G. M. Hopkins Heaven-haven

Emotional

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  ‘Sat we two, one anothers best’ (l.4)
  
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  ‘as yet was all the meanes to make us one’(l.9)
  
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  ‘And we said nothing, all the day’(l.20).
  

Although The Extasie is a long poem, its structure is quite simple, much simpler than the typical Donne poem, being a series of iambic tetrameter quatrains, rhyming abab. The iambic tetrameter form is a favourite form for many of the metaphysical poets, especially Andrew Marvell, though Donne tends to avoid it (though note A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning). Some editions actually print the poem as quatrains. The sentence structure adheres fairly strictly to the quatrain form, which again makes the argument that much easier to follow. There are no ‘neat’ solutions, since there are no rhyming couplets, so when two lines fit together perfectly, as do ll.71 and 72, it is a consonance of thought rather than of sound.

The Relique is a typical metaphysical poem written by the master of the school John Donne himself. It has sharp wit, irony, short pithy statements in a style full of allusions, conceit and epigram.

It is a characteristically metaphysical love poem combining levity and seriousness to the core. It is a hypothetical situation, where the spectral voice of the lover assumes that his and his beloved's graves are broken open and their skeletons are displayed and projected as the ultimate romantic icon. The persona, however, subtly undercuts this canonization by referring to their rather inhibited relation abiding all the social customs of the big brothers and doing everything as par calculations and never doing anything from the bottom of the heart. The canonization is thus struck by a kind of grotesque note in the poem.

In “The Relic,” John Donne conducts a grand compliment to the woman he loves by way of holy and hopeful imagery. The poem is based upon the central image of a holy relic used to reference a simple lock of his loved-one’s hair, a lock which, “At the last busy day” of Final Judgment, will pull him and his love together, as their bodies re-assimilate upon holy disinterment. (ln.10) The piece goes on to present additional images, primarily religious, as in completes the concepts of reincarnation, profound love, and miracle.

The first stanza’s images are essential merely poetic devices of metaphor and metonymy. The “second guest” to be entertained by the grave “bed” which he once possessed are basically metaphors. (lns.2, 4) They suggest, however, that the stay in the grave is not indefinite; guests leave eventually, sleepers in beds wake up (even lovers leave beds eventually: a more fitting parallel because of the “women-head” polygamous suggestion). (ln.3) Thus already there is some suggestion of Christian mythology of reincarnation.

The second stanza is where the religious imagery congeals to set the holy tone for the entire work. Donne hopes, upon his digging-up, if this event occurs in a superstitious, idolatrous land, “where mis-devotion doth command,” that the digger will take his and his lover’s remains to “to the Bishop and the King” (thereby pegging Roman Catholicism, by association, as superstitious) to be made into “relics.” (lns.13, 15, 16) By this elevation of their base remains, they in turn are elevated (in the idolatrous society) to holy status—a status which Donne feels they deserve. They will then become “Mary Magdalen” and he “something else thereby.” (lns.17, 18) This religious allusion and his association “thereby” to it suggests perhaps that his lover is akin to a whore, though one forgiven, and that he is guilty as well and forgiven as well. (ln.18) It is tempting to suppose, at this point, that he and the women to whom he writes this poem had sexual relations, relations which her Roman Catholic upbringing has caused undue (in Donne’s opinion) guilt in her. The “harmless miracles” which the lovers “wrought” then could be an effort to both elevate this relationship of ‘sin’ as well as show its simple kernel. (ln.22)

Yet the third stanza opens with an enumeration of these miracles, and the foremost of them is chastity: “Difference of sex no more we knew,/ Than our guardian angels do.” (ln.25) They never, then, “touched those seals/ Which nature, injured by late law, sets free:” those of virginity or chastity. (lns.29-30) So the conciliatory tone of the poem is now nothing but celebratory or complimentary; there is no persuasion going on here; though Donne feels the freedom of sexual abandon to be injured by laws of chastity, he knows also that such resistance is miraculous and holy. The way is paved for the ‘Grand Compliment’ of the piece, where he expresses language and quantification’s inability to express “what a miracle she was.” (ln.33) He abandons the poem, almost anti-climatically, with a sense that this image of her miraculous nature must be expressed by not expressing it, by not ‘nailing it down’ in language or measure (meter).

Therefore, what begins as a poem suggestive of base and worldly matters, where sexuality is set up to be lauded in spite of Roman Catholic prudery, closes with a ‘double-cross’ of transcendence. The religious imagery of the piece, at first suggestive of Judgment, death, idolatry, forgiven sin, gives way to direct, non-imaginative language, where only the satisfying “meal” of a kiss intrudes its poetic device on the stanza. (ln.28) The holy transcends into the woman who is the subject, thereby making her, in effect, transcend the transcendent; though he could speak of death, Judgment, idolatry, and their actions on the earth with holy imagery, when the time comes to speak of “what a miracle she was,” no words, images, or verse will suffice. (ln.33) By not lauding, and explaining why, more praise than is possible is rained upon the lucky woman, Donne’s love.

The expiration - parting :.

Just a basic over-view: the poem is, on the surface, about death and the parting of two souls. But the "parting of two souls" can also be interpreted as a physical distance taken between two people - perhaps one is travelling away from their lover, etc. There are a variety of possibilities. The focal point is the idea of one's last breath also being one's soul leaving their body as death encompasses them.

"vapors" is a word with quite a different meaning to today's; rather than simply relating to gasses, as one would now think, it deals with ghosts, spirits, and the above-mentioned "last breath = soul".

The first paradox is: Donne is a human being, made by God and for God, and yet he is being bought by God or has to be bought by God. How can God buy something which is His back? First and foremost, “I resign/ Myself to thee, O God” has an air of surrender, as Donne’s persona prays and says that he surrenders himself wholly to God. Then having surrendered himself to the Lord, the speaker says that “First I was made/ By Thee; and for Thee” where it is clear that according to Christian beliefs, man was made by God and for the glorification of God. It is also according to Christian theology and belief that when sin sets in, the only saving grace or salvation for mankind is God himself: “when I was decay'd/ Thy blood bought that, the which before was Thine” suggests that key Christian idea, that when decay, associated with death, decline and degeneracy, sets in, only Jesus’ saving blood can buy Donne’s speaker back. This is reflected in the Bible via the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The paradox is that God apparently has to buy something that originally belongs to Him back, paying with His blood.

The second paradox is that Donne, speaking through his speaker and persona, is son, servant, sheep and spirit, all at once. First, he seems to suggest that he is the “Son of God”, where this title reminds us of Jesus Himself, who was called the Son of God and the Son of Man. “I am Thy son, made with Thyself to shine” could also be suggestive of the fact that all human beings can be considered God’s children, and that they make God their father “shine” with their actions, where the play on words is with the word “son”, which can be either son, or sun. Hence, it seems that Donne’s speaker is a son of God, or even the Son of God. Yet at the same time, he is also a servant of God, through his religion as well as his religious position and posts. “Thy servant, whose pains Thou hast still repaid” is a clear reference to the speaker’s subservient position vis-à-vis God, and that since God has bought his life, the speaker is merely a servant who owes his life to God for being bought. In fact, slaves in ancient history all owed their lives to their masters. At the same time, it is also clear that the speaker is like a sheep, where the true meaning seems to be that Jesus is the shepherd and the persona is the sheep. “Thy sheep, Thine image” also suggests common Christian theology and philosophy of the “Lamb of God”, and also that man was made in God’s image. Before the speaker “betrayed” God, he could also be considered a spirit: “temple of [God’s] Spirit divine” because man was made in God’s image. It is therefore clear that the speaker is son, servant, sheep and spirit all at once, paradoxical but true according to the Bible. There are many religious references within every line of the second stanza, all reflecting Christianity and the interesting paradoxes that form the core and heart of belief.

The volta and the sudden change in the direction of the sonnet brings about the next key idea of the image of the devil raping and ravishing the speaker/ persona. There is an idea of theft and the stealing of God’s hard and holy work. “Why doth the devil then usurp on me?” is the sudden volta in the sonnet, that questions why the devil wants to steal and take away God’s work, “Why doth he steal, nay ravish, that's Thy right?” There seems to be a sudden begging on the part of the speaker, where he begs “Except Thou rise and for Thine own work fight/ O! I shall soon despair”, suggesting that the power of the devil is rather strong, and that God should rise and fight to defend his creation, which is under attack from the devil. There is a sense of deep despair and worry and the atmosphere is now very tense. This leads on to the last and most interesting paradox: the paradox that despite troubles, God leaves it alone and does not come to the speaker/ persona’s aid.

“That Thou lovest mankind well, yet wilt not choose me,And Satan hates me, yet is loth to lose me.”

The ultimate paradox or irony is that God loves mankind but will not save his people actively, and yet Satan hates mankind, and does not want to lose anyone. Looking at it from a human, simple and limited perspective, Satan has to work harder and try to steal people away from God whereas God seems more comfortable to leave things as they are and give people freedom to choose between good and evil. In a literary sense it is possible to argue that the sonnet ends with a paradoxical sigh, due to the recognition that God has given man free choice to make their own decisions.

In summary, there are many paradoxes in this one single sonnet. Firstly, the speaker is a human being made by God and for God, yet he has to be bought back by God, who made him. One could suggest that God has given men free will, and they seem to have abused it. The second paradox is that Donne’s speaker is son, servant, sheep and spirit, all at once, where it seems that everyone plays multiple roles and cannot be simply labelled. Yet the ultimate ironic but true paradox is that God loves mankind but will not save his people actively, and yet Satan hates mankind, and does not want to lose anyone. This sonnet by Donne is full of religious references and Christian theological and philosophical paradoxes indeed.

“As due by many titles

I resigne” seems to both mock and embrace man‟s inability to secure his own salvation.

Donne‟s language seems to examine the efficacy of both Calvin‟s insistence on the

inability of man to effect his own salvation and the traditional Roman Catholic

insistence that faith and good works affect salvation.

Donne‟s language associates the relationship between God

and man in romantic, almost sexual terms. The soul is cleansed of sin only when it has

been ravished by God; Donne likewise associates the ascent to heaven with being

ravished. “O! might those sighs” romanticizes man‟s spiritual relationship, with the

poet‟s desire to transform impure profane love into a more pure divine love. Donne

seeks to punish himself, rather than asking God to punish him as he did in “Batter my

heart.” The idolatrous mourning he wasted on profane love must be replaced by the

fruitful mourning of repentance, replacing also his earthly love with divine love for

Christ. Having been “ravished” by God, he must turn away from the pleasures of the

flesh, abandoning the lovers he idolized. Romantic love provides relief of coming ills

only in “past joys,” while repentance offers him the chance for salvation through the love

of Christ.

. “As

due by many titles,” rather than espousing these Calvinistic doctrines and accepting

Donne asks, “Why doth the devil then usurpe on mee” (l. 9)? If the speaker is truly God‟s

image, and Christ‟s sacrifice has indeed rectified his sins, why is the devil allowed

control over him? This sonnet suggests that such Calvinistic theology is not acceptable,

that it should not be possible to be taken by the devil when God has already worked to

effect grace and salvation upon mankind as a whole. If this truly presents “states of soul

attendant upon the Protestant drama” (265), as Barbara Lewalski asserts, then it is a

state of soul unsatisfied with the Protestant drama of salvation, and the lack of

assurance that the soul with obtain grace.

As this sonnet shows, Donne is finds no security in the doctrines of

Protestantism. He was made by and for God, so why should God refuse to fight “for

Thine owne worke” and allow the devil to have him? Donne himself suggests a need for

reassurance that is lacking in this Calvinistic doctrine of grace and expresses frustration

and anxiety that God has “allowed” him to be taken over by Satan.

I am thy sonne, made with thy selfe to shine…

Why doth the devil then usurpe on mee?

Why doth he steale, nay ravish that‟s thy right?

Except thou rise and for thine owne worke fight,

Oh I shall soone despaire….

ll. 5-12
The poem is an exhortation to action on the part of God; the poet demands that

God grant him salvation since he “was made/By thee, and for thee” (ll. 2-3). Donne is uncertain that God is even on his side, much less fighting to keep his soul from eternal

damnation. The language of the poem makes it seem as though God might be indifferent

towards his creation: “…thou lov‟st mankind well, yet wilt‟not chuse me” (l. 13). Man can

be damned simply because he had not been “chosen” by God, regardless of the fact that

he was made by God and redeemed by the crucifixion (ll. 2-4). Donne‟s language in the

sonnet speaks to an anxiety regarding the Protestant means of salvation. Donne is

clearly unhappy with the lack of assurance in his own salvation—an assurance,

according to John Carey, that was supplied more readily by the Catholic Church and its

sacraments (Carey 57). He states:

Donne, in abandoning the Catholic for the Protestant church, had entered

the realm of doubt, and had he not made this move the „Holy Sonnets‟

could never have been written. They are the fruit of his apostasy. For all

their vestiges of Catholic practice, they belong among the documents of

Protestant religious pain, and their suffering is the greater because they

are the work of a man nurtured in a more sustaining creed. (57)
As Carey notes, Donne has “cut himself off” from the assurance of salvation that

came with Catholic traditions, and must now work through his doubt and anxiety.

In the first lines of the sonnet, Donne‟s language reflects an insistence that he

should be assured salvation and that grace has been bestowed already.

…First I was made

By Thee; and for Thee, and when I was decay‟d

Thy blood bought that, the which before was Thine.

I am Thy son, made with Thyself to shine,

Thy servant, whose pains Thou has still repaid,

Thy sheep, Thine image, and—till I betray‟d

Myself—a temple of Thy Spirit divine.

ll. 2-8
The speaker insists that he has already been accepted as one of God‟s children,

that there should be no reason to doubt or question his salvation. Yet the following lines question why God would expend effort for the salvation of mankind and then abandon

the speaker to the devil:

Why doth the devil then usurp on me?

Why doth he steal, nay ravish, that‟s Thy right?

Except Thou rise and for Thine own work fight,

O! I shall soon despair, when I shall see

That Thou lovest mankind well, yet wilt not choose me,

And Satan hates me, yet is loth to lose me.

ll. 9-14
Rather than upholding Calvinist theology, these lines agonize over what seems to

be wasted effort on the part of God. Why should God create man in His own image, then

secure salvation through Christ‟s sacrifice, only to refuse adoption to certain people and

fail to protect man‟s soul from being stolen by Satan? The argument presented seems an

absurd one: God creates man, offers salvation after the fall, but will only save a few

through grace.

Rather than being a passive acceptance of the idea of limited atonement, the

sonnet questions its value. Donne “shall soon despair” because God has failed to

“choose” him, yet he insists that he is worthy of salvation. In On Christian Doctrine, St.

Augustine notes that “whoever does not believe that his sins can be forgiven worsens in

desperation, as if nothing better than evil remained to him since he has no faith in the

fruits of his conversion” (I.xviii.17, p.17). While Donne has not explicitly lost faith, “As

due by many titles” shows a poet in danger of losing faith in his own salvation—he

cannot believe that he is “nothing better than evil,” but reason seems to demand that he

must be evil if Satan steals him while God looks on indifferently. Donne despairs

because he does not see that grace has been bestowed upon him, grace that might

prevent him from being “ravished” by the devil. Without the secure knowledge of salvation, Donne lapses into despair, yet still begs God to fight for his soul and give him

the knowledge that grace has been bestowed upon him. Donne is unable to even repent

of his sins because he is still helplessly suffering under the yoke of Satan and unsure of

his salvation. Donne‟s language neither accepts nor upholds a theology of election,

where some are saved and some are damned, or of limited atonement. The anguished

tone of the speaker in the last two lines reflects an inherent rejection of the idea that

God could have bestowed grace on all and didn‟t: “That thou lovest mankind well, yet

wilt not choose me,/ And Satan hates me, yet is loth to lose me” (l. 13-4). The language

and tone of the poem thus prevent a Protestant, Calvinist reading of the sonnet,

elucidating a desire for more spiritual inclusion—inclusion that he could not find by

limiting himself to Calvinist theology.
HOLY SONNETS.

IV.


O, my black soul, now thou art summoned
By sickness, Death's herald and champion ;
Thou'rt like a pilgrim, which abroad hath done
Treason, and durst not turn to whence he's fled ;
Or like a thief, which till death's doom be read,
Wisheth himself deliver'd from prison,
But damn'd and haled to execution,
Wisheth that still he might be imprisoned.
Yet grace, if thou repent, thou canst not lack ;
But who shall give thee that grace to begin ?
O, make thyself with holy mourning black,
And red with blushing, as thou art with sin ;
Or wash thee in Christ's blood, which hath this might,
That being red, it dyes red souls to white.