanks are due,
And thee we ask thy favours to renew,
Since in thy pow'r, as in thy will before,
To sooth the griefs, which thou did'st once deplore.
May heav'nly grace the sacred sanction give
To all thy works, and thou for ever live
Not only on the wings of fleeting Fame,
Though praise immortal crowns the patriot's name,
But to conduct to heav'ns refulgent fane,
May fiery coursers sweep th' ethereal plain,
And bear thee upwards to that blest abode,
Where, like the prophet, thou shalt find thy God. |
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Term
| "To the University of Cambridge, in New England" |
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Definition
Author: P. Wheatley Genre: Poem
Summary: In the ringing tones of a sermon, the slave poet draws a clear distinction between the backgrounds of herself and the Harvard College students she addresses. Wheatley opens with a statement about how recently she was brought from Africa, “land of errors.” In contrast, the students have had the benefit and privilege of studying the world's best wisdom. Calling them “sons of science,” the poet reminds them, however, that the most important knowledge they will ever have is that Jesus died to redeem them and all other sinners. She exhorts them to be ever vigilant against evil and to shun sin in its smallest manifestations.
The two major notes that Wheatley strikes repeatedly in the poem are her race and the urgency of renouncing sin. A devout Christian, she does more than serve as witness to God's mercy and humans’ need for salvation. She testifies to the power and glory of the merciful God who brought her safely from a dark place; it is possible that she is referring to Africa, but she may well be referring to the dark slave ship that transported her to America where, though well treated, she is still enslaved. Again she draws attention to her race and servitude by reminding the students that an “Ethiop” (African) is warning them that sin leads to ruin and damnation. By implication, she seems to be leading them to the conclusion that enslaving fellow humans is one such deadly sin.
Poem:
WHILE an intrinsic ardor prompts to write,
The muses promise to assist my pen;
’Twas not long since I left my native shore
The land of errors, and Egyptian gloom:
Father of mercy, ’twas thy gracious hand 5
Brought me in safety from those dark abodes.
Students, to you ’tis giv’n to scan the heights
Above, to traverse the ethereal space,
And mark the systems of revolving worlds.
Still more, ye sons of science ye receive 10
The blissful news by messengers from heav’n,
How Jesus’ blood for your redemption flows.
See him with hands out-stretcht upon the cross;
Immense compassion in his bosom glows;
He hears revilers, nor resents their scorn: 15
What matchless mercy in the Son of God!
When the whole human race by sin had fall’n,
He deign’d to die that they might rise again,
And share with him in the sublimest skies,
Life without death, and glory without end. 20
Improve your privileges while they stay,
Ye pupils, and each hour redeem, that bears
Or good or bad report of you to heav’n.
Let sin, that baneful evil to the soul,
By you be shunn’d, nor once remit your guard; 25
Suppress the deadly serpent in its egg.
Ye blooming plants of human race divine,
An Ethiop tells you ’tis your greatest foe;
Its transient sweetness turns to endless pain,
And in immense perdition sinks the soul. |
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Term
| A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson |
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Definition
Author: M. Rowlandson Genre: autobiography and capture narrative
Summary: On the morning of February 10, 1675, the British settlement of Lancaster, in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, is besieged by Native Americans. The attackers burn down houses and open fire on the settlers, wounding and killing several of them, and take a number of the survivors captive. Mary Rowlandson is one of the wounded, as is her youngest child, Sarah. Other members of Rowlandson’s family are killed outright. As the melee dies down, the Native Americans begin to lead their captives, including Rowlandson and her three children, from the settlement into the surrounding wilderness. At this point, Rowlandson and her two elder children are separated, but she and the youngest are allowed to remain together.
After a night spent in an abandoned town nearby, from which colonists had fled in fear of Indian attack, the captors and their captives begin to trek westward, farther into the forest. As Rowlandson and her daughter are both wounded, the journey is difficult and painful. After another day of travel, they reach an Indian settlement called Wenimesset. Here, Rowlandson meets another British captive, Robert Pepper, who wants to offer the new captives comfort. The Indians and their captives remain in Wenimesset for over a week, and during this time, Rowlandson’s wounded child becomes more ill, finally dying on February 18. By this time, Rowlandson’s original captor has sold her to a Saggamore Indian named Quannopin, who is related by marriage to King Philip. Quannopin oversees the burial of Rowlandson’s dead child, and a grieving Rowlandson visits her elder daughter (also named Mary), who she learns is also being held in Wenimesset. As she despairs over the fate of her family, her son visits her—he has been allowed to come from the nearby Indian settlement where he is being held in captivity. Meanwhile, the Indians continue to attack British towns, including Medfield, killing and looting as they go. Her captors give Rowlandson a Bible, part of the spoils of Medfield, and in it she finds comfort and hope.
After the fighting at Medfield, the Indians decide again to “remove” westward, now heading north as well. Rowlandson is again separated from her family and acquaintances. After a four-day rest in the forest, the band of Indians with whom Rowlandson is traveling begins to travel more swiftly. Rowlandson suspects that the British army must be close. They reach the Baquaug River and cross it, and the English arrive close behind. The British soldiers, however, are unable to ford the river, and the Indians and Rowlandson continue to the northwest. Rowlandson and her captors soon reach the Connecticut River, which they plan to cross in order to meet with King Philip. Here, however, are English scouts, and the Indians and Rowlandson are forced to scatter in the forest to remain undetected. Rowlandson again meets up with her son and his captors, though they must soon part ways.
After this detour, Rowlandson and the Indians cross the river, and on the other side, she meets with King Philip as planned. For some time, she remains at this settlement, sewing clothes for the Indians in return for food. The Indians, meanwhile, raid Northampton and return with spoils, including horses. Rowlandson asks to be taken to Albany on horseback, hoping that there she will be “sold” in exchange for gunpowder, but instead, the Indians prepare to take her northward and over the river once more.
After a brief sojourn at a settlement five miles north of King Philip’s abode, Rowlandson’s captors once again bring her north but then turn south again. Rowlandson hopes she’ll be returned home, but the Indians delay the journey, continuing south down the Connecticut River rather than turning east toward civilization. Indian attacks on British towns continue, and another captive, Thomas Read, joins Rowlandson’s group. From Read, Rowlandson learns that her husband is alive and well, which heartens her. Rowlandson also sees her son again, briefly. Rowlandson and her captors finally begin to move east.
They again cross the Baquaug River. Messengers meet them and report that Rowlandson must go to Wachuset, where the Indians will meet to discuss her possible return to freedom. More hopeful than she has been in some time, Rowlandson eagerly sets off toward the council’s meeting place. But the journey tires her, and she is disheartened by the sight of an injured colonist, wounded in still another Indian attack. At Wachuset, she speaks with King Philip, who promises her she’ll be free in two weeks. Nonetheless, the council continues to deliberate, asking Rowlandson how much her husband would be willing to pay them as ransom. The Indians then send a letter to Boston, stating that Rowlandson can be redeemed for twenty pounds. Meanwhile, attacks on British settlements continue, including an attack on Sudbury, after which Rowlandson must travel with her captors back into the forest.
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As the Indians celebrate their victories, messengers arrive from the council, along with an Englishman named John Hoar. Rowlandson hopes she’ll be allowed to leave with Hoar, but negotiations continue for several more days. Rowlandson is finally allowed to travel back to now-abandoned Lancaster, then on to Concord, and finally to Boston. After nearly twelve weeks in the wilderness, Rowlandson is reunited with her husband. The two stay with a friend in Concord for eleven weeks, during which time Rowlandson’s sister is also released from her captivity. Rowlandson’s son and daughter are eventually returned as well. The family, together again at last, sets up a new household in Boston, where they continue to live until 1677.
Quotations:
1. It was a solemn sight to see so many Christians lying in their blood, some here and some there, like a company of sheep torn by wolves.
2. Yet the Lord still shewed mercy to me, and helped me; and as he wounded me with one hand, so he healed me with the other.
3. When I came I asked them what they had done with it? then they told me it was upon the hill: then they went and shewed me where it was, where I saw the ground was newly digged, and there they told me they had buried it: There I left that Child in the Wilderness, and must commit it, and myself also in this Wilderness-condition, to him who is above all.
4. The first week of my being among them, I hardly eat any thing; the second week, I found my stomach grow very faint for want of something; and yet it was very hard to get down their filthy trash; but the third week, though I could think how formerly my stomach would turn against this or that, and I could starve and die before I could eat such things, yet they were sweet and savory to my taste.
5. When the Lord had brought his people to this, that they saw no help in any thing but himself, then he takes the quarrel into his own hand; and tho’ they had made a pit, as deep as hell for the Christians that summer, yet the Lord hurled themselves into it.
Themes
The Blurred Line Between Civilization and Savagery
Even though Rowlandson’s forced journey from civilization into the wilderness culminates in a triumphant return to civilization, her once-clear conception of what is and is not “civilized” undergoes a radical and permanent shift. Initially, Rowlandson views civilization as that which is not savage or not wilderness, and at times she implies that the Indians’ savagery is actually connected to the natural world around them. The Indians eat coarse food such as horse meat and bear, they live in wigwams, and they spend their days traveling through forests and swamps. As a result, she speculates, they are violent savages. Later, however, similarities between the Indians and the settlers become more apparent. Wettimore is as vain as a rich white woman, “praying Indians” claim to have converted to Christianity, and Indians sometimes wear the colonists’ clothing. Rowlandson also recognizes her own capacity for uncivilized behavior. She finds herself eating and enjoying the Indians’ food, and at times she behaves with a callousness comparable to that of her captors. No longer are civilization and savagery so distinct. Rowlandson’s initial vision of the world as a place defined by opposites (good and evil, civilization and savagery, Puritans and Indians) eventually gives way to a worldview that contains more ambiguity.
Life Is Uncertain
The attack on Lancaster and Rowlandson’s subsequent captivity teach Rowlandson that life is short and nothing is certain. All of the seeming stability of life, including material possessions, can disappear without warning, even during a single day. Rowlandson’s descriptions of her time with the Indians reinforce this lesson: nothing, during her captivity, is consistent. One day, her captors treat her well, while the next day they give her no food or reprimand her without reason. One day, they tell her she’ll soon be sold to her husband; the next day, she is forced to travel farther into the wilderness. In her captive state, Rowlandson can take nothing for granted. She does not even know for sure if she’ll survive the experience.
The Centrality of God’s Will
As a Puritan, Rowlandson believes that God’s grace and providence shape the events of the world. She and other Puritans also believe that God arranges things for a purpose. Throughout her narrative, Rowlandson argues that humans have no choice but to accept God’s will and attempt to make sense of it. Rowlandson’s attempt to understand involves drawing parallels between her own situation and biblical verses. She compares herself to Job, to the Israelites, and to Daniel in the lion’s den, among others. Like these biblical figures, she is at the mercy of God’s will and grace. Everything in her narrative, she believes, happens for a reason, and the reason British troops do not defeat the Indians sooner is that the Puritans have not yet learned their lesson. They are not humble and pious enough for the reward of victory.
The Fear of the New World
In her narrative, Rowlandson explores the fearful hesitation white settlers feel in the face of new environments and experiences. Rowlandson, like other Puritans, is unsure how far the colonists should forge into the wilds. Lancaster is a frontier settlement, and the attack serves as a sign that perhaps the settlers are pushing too far west, too far from their established towns. However, Rowlandson goes still farther inland when she is taken captive, and her experience brings her even further from what she knows. She and other captives, such as Robert Pepper, are able to amass practical knowledge about the natural world during their time with the Indians. Rowlandson learns to gather food for herself and to tolerate meats that would formerly have repulsed her. Though this practical knowledge is positive, it also brings anxiety and guilt because Rowlandson fears leaving “civilization” behind.
Motifs
The Threatening Landscape
The threatening wilderness through which Rowlandson moves characterizes the dangers and threats of the New World as a whole. Rowlandson’s journey begins with an uphill trek, which suggests the difficulties to come. From the summit, Rowlandson gets the last glimpse of civilization she’ll have for some time. The next day, the travelers set off down a steep hill, and Rowlandson and her daughter tumble off their horse: their descent into the hell of the wilderness has begun. The landscape grows increasingly bleak, and Rowlandson crosses desolate swamps, dark thickets, and icy streams. As she travels, Rowlandson sees farmlands gone to waste and slaughtered farm animals, and she fears the triumph of the Indians and the dark, unknown wilderness over the order and reason of civilization.
Christian Imagery and the Bible
Rowlandson frequently quotes the Bible and alludes to biblical tales, which emphasizes her own faith, her own knowledge of the scriptures, and their centrality in her life. She also uses the Bible to reinforce her descriptions of a world of dichotomies: punishment and retribution, darkness and light, and evil and good. By casting the Indians as children of the devil, Rowlandson depicts them as a large, permanent enemy. That is, the Indians are not just the enemy of the colonists in this war, in a specific time and a place, but rather represent the enemies of Christianity, goodness, and light throughout all time. By alluding to the Bible so frequently, Rowlandson turns her own story into an epic and allegorical tale that is broader than the story of one woman’s captivity.
Symbols
The Attack on Lancaster
The attack on Lancaster, described as a fiery inferno, represents God’s wrath and the strife and chaos of King Philip’s War as a whole. When Rowlandson describes the start of the attack, she writes that “several houses were burning, and the smoke ascending to heaven.” This image of smoke rising to heaven suggests ritual sacrifice and emphasizes that this attack has religious meaning and is more than just a random or political attack.
Robert Pepper’s Oak Leaves
The oak leaves, which Robert Pepper helps Rowlandson use to heal her wound, suggest the positive potential of nature. In addition to being a dangerous temptation, the natural world can also be a means of curing a person’s ills. One must be taught, however, how to use nature’s bounty, and God must be willing to provide assistance as well. That the natural world proves to be a source of healing is also a threat to Rowlandson, since she has always linked the wilderness with savagery, not civilization. These healing leaves help Rowlandson develop a different, more ambiguous perspective on the world.
The Indians’ Clothing
The Indians Rowlandson encounters often dress in the colonists’ clothes. Sometimes this is a sign that the Indians are converts to Christianity, but at other times it signifies their savagery, since the clothes are from enemies they have killed and towns they have ransacked. The Indian in British clothes, then, suggests the unreliability of outward appearances. Though the Indians may look civilized, Rowlandson suspects—though she is not certain—that they are still savages underneath.
Other themes:
humans have no choice but to accept God’s will. War as a punishment (she didn’t take God as seriously as they should). Everything is predestined by God to happen.
model of how christians should act under stress. Superiority of moral virtue and perseverance (Alcott, Winthrop)--Everyone else model after her. Thanks God for giving her this experience for making her strength stronger. Begins to see herself as something greater, a symbol, modern-day saints because they are elect (Kempe), compares herself to Job and Daniel in the lions den. Indians are the scourge (God’s punishment), even they fit into her trial.
optimism in face of certain death. (Crusoe)
blur boundaries of savagery and civilization: relying on primal instincts, enjoying indians food, moves away from binaries? Some indians are accepting and benevolent of her, help her, give a good farewell, no one tries to rape her, frequently go on journeys. |
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Term
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Definition
Author: Benjamin Franklin
Summary: orn 1706 in Boston, Benjamin Franklin was the 15th of his father's 17 children. He went to school as a child with the intent of becoming a minister, as his father, Josiah, intended. However, that idea was dropped after Franklin showed a keen interest in reading and writing. He was apprenticed to his brother, James at a young age, but after fighting with his brother he quit the job and moved to Philadelphia, where he worked for a man named Samuel Keimer. After befriending some prominent political figures, including the royal Governor, Franklin left for England, where he spent 18 months working for a printer with his friend James Ralph, with whom he later became estranged. Shortly after returning to America in 1726, Franklin formed a debating club called the Junto. Two years later, he took over The Pennsylvania Gazette from Keimer and turned it into a successful publication with tools from London. In 1730, Franklin wed his old sweetheart, Deborah Read, with whom he had two children. The first, William Franklin, was born approximately one year later; he is the man to whom the Autobiography is addressed in Part One.
Throughout the 1730s, Franklin held some minor positions doing printing work for the government. In that time, he began Poor Richard's Almanac and became postmaster of Philadelphia. Towards the end of the decade, he invented the Franklin stove. In the 1740s, Franklin worked on several projects, including the fire brigade, the police force, the University of Pennsylvania, the street sweeping service and some other smaller public works projects. He retired from the printing business in 1748 and began to conduct scientific experiments in lightning. In 1753, he was awarded honorary degrees from Harvard and Yale, and he became Postmaster General of America. The following year, when war broke out between England and France (the French and Indian War Franklin began to draft proposals outlining means by which funds could be raised for colonial defense. He succeeded in many of his proposals, and he personally played a large part in organizing the war effort. The Autobiography, however, breaks off in 1757; it is left unfinished.
The Autobiography itself was written in three different times: 1771 in England, 1783-83 in France, and 1788 in America. If Franklin meant to complete it, he died before he got the chance.
About Benjamin Franklin:
• Considered the “the first American”
• Represents the rise of the middle class literacy.
• Franklin was a Hedonist. Loved pleasure, prostitutes, jovial, living well.
• He was a philanthropist. Gave large charitable donations and increased standard of living in cities.
• Different from the other founding fathers: older, lives in the city (founds urban improvements: universities, libraries, street cleaning, fire trucks), more social, artisan, middle class working (not land owner), witty, did more “founding” than the other founding fathers.
• Paved way for secularism in America away from fanatic Puritanism
Enlightenment: Benjamin Franklin also known as the “Enlightenment Hero.” The enlightenment held a spirit of critical reason to social, political, economic affairs (use scientific method), secularization in which science replaces religion as the principle focus of effort in educated people. Influenced by the European Enlightenment: disillusion with religious wars, blame religious fanaticism, increasing prestige of sciences. Main transition from salvation to happiness. Universal is a continuum, natural explanations for extraordinary occurrences (ex. of lightning), no distinction between natural world and Providence, natural world can be controlled by humans. Notion of a single universe without supernatural phenomena subject to human control. The universe obeys law, it is a rational single system that can be explained through science.
Summary of American Enlightenment:
• diminish unnecessary punishment and suffering
• secularize morality
• understand principles of the natural world through reason
• universe is a single rational system that man can control through science
• center goal increase happiness of the human collective. (Franklin added: pursuit of happiness)
• meaning of life/key theme: adding to improvement of their way of life, however small (optimistic: we can improve our standard of living, our life through reason). See quote below.
Puritanism: Franklin kept the Puritan ethic (seriousness, work ethic, sober, frugal, disciplined, industrious), but divorces these attributes from the Puritan foundation of salvation. Secularization begin to precede religion: central question becomes ‘How can I be happy?’ (not ‘How can I be saved?’)--Franklin plays huge role in shaping secular morality. (Family intended Franklin to become a Minster). Self-improvement cast in a secular framework, material enhancement, and civic improvement. Believes in the rational, systematic, methodical ethic came from the Calvinist/puritan matrix. Every minute is under scrutiny, God is watching you all the time= in capitalism: time is money, every minute counts.
How Franklin differs from Puritans:
• believes in the efficacy of good works
• wrongs can be corrected “errata” notion that mistakes are not irremediable.
• against the idea of original sin: we are not doomed. We can make a difference and progress as a human race (core belief) through civic improvement.
• benevolence/service to one’s neighbor is the best way to worship express our gratitude to God. Serve your fellow men. (opposite from Puritanism)
• tolerance of others and beliefs. Gave money to churches and synagogues. Also open to Islam.
Key Themes from the Autobiography: Three themes essential to American identity: material success, moral regeneration, social improvement.
• First real successful account of the american dream and the self-made man. Story of going from working class to very successful and influential.
• Felicity: What really matters is making small improvements everyday: “Some may think these trifling matters not worth minding or relating; but when they consider that tho' dust blown into the eyes of a single person, or into a single shop on a windy day, is but of small importance, yet the great number of the instances in a populous city, and its frequent repetitions give it weight and consequence, perhaps they will not censure very severely those who bestow some attention to affairs of this seemingly low nature. Human felicity is produc'd not so much by great pieces of good fortune that seldom happen, as by little advantages that occur every day.”--Autobiography
• Money is Prolific: accumulation of wealth, money begets more money through frugalness and work ethic.
• Labor theory of value (marxist): wealth come from hard work, but he also was an advocate of taxation for the common good. Not to accumulate wealth but to live well and help others.
• Civil society: coming together outside of government organizations to better society. |
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Term
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Definition
Author: T. Paine Genre: Non-Fiction
Key Points:
Government as a necessary evil
From the outset, Paine makes it clear that he is not particularly fond of government, whose sole value he thinks lies in "restraining our vices". For Paine, the natural state of man is to live without government, and government's existence is justified only to the extent that it alleviates problems that would be created by this natural, anarchic way of life. If a government fails to improve society or, worse, actively causes some of the same troubles that would result from anarchy, it is particularly blameworthy.
State of Nature
Much of Paine's analysis proceeds by considering an imagined natural state in which man might have first found himself. This method of analysis, popularly used by political theorists such as Locke and Hobbes, considers man as he might have been before society was formed. Such an analysis then imagines what man would have been like, and what rights he might have had, if it were not for the interference of outside circumstance. Paine uses this imagined natural state to analyze a political dilemma with his parable of the settlers first coming to America. Furthermore, in discussing monarchy, Paine presumes men to be "originally equals", and in doing so, hearkens back to some imagined age where he presumes men to have all been equal.
The Inevitability of American Independence
A linchpin in Paine's argument is that America will eventually be independent. At times, he presents this as a simple fact that everyone accepts, but occasionally, he argues for it, citing the extent of the rift separating the colonies and the English king. Since many people were uncertain about the idea of a revolution that would sever them from the king, establishing the principle of American independence was an important first step for Paine to take in his arguments. By convincing his audience that America will be independent some day, it is much easier for Paine to make the case for an immediate and full rebellion.
The Inevitability of British Oppression
Yet another key point in Paine's argument derives from considering what will happen if America reconciles with Britain. Paine argues that even if the colonists reach an agreement with Britain, the problems that have developed between the colonies and the king will inevitably repeat themselves. New taxes will be levied and parliament will interfere with colonial life. Paine attempts to demonstrate this in two ways. First, he points to the history of colonial relations with Britain, especially the events surrounding the Stamp Act. Second, he attacks the structure of Britain's government, arguing that it is corrupt and unjust, and will inevitably lead the British to continue mistreating the colonies.
America's relationship with the rest of Europe
Paine is acutely aware of the benefits to be reaped through developing strong relationships with European countries other than Britain. This informs his argument in a number of ways. First, Paine points out that it would be advantageous for America to form commercial and political ties with these nations. Second, he notes that the current political arrangement of America's being subservient to Britain precludes the colonies from being able to independently engage in such alliances. He concludes that only if the colonies declare independence, will they be able to reap the opportunities offered by alliance with various European nations.
The Problems with Monarchy
A large part of Common Sense is dedicated to attacking monarchy, both as an institution and in its particular manifestation in Britain. Paine puts the theoretical attack in Biblical terms, arguing from the text of the Bible that the monarchy originated in sin. Paine presents his specific problems with the British monarchy, with his attack on hereditary succession and with the numerous grievances he makes against the present king.
Society
Paine thinks of society as everything good that comes out of people living and working together. It is the state of affairs whereby people collaborate to bring about positive aims.
Government
Government, according to Paine, is the force that aims to keep people from acting in accordance with their vices. Its existence is the unfortunate consequence of the fact that people sometimes act in evil ways.
Stamp Act
Passed by Parliament in 1765, the Stamp Act levied a tax on a large body of printed material in the colonies. The tax was aimed at recouping some of the large costs incurred by the British in the French and Indian War. This tax was met with great resistance by the colonists, who refused to buy stamps, rioted, and threatened tax-collectors. Furthermore, delegates from nine states convened at a Stamp Act Congress in order to voice a unified protest against the king. Parliament repealed the Act, although it also issued a Declaratory Act in 1766, asserting its right to tax the colonies.
Reconciliation
The notion that the colonies should attempt to resolve the dispute with Britain and remain a part of the British empire. Even after hostilities first broke out, there was a strong sentiment among Americans that it was unnecessary to break completely free of Britain. Many still felt a loyalty to the monarchy and thought it possible to come to a peaceful agreement with the British. This position, which was common in 1776, is the viewpoint that Paine wrote Common Sense to oppose.
Hereditary Succession
The notion that the power to rule as a legitimate king should be passed down by blood relations. This idea legitimated the passing on of the monarchy in Britain from father to son for generations on end. The idea also pervaded other areas of British society, where people were often seen as being born into a certain position in life, and limited to living the same lives as their parents.
Usurpation
The unlawful or unjustified seizure of the power to govern. In the context of Paine's argument, this comes up in the discussion of British royal power. |
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Term
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Definition
Author: T. Paine Genre: Non-Fiction
Key Points: The Age of Reason; Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology is a deistic pamphlet, written by eighteenth-century British radical and American revolutionary Thomas Paine, that criticizes institutionalized religion and challenges the legitimacy of the Bible, the central sacred text of Christianity. Published in three parts in 1794, 1795, and 1807, it was a bestseller in the United States, where it caused a short-lived deistic revival. British audiences, however, fearing increased political radicalism as a result of the French Revolution, received it with more hostility. The Age of Reason presents common deistic arguments; for example, it highlights what Paine saw as corruption of the Christian Church and criticizes its efforts to acquire political power. Paine advocates reason in the place of revelation, leading him to reject miracles and to view the Bible as an ordinary piece of literature rather than as a divinely inspired text. It promotes natural religion and argues for the existence of a creator-God.
Natural theology: is a branch of theology based on reason and ordinary experience. Thus it is distinguished from revealed theology (or revealed religion) which is based on scripture and religious experiences of various kinds; and also from transcendental theology, theology from a priori reasoning.
early eighteenth-century British deism: These deists, while maintaining individual positions, still shared several sets of assumptions and arguments that Paine articulated in The Age of Reason. The most important position that united the early deists was their call for "free rational inquiry" into all subjects, especially religion. Saying that early Christianity was founded on freedom of conscience, they demanded religious toleration and an end to religious persecution. They also demanded that debate rest on reason and rationality. Deists embraced a Newtonian worldview, and they believed all things in the universe, even God, must obey the laws of nature. Without a concept of natural law, the deists argued, explanations of the workings of nature would descend into irrationality. This belief in natural law drove their skepticism of miracles. Because miracles had to be observed to be validated, deists rejected the accounts laid out in the Bible of God's miracles and argued that such evidence was neither sufficient nor necessary to prove the existence of God. |
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Term
| "Prologue" to Preparatory Meditations |
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Definition
Author: Edward Taylor; Genre: Religious Poetry written in the metaphysical style (the only American to do so)
Lord, can a crumb of dust the earth outweigh,
Outmatch all mountains, nay the crystal sky?
Imbosom in't designs that shall display
And trace into the boundless deity?
Yea, hand a pen whose moisture doth gild o'er
Eternal glory with a glorious glore.
If it is pen had of an angel's quill,
And sharpened on a precious stone ground tight,
And dipped in liquid gold, and moved by skill
In crystal leaves should golden letters write,
It would but blot and blur, yea, jag and jar,
Unless Thou mak'st the pen and scribener.
I am this crumb of dust which is designed
To make my pen unto Thy praise alone,
And my dull fancy I would gladly grind
Unto an edge on Zion's precious stone;
And write in liquid gold upon Thy name
My letters till Thy glory forth doth flame.
Let not th' attempts break down my dust I pray,
Nor laugh Thou them to scorn, but pardon give.
Inspire this crumb of dust till it display
Thy glory through't: and then Thy dust shall live.
Its failings then Thou'lt overlook, I trust,
They being slips slipped from Thy crumb of dust.
Thy crumb of dust breathes two words from its breast,
That Thou wilt guide its pen to write aright
To prove Thou art and that Thou art the best
And shew Thy prosperties to shine most bright.
And then Thy works will shine as flowers on stems
Or as in jewelary shops do gems.
Remember that Bradstreet's poem by the same title had sought to answer the question of whether or not a woman writer can be the equal of men. Taylor goes still further, and asks: Can any writer be equal to God's grace? In the opening lines he is that "crumb of dust" which is nothing compared to God's natural creation ("the earth," "all mountains" and "the crystal sky"), and is nothing, therefore, compared to a "boundless" creator. The second stanza turns still more specifically to the problem of writing, or creating on paper. There, the speaker claims that even should the quill of his pen come from an angel, be sharpened on the most precious stone, and write in pure gold inks, it would still write nothing but errors ("It would but blot and blur, yea jag, and jar") unless God himself both makes the pen and guides the hand of the writer, or "scrivener."
The third stanza lays the speaker's claim to be that writer, that "crumb of dust"; it says that he devotes his writing utterly to God, "unto Thy praise alone." And the fourth stanza follows up this thought. It asks that the inescapable faults of the writing be overlooked and permitted to speak, for only thus can the divine "dust" really "live." Indeed, Taylor's diction takes the idea still further when he says to God: "Thy being slips slipped from Thy crumb of dust." In other words, Taylor is saying that the faults, or "slips," that are part of this divinely created man ("Thy being"), are themselves "slipped" away from that human "crumb." The theme, then, is purification, the salvation of the individual (in this case) through meditative writing. And the concluding stanza rephrases that idea, so that the promise of purification is itself the "proof" or "shine" on all worldly being.
Taylor writes in iambic pentameter lines, which is to say that the rhythm is composed of an unstressed followed by a stressed syllable (the iambic rhythm), in lines of five stresses each: "I am this crumb of dust which is designed." The iambic rhythm feels relatively easy and natural, in English speech; though in English poetry the iambic pentameter line has been traditionally associated with elevated topics, in elegiac, heroic, and epic verse. Moreover, note Taylor's use of six-line stanzas rhymed on an ababcc pattern. In those stanzas, the first four lines (or quatrain) serves to state an idea metaphorically (in stanza 4, for example, man as a crumb of dust whose failings are worth pardoning), so that the closing two lines (or couplet) can drive home a thought about that idea (let slip those faults, those slips of the pen, and the soul can be purified). This is the form he will use throughout the Preparatory Meditations, each written on the theme of a specific passage of scripture, and on a specific problem posed by that passage, all of it meant to prepare the individual for Sabbath Day services.
Taylor's poems each tend to work with a particular extended metaphor, such as the comparison of a man to a crumb of dust in the "Prologue." Reading his poems, focus your attention on the aspects and functions of those metaphors, and how they further his Puritan religious themes. Pay special attention to the ways that Taylor uses the concrete facts of ordinary life to examine the abstract ideas of Puritan theology. |
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Author: Edward Taylor; Genre: Religious or Devotional Poetry; metaphysical poetry
I ken[n]ing through Astronomy Divine
The Worlds bright Battlement, wherein I spy
A Golden Path my Pensill cannot line,
From that bright Throne unto my Threshold ly.
And while my puzzled thoughts about it pore
I finde the Bread of Life in't at my doore.
When that this Bird of Paradise put in
This Wicker Cage (my Corps) to tweedle praise
Had peckt the Fruite forbad: and so did fling
Away its Food; and lost its golden dayes;
It fell into Celestiall Famine sore:
And never could attain a morsell more.
Alas! alas! Poore Bird, what wilt thou doe?
The Creatures field no food for Souls e're gave.
And if thou knock at Angells cores they show
An Empty Barrell: they no soul bread have.
Alas! Poore Bird, the Worlds White Loafe is done.
And cannot yield thee here the smallest Crumb.
In this sad state, Gods Tender Bowells run
Out streams of Grace: And he to end all strife
The Purest Wheate in Heaven, his deare-dear Son
Grinds, and kneads up into this Bread of Life.
Which Bread of Life from Heaven down came and stands 5.
Disht on thy Table up by Angells Hands.
Did God mould up this Bread in Heaven, and bake,
Which from his Table came, and to shine goeth?
Doth he bespeake thee thus, This Soule Bread take.
Come Eate thy fill of this thy Gods White Loafe?
Its Food too fine for Angells, yet come, take
And Eate thy fill. Its Heavens Sugar Cake.
What Grace is this knead in this Loafe? This thing
Souls are but petty things it to admire.
Yee Angells, help: This fill would to the brim
Heav'n s whelm'd-down Chrystall meele Bowle, yea and higher.
This Bread of Life drops in thy mouth, doth Cry.
Eate, Eate me, Soul, and thou shalt never dy.
The traditions or movements in poetry that was currently going on back over in England were metaphysical poetics of John Donne, George Herbert, books like that. This poem is an example of this kind of metaphysical poetry. The characteristics of this kind of poem are its use of strong language from images, powerful images. Sometimes a bit jarring and also strange kind of comparisons. 'Torturing one poor word ten thousand ways" is the way Dryden describes the metaphysical poets in a later era. Looking back we find this same sort of thing in Edward Taylor.
I kening through Astronomy Divine
The World’s bright battlement, wherein I spy
A Golden Path my Pencil cannot line,
From that bright Throne unto my Threshold ly.
And while my puzzle thoughts about it pour,
I find the Bread of Life in’t at my door.
So he is looking out at the sky and sees a path from God’s Heaven to his door, and there is a basket of bread which is the Bread of Life. Remember that Galileo had recently been excommunicated for his Astronomy, which was more natural and less Divine.
When that this bird of Paradise put in
This Wicker Cage (my Corpse) to tweedle praise
Had pecked the Fruit forbade: and so did fling
Away its Food; and lost its golden days;
It fell into Celestial Famine sore:
And never could attain a morsel more.
This stanza refers to original sin, the Total deprevity part of TULIP. The Bird of Paradise is the soul which is kept inside the prison of the body. It is rather Greek image. Some ancient Greeks believed in the immortality of the soul so it was a divine spark which was then imprisoned in the lump of clay that was the body, and they longed for the day that they would be free of it. So in the opposition between the body and soul, last time we saw that the body is the evil twin of the soul. Now the body is the cage and the soul is the bird that is enclosed in the cage. Something else is also affecting the bird, original sin. He lost his ability to eat the divine food and so he was hungry in a severe famine.
Alas! alas! Poor Bird, what wilt thou do?
The creatures’ field no food for Souls e’er gave.
If you go out and look at corn, wheat, deer, is this food for the soul? No, you can eat it but it won’t feed the soul, it just feeds the body. The soul cannot feed on the food that animals feed on or even on the food that feeds the physical side.
And if thou knock at Angels’ doors they show
An Empty Barrel: they no soul bread have.
Angels don’t have soul food. You can’t go to Heaven and ask for a cup of bread or divine flour. He is twisting and looking at this idea of the Bread of Life from various angles.
Alas! Poor Bird, the World’s White Loaf is done.
And cannot yield thee here the smallest Crumb.
There is nothing for him to feed on. But then we find God’s grace intervene.
In this sad state, God’s Tender Bowels run
Out streams of Grace.
This is an image you might not want to visualize. What Taylor is saying is that God is overflowing in His love and mercy toward us. This is the irresistible grace area of TULIP.
Out streams of Grace.And He to end all strife
The Purest Wheat in Heaven His dear-dear son
Grinds, and kneads up into this Bread of Life.
God took his own son to make Bread of Life for us. Taylor is pushing the limits of the image as metaphysical poets tend to do. This is the atonement area of TULIP:
Which Bread of Life from Heaven down came and stands
Disht on Thy Table up by Angels’ Hands.
Taylor is saying that God has provided. This is also the atonement area. Since there was no provision to overcome sin, God made provision.
Did God mold up this Bread in Heaven, and bake,
Which from His Table came, and to thine goeth?
Doth He bespeak thee thus, This Soul Bread take.
Come Eat thy fill of this thy God’s White Loaf?
It’s Food too fine for Angels, yet come, take.
And Eat thy fill. It’s Heaven’s Sugar Cake.
Jesus is now the sugar cake of life. By this, Taylor is saying that he is better than just regular breads he is like sugar loaf. Taylor is trying to see how far he can push the image before it breaks down.
What Grace is this knead in this Loaf? This thing
Souls are but petty things it to admire.
Yee Angels, Help: This fill would to the brim
Heav’ns whelmed-down Crystal meal Bowl, yea and higher.
This Bread of Life dropped in thy Mouth, doth Cry:
Eat, Eat me, Soul, and thou shalt never die.
Here is another aspect of metaphysical poetry, as well as other kinds of poetry. That is the tendency to rearrange the syntax. Souls are but petty things to admire it. Instead of saying this, Taylor says "Souls are but petty things it to admire". When you are reading this poetry if you want to understand it, you have to stop and say, "O.K. what’s the verb; what’s the subject; what’s the object; how would this flow in normal English ?" Then once you understand what the sentence would normally read, you can start to appreciate what Taylor is doing with the sentence by rearranging it. |
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| Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace, and Perseverance of the Saints |
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| Celebrated today as colonial America's most prolific and inventive poet, Edward Taylor was virtually unpublished in his lifetime. Not until the 20th Century did Thomas Johnson unearth Taylor's long-buried manuscripts in 1937. These collections revealed Taylor to be a frontier parson with a secret passion for the confessional lyrics and versified theological allegories popular among 17th century English poets and clerics. In his "career" as a poet, he sought out varied literary forms, like acrostics, love poems to his wife, miniature allegories on domestic objects or insects, and spiritualized contemplations on natural occurrences. In 1682, Taylor inaugurated the Preparatory Meditations before my Approach to the Lords Supper, two extended series of 217 poems -- and his greatest artistic achievement. Generally composed after he had drafted a sermon or preaching notes, the the poems are private mediations, in which Taylor applies to his own soul lessons gleaned from the sacrament day's Biblical text. Taylor's purpose is self-examination; to root out sins that infect his soul and to cultivate instead a heart receptive to God's sweet grace. As a preacher and Puritan, debased by his human condition, Taylor felt spiritually unworthy of God's grace. His poetic petitions to God and Christ serve as ritualized cathartic cleansings and as twofold preparations of the soul; first, for the imminent, preaching of God's word to his Westfield congregation and administering of the Lord's supper,; second, as a saint's lifelong preparation for the heavenly union with Christ. THese poems became Taylor's private diary, a preparation not merely for his own earthly supper, but for the eternal feast at which Taylor would be wed as a loving spouse to the Bridegroom Christ forever. |
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Author: Edward Taylor; Genre: Devotional poem; confessional poem; metaphysical poem
Make me, O Lord, thy Spinning Wheele compleat;
Thy Holy Worde my Distaff make for mee.
Make mine Affections thy Swift Flyers neate,
And make my Soule thy holy Spoole to bee.
My Conversation make to be thy Reele,
And reele the yarn thereon spun of thy Wheele.
Make me thy Loome then, knit therein this Twine:
And make thy Holy Spirit, Lord, winde quills:
Then weave the Web thyselfe. The yarn is fine.
Thine Ordinances make my Fulling Mills.
Then dy the same in Heavenly Colours Choice,
All pinkt with Varnish't Flowers of Paradise.
Then cloath therewith mine Understanding, Will,
Affections, Judgment, Conscience, Memory;
My Words and Actions, that their shine may fill
My wayes with glory and thee glorify.
Then mine apparell shall display before yee
That I am Cloathd in Holy robes for glory.
For modern audiences no longer concerned nor familiar with the details of weaving, it stands as an early-American example of metaphysical poetry and the use of the poetic conceit.
The term conceit, in literature, refers to an elaborate and surprising figure of speech comparing two things that are extremely dissimilar. That definition could apply to any metaphor, but when it is extended throughout a poem and involves highly abstract and elaborate correspondences, it enters the realm of metaphysics and passes beyond the definition of a simple implied comparison.
The title is a word that was commonplace in the 17th century but has since disappeared from use except for a remnant in the negative term "hussy" that denotes a lewd or brazen woman. In Taylor's time, his title was pronounced with a silent "w" and a short "i" and sounded like "hussifry." It denoted the full range of domestic tasks performed by Puritan housewives. In the poem, those tasks are narrowed to spinning and weaving.
The tone of the opening sentence is prayerful. The poet says, "Make me, O Lord, Thy spinning wheel complete." The succession of interrelated metaphors explains the poet's intention in this odd-sounding request. Gradually we see spinning and cloth-making as a figurative expression of the activity of the Master Weaver, who clothes people in grace.
Each part of the spinning wheel is equated with an aspect of spiritual life. The distaff is a piece of wood on which is wound flax or wool that is spun into thread. It is metaphorically equated with the Word of God - the Bible - from which we extract grace. The "affections" or emotional feelings are the "flyers" that twist and make thread from the raw material on the distaff.
The "spool" onto which the thread is wound is the soul of the speaker. The "reel" that holds the finished thread is referred to as the speaker's "conversation," by which he means his social exchanges with others. Thus, in stanza one we see the mechanical progression of the word of God becoming the grace necessary for salvation.
In the next stanza we proceed from spinning wheel to loom. On the loom the thread of God's word is woven into cloth. God, who operates the loom, winds or turns the "quills" (hollow tubes onto which the yarn is wound) and produces a web of cloth from the myriad threads. God's ordinances (laws and sacraments) act as "fulling mills" that cleanse the cloth and prepare it for dyeing and decorating with designIn the concluding stanza the speaker asks God to garb or outfit him in raiment made from the newly spun and woven cloth. Once attired in this glorious garment, the speaker will be able to give God glory in return.
Though some of the terminology rings strange to a modern ear, Taylor has created a poetic prayer for salvation couched in images readily comprehensible to an audience of his day. All dedicated Puritan ministers offer their lives in service to the Almighty, but few have the talent to do so with such ingenious poetry. |
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| Upon Wedlock, and Death of Children |
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BY EDWARD TAYLOR; metaphysical poet
A Curious Knot God made in Paradise,
And drew it out inamled neatly Fresh.
It was the True-Love Knot, more sweet than spice
And set with all the flowres of Graces dress.
Its Weddens Knot, that ne're can be unti'de.
No Alexanders Sword can it divide.
The slips here planted, gay and glorious grow:
Unless an Hellish breath do sindge their Plumes.
Here Primrose, Cowslips, Roses, Lilies blow
With Violets and Pinkes that voide perfumes.
Whose beautious leaves ore laid with Hony Dew.
And Chanting birds Cherp out sweet Musick true.
When in this Knot I planted was, my Stock
Soon knotted, and a manly flower out brake.
And after it my branch again did knot
Brought out another Flowre its sweet breath’d mate.
One knot gave one tother the tothers place.
Whence Checkling smiles fought in each others face.
But oh! a glorious hand from glory came
Guarded with Angells, soon did Crop this flowere
Which almost tore the root up of the same
At that unlookt for, Dolesome, darksome houre.
In Pray're to Christ perfum'de it did ascend,
And Angells bright did it to heaven tend.
But pausing on't, this sweet perfum'd my thought,
Christ would in Glory have a Flowre, Choice, Prime,
And having Choice, chose this my branch forth brought.
Lord, take't. I thanke thee, thou takst ought of mine,
It is my pledg in glory, part of mee
Is now in it, Lord, glorifi'de with thee.
But praying ore my branch, my branch did sprout
And bore another manly flower, and gay
And after that another, sweet brake out,
The which the former hand soon got away.
But oh! the tortures, Vomit, screechings, groans,
And six weeks fever would pierce hearts like stones.
Griefe o're doth flow: and nature fault would finde
Were not thy Will, my Spell, Charm, Joy, and Gem:
That as I said, I say, take, Lord, they're thine.
I piecemeale pass to Glory bright in them.
In joy, may I sweet Flowers for Glory breed,
Whether thou getst them green, or lets them seed
Themes: Trees & Flowers, Relationships, Nature, Living, Religion, Family & Ancestors, Sorrow & Grieving, Christianity, Death
Form: Rhymed Stanza |
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| Wieland: or, The Transformation: An American Tale |
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Author: CB Brown Genre: Gothic Novel; horror; psychological fiction; epistolary fiction
First published in 1798, it distinguishes the true beginning of his career as a writer.
Main characters
Clara Wieland is the narrator of the story, and the sister of Theodore Wieland. She is an intellectual, and has strong character. She is secretly in love with Henry Pleyel.
Theodore Wieland hears disembodied voices, and believes these voices tell him to kill his family. He is not as strong as his sister, Clara, which makes him fall prey to the voices and go insane.
Catharine Wieland is Theodore's wife, and childhood friend of Clara.
Henry Pleyel is Catharine's brother, and Clara's friend. He is incredibly practical, and continually attempts to understand the mysterious voices empirically.
Carwin is a mysterious stranger who appears at the Wieland's house. He is a biloquist and the source of many of the disembodied voices heard by Theodore. Carwin is generally thought to be the villain of Wieland, though he claims he never told Theodore to kill anyone.
Plot summary
Set sometime between the French and Indian War and the American Revolutionary War, Wieland details the horrible events that befall Clara Wieland and her brother Theodore's family. Clara and Theodore's father was a German immigrant who founded his own religion; he came to America just before the American Revolution with the conviction to spread his religion to the indigenous people. When he fails at this task, he believes he has also failed his deity. One night, as he worships in his bare, reclusive temple, he seems to spontaneously combust, after which his health slowly deteriorates and he dies. His children inherit his property, which is divided equally between them. Theodore marries their childhood friend, Catharine Pleyel, and they have four children.
Soon, Theodore begins to hear voices and Catharine's brother, Henry Pleyel, begins to hear them, too. Though at first doubtful of the voices that the men claim to hear, Clara also begins to hear a strange voice. The mysterious Carwin appears on the scene, and suggests that the voices may be caused by human mimicry.
Clara is secretly in love with Pleyel, and makes a plan to tell him so; however, her chance is ruined. When she returns home, she finds Carwin hiding in her closet. He admits he had been planning to rape Clara, but believing her to be under the protection of a supernatural force, leaves her.
The next morning, Pleyel accuses Clara of having an affair with Carwin. He leaves quickly, without giving Clara enough time to defend herself. She decides to go to see Pleyel, to tell him he is mistaken, but he does not seem to believe her. On her way home, Clara stops to visit her friend Mrs. Baynton, where Clara finds a letter from Carwin waiting for her, which requests an audience with her.
At Theodore's house, Clara finds that everyone seems to be asleep, so she continues on to her own home, where she is to meet with Carwin. When she arrives, there are strange noises and lights, and she sees a glimpse of Carwin's face. In her room, she finds a strange letter from Carwin, and Catharine in her bed – dead. Shocked, she sits in her room until Theodore arrives and threatens Clara. When he hears voices outside, he leaves Clara unharmed. Clara learns that Theodore’s children have also been killed.
Clara falls ill; later, she is able to read the murderer's testimony. The killer is her brother, Theodore. He claims to have been acting under divine orders. Clara is sure that Carwin is the source of Theodore's madness.
Carwin reveals to Clara that he is a biloquist. He was the cause of most of the voices, but he claims that he did not tell Theodore to commit the murders. Wieland, having escaped from prison, arrives at Clara's house and tries to kill her. Carwin uses his ability to tell Theodore to stop. He says that Theodore should not have listened to the voices, and Theodore suddenly comes to his senses. He kills himself, full of remorse for what he has done.[3]
Clara refuses to leave her house, until it burns down one day. She then goes to Europe with her uncle, and eventually marries Pleyel. Clara feels she has finally recovered from the tragic events, enough to write them down. As for Carwin, he has become a farmer in the countryside [4].
Apparently the novel was based on the true story of murders which took place at Tomhannock, New York (a hamlet near Pittstown) in 1781. Mirroring the incidents of the later novel, one James Yates, under the influence of a religious delusion, killed his wife and four children, then attempted to kill his sister, and expressed no remorse for his conduct in court later.
Brown gave his tragic hero a pedigree related to that of the actual German author Christoph Martin Wieland, who is mentioned obliquely in the text:
My ancestor may be considered as the founder of the German Theatre. The modern poet of the same name is sprung from the same family, and, perhaps, surpasses but little, in the fruitfulness of his invention, or the soundness of his taste, the elder Wieland.[5]
This and others of Charles Brockden Brown's novels were very influential in the later development of the Gothic genre by such writers as Edgar Allan Poe and Mary Shelley.
Major Themes
[edit]Religious Fanaticism
The obvious theme of Wieland is the criticism of religious fanaticism. The religious fanaticism of both Theodore and his father demonstrates the subjectivity of the human experience. Even more, it suggests that "godliness can corrupt, and absolute godliness can corrupt absolutely".[6] That the horrors that befall the Wieland family come from the direct result of religious enthusiasm indicates Brown's dislike for extreme religious sentiment. Indeed, it is often suggested that Wieland is an attack on Puritanism (though it is also often thought of as a historical allegory, or even one that explores the writing process itself).
Sensationalist Psychology
Wieland calls into question the sensationalist psychology of the time. The plot is based on the psychological ideology of the time, which was solely based on sensory inputs. While the action is based on this kind of psychology, Brown did not necessarily accept the doctrine without criticism. In fact, he calls into question its validity: the characters are trying to find the truth that is disguised by appearance, and the action – especially Carwin’s ventriloquism – shows how difficult it is to find truth simply through sensory evidence.[8] What Brown is concerned with is how the mind can be corrupted by unaccountable and dark impulses.
Ventriloquism
Ventriloquism exists as a plot device in Wieland, though it goes beyond this simplistic use; Clara Wieland can be thought of as Brown's ventriloquistic voice. Brown, like Carwin, speaks using Clara's voice. It has been suggested that Carwin's confession of his ventriloquism can be equated with Brown’s attempt to speak with Clara's voice. When Carwin says, "I exerted all my powers to imitate your voice, your general sentiments, and your language" (Wieland, 240), it can be read that Brown himself has been attempting as an author to speak using a female voice. Seeing ventriloquism as a metaphor in Wieland reaches a deeper truth: that things may not be as they appear, and genuine truth must be actively searched for.
With his intellectual and Enlightenment interests, Brown invested Gothic fiction for the first time with a higher and more urgent calling than pure sensational entertainment. He used the genre to explore a dark and irrational underside of his life and times—the secret and hidden consequences of the new American political system.
In an “Advertisement” prefacing the text of Wieland , Brown states that “his purpose is neither selfish nor temporary, but aims at the illustration of some important branches of the moral constitution of man.” He goes on to explain that “it is the business of moral painters to exhibit their subject in its most instructive and memorable forms.”
Brown’s effort to delineate what he calls “the moral constitution of man” is essentially an aim to define the innate nature of humans—what philosophical contemporaries termed natural man. The young American author deliberately aligns the project of his fiction with the larger phenomenon of scientific and philosophical discovery that rose from the Enlightenment. He views himself as a “moral painter” and writes to spark enlightenment debates over the nature of human psychology, in a way that would be “instructive” to his fellow man.
Brown was an educated young man, enlightened beyond many of his contemporaries. He was also a Quaker, a religion endowed with an unflinching sense of equality among genders and races. Brown stands as one of our country’s earliest feminists, and although no full-fledged abolitionist movement existed at the time, his writings strongly suggest he would have been a strong proponent. These beliefs informed his politics and his writing. |
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| "A Model of Christian Charity" |
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Author: John Winthrop; Genre: Non-Fiction; sermon
In the 1630s, they form the Massachuttes Bay Colony. They are NOT separatists from the Church of England. They think it is almost impossible to set up a model for the people in England for what a true church would look like, so they want to lead England to a new World and set up a model for the Old World. It is the City on the Hill. This is the true society of church-state, based on biblical notions. John Winthrop (leader), he helps to establish the colony for what this would look like. Reformation is based off what we find in scripture. We are entered into a covenant for this. If we do not do the right thing, the Lord will be avenged upon us. If we serve the Lord, then he will bless us and prosper. “IF-then” language of the bible. Citizenship is based off of church membership and baptism. They set up some legislative houses. they are set up on a covental theology between individual and nations. There is both civic responsibility and moral responsibility in both society and government. THis is still Christendom. TO vote, you must be baptized.
John Winthrop wrote and delivered the lay sermon that would be called A Modell of Christian Charity either before the 1630 crossing to North America or while en route. It described the ideas and plans to keep the Puritan society strong in faith as well as the struggles that they would have to overcome in the New World. He used the phrase "city upon a hill" (derived from the Bible's Sermon on the Mount: "You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden") to characterize the colonists' endeavour as part of a special pact with God to create a holy community. He encouraged the colonists to "bear one another's burdens", and to view themselves as a "Company of Christ, bound together by Love." He told the colonists to be stricter in their religious conformance than even the Church of England, and to view as their objective the establishment of a model state. If they did so, God would "make us a prayse and glory, that man shall say of succeeding plantacions: the lord make it like that of New England." Winthrop's sermon is often characterized as a forerunner to the concept of American exceptionalism.
Connections:
Essay on Man
The Metanarrative of America
The Legacy and vision of the American Dream
The Chosen People
Little Women
Wieland
The Scarlet Letter
The Day of the Locust |
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| "A Divine and Supernatural Light" |
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Definition
Author: John Edwards; Genre: Non-fiction; sermon
In “A Divine and Supernatural Light,” Jonathan Edwards describes the spiritual light as knowledge that is directly received from God and not from natural means such as rational thinking or physical sensation. In the sermon, Edwards’ use of imagery to describe the spiritual light gives the audience a better understanding of what the spiritual light is and how God utilizes reason to convey spiritual knowledge. Edwards uses imagery throughout the sermon to convey a deeper understanding of his points. In the sermon, Edwards explains that the spiritual light cannot be achieved by rational understanding or hearsay; the spiritual light is something that is felt in the heart as pleasure. Edwards states, “There is a difference between having a rational judgment that honey is sweet, and having a sense of its sweetness.” A person can reasonable believe that honey is sweet by its use as a sweetening substance or the fact that it attracts ants. However, only someone who has tasted honey knows the unique sweetness of honey, a taste that is different from sugar, another sweet substance. Edwards also points out that though the spiritual light cannot be derived from reason, God utilizes man’s reasoning abilities to convey divine truths. He associates reason with the use of “our eyes in beholding various objects, when the sun arises, is not the cause of the light that discovers those objects to us.” Without the spiritual light, the use of our eyes or our reason cannot visualize the divine truth. Edward also associates God as the Sun that shines this light, illuminating the divine objects so that they can be perceived by the eyes. The use of imagery in Edwards’ sermon allows that audience to better understand Edwards’ claims by giving the audience a visual interpretation of how spiritual knowledge is perceived through the heart as an inner feeling of delight and how the spiritual light is conveyed with the use of reasoning.
Sanctified Reason
Edwards thinks that reason can prove that God exists, establish many of his attributes, discern our obligations to him, and mount a probable case for the credibility of scripture. But he also believes that grace is needed both to help the natural principles “against those things that tend to stupefy [them] and to hinder [their] free exercise,” and to sanctify “the reasoning faculty and” assist “it to see the clear evidence there is of the truth of religion in rational arguments” (“Miscellanies,” nos. 626, 628; Edwards 1957–, vol. 18, 155, 156f).
His view is briefly this. “Actual ideas” are ideas that are lively, clear, and distinct. Thought has a tendency to substitute “signs” (i. e., words or images) for actual ideas. While this tendency is useful and normally quite harmless, it impedes reasoning when “we are at a loss concerning a connection or consequence [between ideas], or have a new inference to draw, or would see the force of some new argument” (“Miscellanies,” no. 782; Edwards 1957–, vol. 18, 457). Since accurate reasoning about a subject matter requires attending to actual ideas of it, one can't accurately reason about religion if one lack the relevant actual ideas. To have an actual idea of God, for example, one must have actual ideas of the ideas that compose it. But most of us don't. Those parts of the idea of God that everyone has (ideas of knowledge, power, and justice, for instance) either aren't attended to or, if they are, fail to elicit the appropriate affective reaction. In addition, we can't fully understand ideas of affections which we haven't experienced and so can't properly understand God's benevolence if we aren't benevolent ourselves. And without the simple idea of true beauty, one can understand neither God's holiness nor the facts that depend on it.
True benevolence remedies these deficiencies. Because the desires of the truly benevolent are properly ordered, they attend to ideas of religion and are suitably affected by the ideas of God's attributes and activities that everyone has. (They fear his wrath, for example, and are grateful for his benefits.) Furthermore, they understand God's benevolence because their own benevolence mirrors it. Finally, the truly benevolent delight in the benevolence in which holiness consists, i.e., they “perceive” or “taste” or “relish” its beauty. Edwards' claim, then, is that to reason accurately about God one must have an actual idea of him, and to have that one must be truly benevolent. Right reasoning about religious matters requires right affections.
Edwards is an evidentialist. Rational religious beliefs are either properly basic or rest on good evidence. A belief that the gospel scheme exhibits true beauty is an example of the former. But most religious beliefs depend on evidence. Sometimes this evidence includes the idea of true beauty. Even when it does not, however, the right affections are needed to appreciate its force. In either case, only those with properly disposed hearts can read the evidence correctly. Recent studies have emphasized how thoroughly Edwards grounded his life's work on conceptions of beauty, harmony, and ethical fittingness, and how central The Enlightenment was to his mindset. Edwards played a very critical role in shaping the First Great Awakening, and oversaw some of the first fires of revival in 1733–1735 at his church - First Church - in Northampton, Massachusetts.[6] Edwards delivered the sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God", a classic of early American literature, during another wave of revival in 1741, following George Whitefield's tour of the Thirteen Colonies. |
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Term
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Definition
Christian revitalization movement that swept Protestant Europe and British America, and especially the American colonies in the 1730s and 1740s, leaving a permanent impact on American religion. It resulted from powerful preaching that gave listeners a sense of personal revelation of their need of salvation by Jesus Christ. Pulling away from ritual and ceremony, the Great Awakening made Christianity intensely personal to the average person by fostering a deep sense of spiritual conviction and redemption, and by encouraging introspection and a commitment to a new standard of personal morality.
It brought Christianity to African slaves and was a monumental event in New England that challenged established authority. It incited rancor and division between old traditionalists who insisted on the continuing importance of ritual and doctrine, and the new revivalists, who encouraged emotional involvement and personal commitment. It had a major impact in reshaping the Congregational church, the Presbyterian church, the Dutch Reformed Church, and the German Reformed denomination, and strengthened the small Baptist and Methodist denominations. It had little impact on Anglicans and Quakers.
Unlike the Second Great Awakening, that began about 1800 and which reached out to the unchurched, the First Great Awakening focused on people who were already church members. It changed their rituals, their piety and their self awareness. To the evangelical imperatives of Reformation Protestantism, 18th- century American Christians added emphases on divine outpourings of the Holy Spirit and conversions that implanted within new believers an intense love for God. Revivals encapsulated those hallmarks and forwarded the newly created evangelicalism into the early republic.
The revival began with Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758), the leading American theologian of the colonial era and a Congregationalist minister in Northampton, Massachusetts. Edwards came from Puritan, Calvinist roots, but emphasized the importance and power of immediate, personal religious experience. Edwards was said to be 'solemn, with a distinct and careful enunciation, and a slow cadence.'[3] Nevertheless, his sermons were powerful and attracted a large following. "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," is his most famous sermon. The Methodist preacher George Whitefield, visiting from England, continued the movement, traveling across the colonies and preaching in a more dramatic and emotional style, accepting everyone into his audiences. |
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Term
| Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God |
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Definition
Author: Jonathan Edwards; Genre: Sermon
preached on July 8, 1741 in Enfield, Connecticut. Like Edwards' other sermons and writings, it combines vivid imagery of Hell with observations of the world and citations of scripture. It remains Edwards' most famous written work, and is widely studied by Christians and historians, providing a glimpse into the theology of the Great Awakening of c. 1730–1755.
Doctrine
"There is nothing that keeps wicked men at any one moment out of hell, but the mere pleasure of God."
Most of the sermon's text consists of ten "considerations":
God may cast wicked men into hell at any given moment.
The Wicked deserve to be cast into hell. Divine justice does not prevent God from destroying the Wicked at any moment.
The Wicked, at this moment, suffer under God's condemnation to Hell.
The Wicked, on earth - at this very moment - suffer the torments of Hell. The Wicked must not think, simply because they are not physically in Hell, that God (in Whose hand the Wicked now reside) is not - at this very moment - as angry with them as He is with those miserable creatures He is now tormenting in hell, and who - at this very moment - do feel and bear the fierceness of His wrath.
At any moment God shall permit him, Satan stands ready to fall upon the Wicked and seize them as his own.
If it were not for God's restraints, there are, in the souls of wicked men, hellish principles reigning which, presently, would kindle and flame out into hellfire.
Simply because there are not visible means of death before them, at any given moment, the Wicked should not, therefore, feel secure.
Simply because it is natural to care for oneself or to think that others may care for them, men should not think themselves safe from God's wrath.
All that wicked men may do to save themselves from Hell's pains shall afford them nothing if they continue to reject Christ.
God has never promised to save us from Hell, except for those contained in Christ through the covenant of Grace.
Purpose
One church in Enfield, Connecticut had been largely unaffected during the Great Awakening of New England. Edwards was invited by the pastor of the church to preach to them. Edwards aim was to teach his listeners about the horror of hell, the danger of sin and the terror of being lost. Edwards describes the shaky position of those who do not follow Christ's urgent call to receive forgiveness.
"Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" is a typical sermon of the Great Awakening, emphasizing the belief that Hell is a real place. Edwards hoped that the imagery and message of his sermon would awaken his audience to the horrific reality that awaited them should they continue without Christ.[1] The underlying point is that God has given humanity a chance to rectify their sins. Edwards says that it is the will of God that keeps wicked men from the depths of Hell. This act of restraint has given humanity a chance to mend their ways and return to Christ.
Application
In the final section of "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," Edwards shows his theological argument at work throughout scripture and biblical history. This is done at length, invoking stories and examples throughout the whole of the Bible and comprises the bulk of this section. Edwards ends the sermon with one final appeal, "Therefore let everyone that is out of Christ, now awake and fly from the wrath to come." Without explicitly saying, Edwards indirectly gives a sense of hope to those currently out of Christ. Only by returning to Christ can one escape the stark fate outlined by Edwards.
Effect
Edwards was interrupted many times before finishing the sermon by people moaning and crying out, "What shall I do to be saved?". Jonathan Edwards' sermon continues to be the leading example of a Great Awakening sermon and is still used in religious and academic studies. Although the sermon has received criticism, Edwards' words have endured and are still read to this day, over 270 years later. |
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Term
| The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano |
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Definition
Author: Olaudah Equiano Genre: Non-fiction
Context: Olaudah Equiano and his sister were kidnapped in Africa, in what is present-day Nigeria. The 11-year-old Equiano was placed aboard a slave ship that sailed across the Middle Passage. Trading vessels laden with weapons and cotton products sailed from British ports to purchase slaves in Africa. The human cargo was taken across the ocean and sold to estate owners in American in exchange for rum and sugar. The ships then sailed back to England and repeated the three part journey.
The enslaved Equiano arrived on the West Indian island of Barbados and was soon transported to Virginia, where he was purchased by a British captain for service aboard a ship. Eventually, he was renamed for, ironically, a Swedish freedom fighter. He remained a slave for almost ten years while serving aboard various vessels. At the same time, the young slave worked for his own profit; he eventually saved up enough money to buy himself. He continued to work as a sailor, and witnessed the deepest curelties of slavery and its dire effects on men and women.
He settled in England in 1777 and learned to read and write during his voyages. He converted to Christianity when he found a bible on one of the ships he worked on. When in England, he dedicated himself to the anti-slavery cause. His autobiography caused a sensation in Britain and America. In the text, Equiano follows the model of the spiritual autobiography and adds the element of social protest. His narrative served as the prototype for many slave accounts written during the abolitionist crusade.
Chapter one of the text describes his homeland and the custom of his native village; he describes the religion, dress, and daily life, as well as his early recollections. The final part of the chapter begins some of the social criticisms that the books is known for:
"These instances, and a great many more which might be adduced, while they show how the complexions of the same persons vary in different climates, it is hoped may tend also to remove the prejudice that some conceive against the natives of Africa on account of their color. Surely, the minds of the Spaniards are did not change with their complexions! Are there not causes enought to which the apparent inferiority of an African may be ascribed, without limiting the goodness of God, and supposing he forebore to stamp understanding on certainly his own image, because "carved in ebony." Might it not naturally be ascribed to their situation? When they come among Europeans, they are ignorant of their language, religion, manners, and customs. Are any pains taken to teach them these? Are they treated as men? Does not slavery itself depress the mind, and extinguish all its fire and every noble sentiment? But, above all, what advantages do not a refined people possess, over those who are rude and uncultivated? Let the polished and haughty European recollect that his ancestors were once, like the Africans, uncivilized, and even barbarous. Did Nature make them inferior to their sons? and should they too have been made slaves? Every rational mind answers, No. Let such reflections as these melt the pride of their superiority into sympathy for the wants and miseries of their sable brethren, and compel them to acknowledge that understanding is not confined to feature or color. If, when they look round the world, they feel exultation, let it be tempered with benevolence to others, and gratitude to God, "who hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth"; (Acts 17:26); "and whose wisdom is not our wisdom, neither are our ways his ways." |
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