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Xerox University Microfilms 300 North Zoeb Rood Ann Arbor, Michigan 481 OS 7*1-3285

PARR, Judith Tanis, 19*+5- ELOQUENT SILENCE IN THE POETRY OF HENRY VAUGHAN.

The Ohio State University, Ph.D., 1973 Language and Literature, general

University Microfilms, A XEROX Company, Ann Arbor, Michigan

© 1973

Judith Tania Parr

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

t

■ 1 l ' ...... — — i- ■ ii i

THIS DISSERTATION HAS BEEN MICROFILMED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED. ELOQUENT SILENCE IN THE POETRY

OF HENRY VAUGHAN

DISSERTATION

Presentod in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University

By

Judith Tanis Parr, B, A., M, A,

The Ohio State University 1973

Approved by

Adviser department of English Preface

The only way uie shall ever recapture the sort of knowledge Lao-Tzu referred to In his dictum "those who know do not speak” is by subordinating the question "how shall we know?" to the more existentially vital question "how shall we live?" To ask this question is to insist that the primary purpose of human existence is not to devise ways of piling up ever greater heaps of knowledge, but to dis­ cover ways to live from day to day that integrate the whole of our nature by way of yielding nobility of con­ duct, honest fellowship, and joy. And to achieve these ends, a man need perhaps "know" very little in the con­ ventional, intellectual sensB of the word. But what he does know and may only be able to express by eloquent silence, by the gracB of his most commonplace daily gestures, will approach more closely to whatever reality is than the most doggBd and disciplined intellectual endeavor, Theodore Roszak, ThB Waking of a Counter Culture,

Silence, . • • brings us short in the same manner as thB prime minister who, upon being asked for advice from his king, told the king that the best advice he could give him was that he should not accept advice from anyone, Charles H, Long, Wvth3 and Symbols in Honor of Mlrcea Ellade.

But before wb come to that which is unspeakable and un­ thinkable, the spirit hovers on the frontiers of lan­ guage, wondering whether or not to stay on its own side of the border, in order to have something to bring back to other men. This is the test of those who wish to cross the frontier. If they are not ready to leave thBir own ideas and their own words behind them, they cannot travel further, Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island.

ii Acknowledgments

"[Suddenly] a light, as it were, is kindled in

one soul by a flame that leaps to it from another,

and thereafter sustains itself." The words are Plato's

("The Seventh Letter," 341c, d), but they aptly de­ scribe my experience and furnish a concise definition

of what I consider the process of education to be.

The first flame which kindled my soul camB from a high school teacher of Latin and world history, Anna

G, JBrue, who first gave me confidence in my own ideas.

Later, my soul was kindled by two Hope College teachers,

Joan Mueller and Charles Huttar, who taught me the discipline of scholarship and introduced me to the literature of Renaissance arid seventeenth-century

England. In graduate school I was encouraged by Joan blabber, who guided the writing of this dissertation.

To these teachers is due my primary acknowledgment.

I would also like to thank my friend Janet Cavano for her assistance, without which my research would have been considerably delayed. Librarians Marilyn

Morgan George and Georgia Mullen of the Methodist

College library and Hattie Oaniels of the fort Bragg

iii library were generous and helpful. Poets, critics, and scholars to whom I am indebted are acknowledged in footnotes. To my husband Bill, who granted me the liberating leisure to write and who proofread . this dissertation and encouraged me in countless ways, I shall continue to express my gratitude in ways that are not limited to words, For any errors in this dissertation I take complete credit.

iv Vita

September 4, 1945 Born - Hudsonville, Michigan

1967 B, A,t Hope College, Holland, Michigan

1967-1969 Teaching Assistant, Department of English, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

1969 M. A,, The Ohio State Univer­ sity, Columbus, Ohio

1969-1970 Research Assistant, Department of English, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

1970 Teaching Associate, Department of English, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

1972 Instructor, part-time, Depart­ ment of English, North Carolina StatB University branch at Fort Bragg, Fort Bragg, North Carolina

v Table of Contents

Page P r e f a c e ...... 11 Acknowledgments ...... ill

V i t a ......

Introduction ■•••••••■ 1

Chapter

I* Vaughan's Poetic Theory • ••••••• 37

II* Silences of God and Nature in Vaughan's Poetry

III* Silences of Nan in Vaughan's Poetry • • • • 123

IV. Vaughan's Poetic Style ...... 181

C o n c l u s i o n ...... ••••••••• 207 List of Works C i t e d ...... 215

v i Introduction

The Renaissance uias heir to and propagator of a rev­ erence for eloquence* Renaissance man held orators of classical Greece and Rome, such as Demosthenes, Isocrates, and Cicero, in high esteem* Humanists of the Renaissance gloried in the belief that what distinguished man from beast, uihat raised man to a place just a little lower than the angels, were man's abilities to reason and to communi­ cate the effects of reason by means of speech* Thomas

Wilson in his Arte of Rhetorioua wrote about how man's powers of reason and eloquence helped to repair the ruins of fallen m a m

[For]] when man was thus past all hope of amend­ ment,’ God [was] still tendering his owne work- manshippe stirring vp his faithfull and elect, to perswade with reason all men to societie* And gaue his appointed Ministers knowledge both to seB the natures of men, and also graunted them the gift of vtteraunce, that thBy might with ease win folks at their will, and frame them by reason to all good order* And there­ fore, whereas men liued. brutishly in open feeldes, hauing neither house to shroude them in,’ nor attire to clothe thBir backes, nor yet any regard to seeke their best auailet these appointed of GOD called them together by vtter­ aunce of speech, and perswaded with them what was good, what was bad, & what was gainful for mankind. And although at first the rude could hardly learns, and either for the straungenease of the thing, would not gladly receiue the offer, or els for lack of knowledge, could not perceiue

1 the goodnesaet yet being somewhat drawne* and delited with the pleasantnesse of reason* and the sweotnesse of vtterauncei after a certaine space they became through Nurture and good ad- uisement* of wilda* sober* of cruell* gentle* of foolb b * wise* and of beastes* men* such force hath the tongue* and such is the power of Eloquence and reason* that most men are forced* euen to yeeld in that which most atand- eth against their will.1

Christian humanists read in their Bibles that Crea­ tion came by the spoken Word of God. God said* "Let there be light*” and there was light (Genesis 1*3). -It was as

Logos, the Word made flesh* that Jesus came and dwelt among men* revealing God the father* communicating to men the will of God* teaching men how to pray* and enabling the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak. Christian humanists believed that God also revealed HimsBlf to men through the vehicle of human language contained in the Bible writ­ ten by men under divine inspiration.

During the Renaissance the art of preaching the Word was valued and developed by men such as Lancelot Andrewes and John Donne* men widely known in their time for their ability as preachers. Donne spake for many of his contem­ poraries when he recognized the necessity for preaching*

Therefore what Christ tels us in the darke* he bids us apeake in the lights and what he sales in our ears* he bids us preach on the house top. Nothing is Gospell* not EvanoBlium. good

<* In English Literary Criticism* The Renaissance, ed. 0, B. Hardison* Jr. (New York* Appleton-Century- Crofts, 1963)* p. 27. message! if it be not put into a messengers moutht and delivered by himt nothing is con- ducible to his end, nor available to our sal­ vation* except it be avowable doctrine* doc­ trine that may be spoke aloud, though it awake them, that sleep in their sinne, and make them more frouard, for being so awaked*2

• . , the sinnes of this Parish* will ly upon my shoulders, if I be silent, or if I be in­ dulgent. and denounce not Gods Judgement upon those Binnes.3

Donne was aware that faith in God came by man's hearing of the Ulord preached*

Renaissance man understood that language enables man to share his thoughts and experiences with others* Lan­ guage rightly used enables man to so communicate with his fellow-man that society can be made to operate in a civi­ lized and orderly manner* Language preserved in writing enables man to learn from those who lived long before him, and language enables him to transmit his words to people whom he will never meet face to face, people who live far from him in distance and in future time. The preservation of his words, furthermore, allows man to transcend the limitations of his mortality, providing for him the insur­ ance of fame, a kind of earthly immortality* More impor­ tantly, ae Donne implied, by words man learns about God's

^ "Sermon XXVII, Preached to the King at Whitehall, April 1, 1627," Donne's Sermons, ed* Logan Pearsall Smith (Oxfordt At the Clarendon Press, 1919), p* 113* 3 "Sermon XLV, Preached at Saint Dunstan's, April 11, 1624," Donne's Sermons, ed* Smith, p* 34* 4 will for him, By words man is made aware of his need for and the availability of salvation, an immortality which

transcends earthly fame.

Not only did Renaissance man find language useful,

but he also found the eloquent use of words to be delight­

ful, and he developed a fondness for eloquence. The popu­

larity of euphuism in the Court of Queen Elizabeth, for

example, illustrates an exuberant delight in words and * thoir patterns almost for eloquence's sake alone. Cer­

tainly the popularity of drama during the Renaissance at­

tests to the delight dramatists and their audiences found

in words eloquently spoken.

But side by side and intertwined with man's rever­

ence for and delight in eloquence there grew up a dis­

trust of words. When God created the world, Ulord and deed

were one. The Fall of man and man's consequent corrupt

tendency to abuse language disintegrated that oneness.

Men used words to tell lies; they used words to stain truth

with falsehoods.

Men found that words were inadequate to describe God,

The prophet Isaiah asked* "To whom then will ye liken God?

or wha£ likeness will ye compare unto him?" (Isaiah 40*

18).

St. Paul admonished Timothy to avoid "profane and vain

babblings" (I Timothy 6i20) and exhorted men to "study to

be quiet, and to do , , . [their^ own business, and to work with • • • [their] own hands" (I Thessalonians 3i11). And

St, Peter urged men "that with well doing • • • [they] may

put to silence the Ignorance of foolish men" (I Peter 2*

15).

Reverence for silence was cultivated by various Creek

philosophers. Simonides condemned vain speeches, claiming

that, as a sixteenth-century book of emblems later puts it,

"my utordes repentance had, / But Silence yet, did neuer A make mee sad." The disciples of Pythagoras were advised C to observe a five-year period of silence. Zeno claimed

that nature gave man one tongua but two ears that man might

hear much and speak little.** Pseudo-Iamblichus held that 7 God is served through silence alone.

Geoffrey Ulhitnoy, "Silentium," £ Choice of Emblemes [Leyden, 15B6], ed. Henry Green (New Yorki Benjamin Bloom, 1967), p. 60. c C. J. De Vogel, Pvthaooras and Early Pvthaooreanlsm (Assen, Netherlands* ' Royal Van Gorcum, Ltd., 1966), p. 186. Cf. Whitney, "Silentium," & Choice of Emblemes. p. 60,

6 Thomas Vaughan, "Coelum Terrae," The Works of Thomaa Vaughan* Euoenlus Philalethes. ed. Arthur Edward Waite (London* Theosophies! Publishing House, 1919), p. 232.

7 Jamblichi [iamblichus of Chalcis], Dg flvsterlls Liber. VIII, 3, ed. Gustavus Parthay (Amsterdam* Verlag Adolf M. Hakkert, 1965), p. 263. The Latin translation is ", . . solo silentio colitur. ..." Cf. flax Pulver, "The Experience of Light in the Gospel of St. John, in the 'Corpus Hermeticum,* in Gnosticism, and in the Eastern Church," trans. Ralph flanheim, in Spiritual Disciplines. Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks, 4 (New York* PanthBon Books, 1960), p. 263, Among the Church Fathers, Ignatius Martyr of Antioch considered silence superior to words* Perhaps influenced by the Gnostic .teaching which designated the "Primal Di­ vine Reality as Svt-Y1? ^Silenca],"® he understood God the g Father to be silent and the Incarnation of Jesus to be 10 "a descent from silence into 'speech1 or logos," Si-

* •lence indicated the perfection of God, while speech un­ accompanied by deeds indicated the imperfection of men.

But in Jesus, speech tuas perfect bocause in Him word and 11 deed were one. Apparently having little roverence for thB Old Testament, Ignatius claimed: "To my mind it is

Jesus Christ who is the original documents* The invio­ lable archives are his cross and death and his rosurrec- 12 tion and the faith that came by him," Ignatius urged

Q Nicholas Arseniev, "Creative Quiet," The Review of Relioion, 16 (1951), 11, q Henry Chadwick, "The Silence of Bishops in Ignatius, Harvard Theological Review, 43 (1950), 171, 1 □ Joseph Anthony Mazzeo, "St, Augustine's Rhetoric of Silence: Truth vs. Eloquence and Things vs. Signs," Renaissance and Seventeenth-Century Studies (New York: Columbia llniv ersity Press ,~1964/, p • 22. Cf, Ignatius, "To the Magnesians," V/II, ii, trans, Cyril C, Richardson, in Early Christian Fathers. ed, Cyril C. Richardson, Library of Christian Classics Series, 1 (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1953), p. 96. 11 Mazzeo, p. 22. Cf; Ignatius, "To the Ephesians," XV, i-ii, in Early Christian Fathers, ed, Richardson, p, 92.

: 12 "To the Philadelphians," VIII, ii, in Early Chris­ tian Fathers, ed, Richardson, p, 110, reverence for eilent bishops, claiming that when a bishop

is silent, he, being the earthly representative of God, is 13 most like God and can do more than those who speak* He

believed that it was better to keep quiet and be real than 1A to speak and be unreal*

St* Augustine stated that no one can find a suitable

name for God because whatever a man conceives or says of

God cannot validly define that which is beyond human under- 13 standing* Man cannot ever truly say that God is inef­

fable, for he is in so saying merely attributing to Gad a

name or definition limited by man's flnitudei "God is not

even to be called 'unspeakable,' because to say even this

is to speak of Him* Thus there arises a curious contra­

diction of words, because if the unspeakable is what can be spoken of, it is not unspeakable if it can be called un­ speakable, And this opposition of words is rather to be avoided in silence than to be explained away by speech* *

"To the Philadelphians," 1, ii, in Earlv Chris­ tian fathers* ed. Richardson, p* 168*

"To the Ephesians," XV, i, in Earlv Christian Fathers, ed* Richardson, p* 92* 15 "Homily XIII, 5," Homilies on the Gospel Accord­ ing to St. John* and His first Epistle* 1 (Oxfordt John Henry Parker, 1848;, p. 204 * Also see The Citv of God. XII, 18, Basic Works of Saint Augustine, ed* Whitney J, Oates (New Yorki Random House Publishers, 1948), II, p« 199. 16 On Christian Doctrine. I, 6, 6, trans, J. F, Shaw, Augustine. Great Books of the Western World, 18 (Chicagot Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1952), p, 626* 8

Augustine urged thB necessity, for quietness as a prelude to hearing the voice of Godt

If to any man the tumult of the flesh were si­ lenced) and the phantoms of earth and maters and air mere silenced) and the poles mere si­ lent as mall) indeed, if the very soul grow silent to herself, and rnent beyond herself by not thinking of herself) if fancies and imag­ inary revelations mere silenced) if every tongue and every sign and every transient thing , . . be silent, having stirred our ears to hear Him mho created them) and if then he [sic^ alone spokB, not through them but by himself, that me might hBar his word, not in fleshly tongue or angelic voice, nor sound • of thunder, nor the obscurity of a parablo, but might hear him • , , me then mith rapid thought might touch on that Eternal UJisdom mhich abides over all,17

He believed that only mordlessly could man perceive the

Word,18

Augustine distinguished betmeen rnords and meaning, form and content, eloquence and truth, mhen he said that it was. "one of the distinctive features of good intellects 19 not to love words, but the truth in words," He went on to say, "God speaks mith a man not by means of some audible creature dinning in his ears , , , but by the truth itself, if any one is prepared to hear mith the mind rathor than

17 , Confessions, Auoustinet Confessions and Enchi­ ridion.* trans, Albert C, Outler, Library of Christian Classics Series, 7 (Philadelphia) The Westminster Press, 1955), p. 194. 10 "Sermo CXVII," Opera Omnia. Patrolooiae Cursus Completus. Series Latina, 38, ed, J.^P, Wigne (Paris, 1865y,pp. 652-671, 1 9 On Christian Doctrine, IV, 11, 26, trans, Shaw, Augustine, p, 683, 20 with tho body." To emphasize eloquence before wisdom, words before realities, was to stress what is of lesser importance. He held that eloquence was useful but not in- 21 dispensable to preachers: he believed that one did not 22 need to bo eloquent in order to be wise and that truth needed no adornment to give pleasure but gave pleasure be- 23 cause it was truth. J. A, Mazzeo aptly summarizest

"for AugustinB, all dialectic, true rhetoric, and thought itself were but attempts to reascend to that silence from which the world fell into perpetual clamour of life as

A JL fallen men knew it." Pseudo-Dionysius, the Areopagite, believed that nei­ ther mystical experience nor God could be described in 25 words. Yet he tried, as the beginning of his Mystical

Theoloov attests> "Trinity, , . , Guide us to that topmost

The City of God. IX, 2, Basic Works. ad, Oates, II, p. 144. 21 On Christian PoctrinB. IV/, 2-8, trans. Shaw, Augustine, pp. 675-682,

22 mD b Catechizandis Rudibus," IX, 13, Opera Omnia. Patrolooiae Cursus Completus. Series Latina, 40, ed, J. P. Migne (Paris, 1887/, pp, 319-320, Cf, Mazzeo, p. 13. 23 On Christian Doctrine, IV/, 12, 28, trans, Shaw, Augustine, p. 684, Cf, Mazzao, p, 12, 24 ~ Mazzeo, p. 23, 25 On the Divine Names and the Mystical Theology, trans. C. E, Rolt (New Yorki Macmillan Company, 1920; rpt, 1951), pp. 200-201, * 10 height of mystic love which exceedeth light and more than exceedeth knowledge, where the simple, absolute and un­ changeable mysteries of heavenly Truth lie hidden in the dazzling obscurity of the secret Silence outshining all brilliance with the intensity of their darkness, and sur­ charging our blinded intellects with the utterly impalp­ able and invisible fairness of glories which exceed all beautyl"^6

Throughout the Middle Ages and extending somewhat even to the present day, silence was and is the rule in various monasteries. Holy men.withdrew not only from the tempta­ tions of worldly action but also from speech. The Ancrene

Riwle warned that unrestrained and indiscriminate talk is 27 morally evil and spiritually dangerous, Meister Eckhart went even further than condemning idle wordsr he urged,

"be silent and prate not about Cod, for whenever thou dost 2B prate about God, thou liest," St, Catherine of Siena expressed a similar thought when describing the difficulty of communicating to others her mystical experiencei "To explain in our defective language what I saw • • • would

26 Dionysius the Areopagite, p. 191, Cf, Arseniev, P. 12. 27 The English Text of the Ancrene Riwle. ed, from British Museum MS Royal BC,1 by A, C, Baugh, Early English Text Society, 232 (Londoni Oxford University Press, 1956), pp, 6-13,

Meister Eckharti quoted in Gerald Bullett, The English Mystics (Londont Michael Joseph, 1950), p, 25, 11 seem to me like blaspheming the Lord or dishonouring Him by my speechs so great is the distance between uihat the intellectt when rapt and illumined and strengthened by

God, apprehends, and what can bB expressed by words, that 29 they seem almost contradictory."

In Dante's Divine Comedy. Virgil, who stands for rea­ son and language among other things, can lead Dante through the inferno and purgatory but, because Virgil is not a

Christian, he cannot lead Dante into paradise. When Dante experiences the beatific vision in paradise, he employs words to announce that words are inadequate to describe what hB experiencesi "From that moment my vision was greater than our speech, which fails at such a sight, and memory too fails at such excess, • . • Now my speech will come more short of what I remember than an infant's. . . . 30 □ how scant is speech and how feeble to my conception!"

29 The Legend of St. Catherine of Siena. II, p. 190| quoted In Itrat-Husain, The Mystical Element in the Meta­ physical Poets of the Seventeenth Century (Londoni Oliver and Boyd, 1948), p. 214. 30 Paradlso. The Divine Comedy. Canto XXXIII, trans. John D, Sinclair (New York*. Oxford University Press, 1939), pp. 481-485, The Italian text followst Da quinci innanzi il mio voder fu maggio che *1 parlar nostro, ch'a tal vista cede, e cede la memoria a tanto oltraggio, (lines 55-57) Omai sara piu corta mia favella, pur a quel ch' io ricordo, che d'un fante (11. 106-107) 0 quanto d corto il dire e come fioco al mio concetto! (11. 121-122a) 12

Petrarch complained about the inadequacy of words to

encompass man's experience and ideas* "What then is that

eloquence)" he asked) "so narrow and frail, which not only

does not comprehend all but also does not draw together 31 that with which it has dealt?" He urged men not to

seek "the vain glory of the tongue) but the genuine quiet 32 of the mind," It is possible, he said, "to know some­

thing without noisy debates) a shout does not accomplish

anything, but meditation makes one more learned. Cer­

tainly, therefore, unless it is our purpose to seem more

than to be, the applause of the frantic multitude will 33 not please so much as the truth in silBnce,"

31 Sscretum, II, Prose, ed, G, dlartsllotti. P, G, Ricci, at al. [Milani Riccardo Ricciardi, 1955;, p, 74, The Latin text follows) "Que est igitur ista eloquentia, tam angusta, tarn fragilis, que nec cuncta complectitur et que fuerit complexa non stringit?" Cf, Jerrold Seigel, "Ideals of Eloquence and Silence in Petrarch," Journal of the History Ideas. 26 (1965), 150,' 32 “ D£ Vita Solitarla. I, Prose, ed, Martellotti, Ricci, ejb jaJ,,, p, 324, The Latin words are "nec inanem lingue gloriam, sed solidam quietem mentis," Cf, Seigel, p. 157. Le, Famlliarl. I, 6, 20, Pubblicazioni dell' uni­ versity di urbino serie di letters e filosophia, 29 (1970), p, 171, The Latin text follows) "sine clamosis alter- cationibus scire aliquid) non facit clamor, sed meditatio doctiorem, Profecto itaque, nisi videri magis quam esse propositum nobis est, non tam plausus insane multitudinis quam veritas in silentio placebit," Cf, Seigel, pp. 157- 150, Cf, also Plato's words about publishing matters of the highest truths [if]] anyone , , • great or small, has written a treatise on the highest matters, and the first principles of things, he has so I say, neither heard nor learnt any sound teaching about the 13

Geoffrey Chaucer noticed that the meanings of various words can change gradually over a period of timei / Ye knows ek that in forme of apeche is chaunge Withinne a thousand yeer, and utordes tho That hadden pris, now wander nyce and straunge Da thinketh hem, and yet thei spake hem so, And spedde as wel in love as men noui dot Ek for to wynnen love in sondry ages. In sondry londes, sondry be usages.34

Certain words thus no longer corresponded to the ideas or things which evoked them.

Of those who distrusted eloquence either because it could so easily be abused, its sweetness seducing men to turn their attention to an imperfect world to follow the wrong persons and to do the wrong things, or because words were considered to be inadequate fully and truly to ex­ press profound thoughts and mystical experiences and to serve all of man's spiritual needa, a more comprehensive

subject of hia treatise) otherwise he would have had the same reverence for it which I have, and would have shrunk from putting it forth into a world of discord and uncomeli- ness. • • • but if he wrote it at all, it was from a mean craving for honour, either putting it forth as hia own invention, or to figure as a man possessed of culture, of which he was not worthy, if his heart was set on the credit of possessing it, "The Seventh Letter," trans. J. Harward, Plato. Great Books of the Western World, 7 (Chicagoi Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1952), p. 611*

*** Troilus and Crisavda. II, lines 22-28, The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, ed. P. N. Robinson, 2nd ed. (Bostoni Houghton mifflin Company, 1957), p. 401. 14 and detailed list could have been presented, But this is not the purpose of this introduction, which so far has presented the contrasting views of those who revered words, language, and eloquence and those who saw words, language, and eloquence as less than worthy of reverence.

All this is background to a study of eloquent silence in the poetry of Henry Vaughan,

A number of book3 and articles have been especially helpful for this study. They can be included within the categories of silence in literature, mysticism, and stud­ ies of the works of Henry Vaughan.

Much that has been written lately about silence in literature has been about twentieth-century writers. Xhab 35 Hassan's The Literature of Silence and George Steiner's 36 Language and Silence deal mainly with silBnce, the un­ speakable, and the self-destructive styles of some twen­ tieth-century writers, Susan Sontag in the chapter "The

Aesthetics of Silence" in her Stylss of' Radical Will3*^ writes about silence as a response of rebellion against the often meaningless words of the "establishment," From these sources one is able to collect a few ideas, which can bB focuss*ed on the seventeenth century to illuminate some works,

35 New York* Alfred A. Knopf, 1967.

36 New York: Atheneum, 1970, * 37 New York* Ferrar, Straus and Giroux, 1969,. 15

More helpful- are studies of silence in pre-twentieth- century literature* Otto Casel in his De Philosoohorum 30 Graecorum Silentio Mvstico considers the silences of

Pythagoras* Heraclitus* Plato* Aristotle* Epicurus* and

Plato* Henry Chadwick's "The Silence of Bishops in Ig- 39 natius," Joseph Anthony fflazzeo's study* "St. Augus­ tine's Rhetoric of Silencet Truth vs. Eloquence and

Things vs* Signs,"*3 and Jerrold E, Seigel*s "Ideals of

Eloquence and Silence in Petrarch"*^ are seminal works* useful for studies of later Christian writers*

R. P* Blackmur's "The Language of Silence"*^ is basic. But Wax Picard's The World of Silence.*3 mainly an impressionistic appreciation of silence* is not very useful* Hildegard Gauger's Die Psvcholooie des Schweloens in England** is a consideration of silence as a symbol, a power* and a characteristic of the English temperament. A more helpful literary-sociological-historical study is

3B Geissem A. TBpelmann* 1919*

39 Chadwick* pp. 169-172.

*° Mazzeo* pp. 1-2B.

*1 Seigel* pp. 147-174. 42 In Lanoueoei An Enoulrv into its Meaning and Function, ed. Ruth Nanda Ansben (New York* Harper & Brothers* Publishers* 1957), pp. 134-152. A3 Trans. Stanley Godman (Chicagoi Henry Regnery Company* 1952),

** Heidelberg* C. Winter* 1937. 16

Walter J. Ong's The Presence of the Word. ^ especially for his perceptive treatment of the devocalization of the uni­ verse in the late seventeenth century and his discussion throughout of the relationship of communications media on changing Bmphases given to certain physical senses,

Basic to any study of mysticism are the classic stud­ ies by William James^ and Evelyn Underhill, ^ Gerald IB Bullett's The English Mystics is a good historical sur­ vey, Louiry Nelson Jr, *s "The Rhetoric of Ineffability t A9 Towards a Definition of Mystical Poetry" is helpful but marred by inattention to the fact that other phenomena besides mysticism can produce ineffability, Elbert N, S.

Thompson's "Mysticism in Seventeenth-Century Literature"^ has been superceded by Itrat-Husain's The Mystical Element 51 in the Metaphysical Poets of the Seventeenth Century, which is more helpful for its focus on the metaphysical

45 New Haveni Yale University Preas* 1967,

The 1/ariBtles of Religious Experiencei A, Study in Human Nature. Gifford Lectures on Natural Religion* de­ livered at Edinburgh, 1901-1902 (Londont Longmans* Green and Company* 1902t rpt. New Yorki Random House* £1936]).

^ Mysticism (191Q| rpt, Cleveland* The World Pub­ lishing Company* 1955), A A Londont Michael Joseph* 1950, in Comparative Literature. 8 (1956)* 323-336,

50 SP. 18 (1921), 170-231, 51 Londani Oliver and Boyd* 1948, 17 poets and its extensive bibliography) examining Vaughan’s

Silex Sclntlllans. Itrat-Husain records the poet’s prog­ ress on the mystical way. Helen C. White's The Plata- 52 physical Poets» £ Study in Rellolous Experience opens with a good discussion of the relationship of poBtry and mysticism.

A summary of criticism on Vaughan's style opens

Chapter four of this dissertation. Other scholarship on

Vaughan includes a fact-laden biography by F. E. Hutchln- 53 son and a more Interesting biographical chapter by 54 Whits. Useful for literary-historical background ars

Edward Dowden's Puritan and Anollcani Studies in Litera­ ture. especially its chapter on the "Anglo-Catholic cc Poeta"i Basil Willey's The Seventeenth Century Back- 56 groundi S, L. Bethell's The Cultural Revolution of the 57 Seventeenth Century. which includes discussion of sev­ eral of Vaughan's poemst Herbert S. Wright's "The Theme

52 New Yorki The Placmillan Company. 1936) rpt. New Yorki Collier Books, 1962.

33 Henrv Vauoham A Life and Interpretation (Oxfordi At the Clarendon Press. T947J* 54 "Henry Vaughani The Country Doctor." The meta­ physical Poets, pp. 240-260. 55 Londont Kegan Paul. Trench. Trubner & Co.. Ltd.» 1900. 56 Garden City. New Yorkt Doubleday A Company. Inc.. 1935. 57 Londont Dennis Dobson. Ltd.. 1951. 10 ,, of Solitude and Retirement in Seventeenth Century Litera­ ture" Maren-Sofie R/rfstvig's The Haonv M a m Studiea in eg the Metamorphosis of a Classical Ideal 1600-1700t C. V. 60 Wedgwood's Seventeenth-Century Poetry. which is helpful for its treatment of the influence of the Civil War on intellectual history and literatures and, of courae, Doug­ las Bush's English Literature in the Earlier Seventeenth

Centuryt 1600-1660.61

Most scholarship on the poetry of Henry Vaughan can be considered under the following categoriesi Vaughan as go c j a precursor of William Wordsworth, as a naturB poet,

50 Etudes Anolaisea. 7 (1954), 22-35,

59 Oxfordi Basil Blackwell, 1954,

60 New Yorki Oxford University Press, 1961,

2nd ed, (Oxfordi At the Clarendon Press, 1962), 62 --Richard Chenevix Trench, A Household Book of English Poetry. 2nd ed, (Londoni Macmillan and Co,, 1670), p. 411, stated that Wordsworth had owned a copy of Silex Sclntillans. Helen McMaster, "Vaughan and Words­ worth.1" RES. 1'TTl935). 313-325, stated that Wordsworth had not owned Vaughan's book and questioned the notion that Wordsworth was influenced by Vaughan. Those who were misled by Trench or who independently found parallels be­ tween the poems of Vaughan and Wordsworth include L, R, Merrill, "Vaughan's Influence on Wordsworth's Poetry," MLN. 37 (1922), 91-96* Muriel Morris, "A Note on Words­ worth and Vaughan," MLN. 39 (1924), 187-186* William Empson, "An Early Romantic," The Cambridge Review. 31 May 1929, pp, 495-496* and K. M. Winterbottom, "Certain Affinities to Wordsworth in the Poetry of Vaughan and Traherne," Diss, Univ. of Pittsburgh, 1933, 63 Alexander C, Judson, "Henry Vaughan as a Nature Poet," PfflLA, 42 (1927), 146-156, claimed that Vaughan was 19 as a Hermetic poet,®* as a metaphysical poet'*’*’ as an

inspired by nature*s order, harmony, and beauty) rarely dealing with nature for its own sake, Vaughan often saw "eternity in the beauties of nature about him" (p. 153), ffl, PI* fflahood, "Vaughani The Symphony of Nature," Poetry and Humanism (New Haven* Yale University Press, 195Q| rpt. New York* U, W, Norton & Company, Inc,, 1970), pp. 252-295, studied recurrent images such as the veil, stones and flint, candle, magnet, and fruit, tracing their sources largely to the Bible, George Herbert, Hermsticists, and nature, Arno Each, "Oie Naturauffassung Henry Vaughans," -Engl lech a religjtfse Lvrlk des 17. Jahrhunderts * Studlen zu PonniT Herbert. Crashaui. Vaughan. Buchreihe der Anglia ieitschrift fiir englische Philologie, 5, Band (Tubingeni Max Niemeyer Verlag, 1955), pp, 160-182, claimed that Vaughan used nature in his poetry for emblematic and di­ dactic purposes) Vaughan saw nature more as a system of correspondences than as an object for worship, James 0, Simmonds, "Henry Vaughan and the Great Chain of Being," 1*° Studies in English Renaissance Literature, ed, Waldo F, fllcNeir (Baton Rouge, La,, 1962), pp. 149-167, considered Vaughan's view of fallen man's place in the Great Chain of Being. Leona Spitz, "Process and Stasis* Aspects of Na­ ture in Vaughan and Itiarvell," Huntington Library Quarterly. 32 (196B), 135-147, examined the dynamic and organic as­ pects of nature in Vaughan's poetry,

64 The seminal study of Vaughan's Hermeticiem and knowledge of alchemy is Elizabeth Holmes, Henry Vaughan and the Hermetic Philosophy (Oxford* Basil Blackwell, 1932), Other studies include Wilson 0, Clough, "Henry Vaughan and the Hermetic Philosophy," PfllLA. 4B (1933), 1106-1130) L, C, martin, "Henry Vaughan and 'Hermes Tria- megistus'," RES, 18 (1942), 301-307) Richard H, Walters, "Henry Vaughan and the Alchemists," RES. 23 (1947), 107- 122) Bain Tate Stewart, "Hermetic Symbolism in Henry Vaughan's 'The Night'," P£, 29 (1950), 417-422) and Henry F, Thoma, "The Hermetic Strain in Seventeenth-Century English mysticism," in Summaries of Theses. Harvard Uni­ versity, 1945, pp. 344-347, more recently, Alan Rudrum has published a number of articles on Vaughan's Hermeti- cism* "Henry Vaughan's 'The Book'," Journal of the Australasian Universities Language and Literature As­ sociation. 16 (1961J. 161-166* "VauQhanj8 ^he Niohi1* Some Hermetic Nates," WLR. 64 (1969), 11-19) and "The Influence of Alchemy in the Poems of Henry Vaughan," PQ. 49 (1970), 469-4B0, P, Grant has published "Her­ metic Philosophy and the Nature of flan in Vaughan's 20 66 67 imitator of George Herbert, as a meditative poet, and

SIIbx Sclntlllans." JEGP. 67 (1968), 406-422, Ross Garner in his book Henry Vauohan* Experience and the Tradition (Chicegoi University of Chicago PrBss, 1959} played down the influence of Hermsticism on Henry Vaughan, limiting it to "the mechanics of metaphor and to the pious aphorisms which Hermeticism shares uiith the central current of West­ ern Christian thought" (p, 163), Studies of Thomas Vaughan's influence on hie twin brother also deal with Hermeticismi Alexander C, Judson, "The Source of Henry Vaughan's Ideas Concerning God in Na­ ture," SP, 24 (1927), 592-606* Arthur J. m. Smith, "Some Relations between Henry Vaughan and Thomas Vaughan," Papers of the Michigan Academy of Science. Arts, and Let­ ters. 18 (1933;, 551-561 1 Ralph PI. Wardle, "Thomas Vaughan's Influence upon the Poetry of Henry Vaughan," PPILA. 51 (1936), 936-952f E, L, Plarilla, "Henry and Thomas Vaughan," MLR. 39 (1944), 180-183* and S, L. Bethel*. "The Theology of Henry and Thomas Vaughan," Theology. 56 (1953), 137-143. About these studies on the influences of Her­ meticism and Thomas Vaughan on Henry Vaughan's poetry, I agree with R, A. Durr, Or* the Mystical Poetry of Henry Vaughan (Cambridge, Plass.t Harvard University Press, 19627, that some citations to works by Thomas Vaughan and alchemical texts "are extremely helpful. But due, par­ tially at least, to their tangential, partitive approach most such investigations have failed to see Vaughan stead­ ily or see him whole” (p. 19).

T., S, Eliot's "The Metaphysical Poets," TLS. 20 October 1921, pp. 669-670, is a classic. Those who study Vaughan as a metaphysical poet include Helen C. White* James B, Leishman, The metaphysical Poetsi Donne. Her­ bert. Vaughan. Traherne (Oxfordi Clarendon. 1934Ji' Joan Bennett. Four Metaphysical Poets» Donne. Herbert. Vauohan. Crashaw (Cambridge* The University Press, 1934* 2nd ed., 1953;, pp. 71-89* Robert Ellrodt, LJI, Inspiration Per- sonnelle Et L' Esprit Du Temps Chez Les Poetes MSta- Phvsiaues Anglais (Paris* Librarie Jos6 Corti, 1960)* Margaret Willy, Three Metaphysical Poets. Writers and Their Work, 134 (London* Longmans, Green & Co., 1961)* Antony Frank Bellette, "Form-and Vision in Four Metaphysi­ cal Poets," Diss. Univ. of British Columbia, 1968* and Charles Franklin Guilford, "Henry Vaughan and the Meta­ physical Tradition," DA, 32 (Jan., 1972), 4000-A (North­ ern Illinois), Of these, the studies by White, Ellrodt, and Bellette have been mast helpful. 21 as a mystical poet.*’**

66 especially F. E, Hutchinson* Henrv Vaughani £ LiFe and Interpretation! Wary Ellen Rickey* "Vaughan,""The Temple, and Poetic Form," SJP, 59 (1962)* 102-170| and Paul Lee Gaston III, "Religious Attitudes and Artistic Achievement in the Poetry of Herbert and Vaughan*" Oiss. Univ. of Virginia* 1970. R, A. Durr, pp. 2-4, 9-13* sum­ marizes accounts of Herbert's influence on Vaughan and warns against judging the poetry of Vaughan by the ar­ tistic criteria used to judge Herbert's poems. L. C, Wartin's edition of The Works of Henrv Vauohan (London* Oxford University Press* 1914| 2nd ed., T957y notes many of Vaughan's borrowings. 67 Especially Louis L. Wartz, The Poetry of Wedita- tlom £ Study in English Religious Literature of bhe Seventeenth Century (New Haveni Yale University Prose* 19541 rpt, 1962li "Henry Vaughant The Wan Within," PMLA. 7fl (1963)* 4Q-49| and The Paradise Withlnt Studies' in Vauohan. Traherne and Wilton (New Haveni -Yale Univer­ sity Press* 1964J. Welvin E. Bradford wrote an article on "Henry Vaughan's 'The Night*i A Consideration of Wetaphor and Weditation," Arlington Quarterly. 1* iii (1968), 209-222. James D, Simmonds in "Vaughan's 'The Book*t Hermetic or Weditative?” Nenohlloloous. 47 (1963)* 320-326* claimed that the poem is meditative* and in his Basques of Godt Form and Theme in the Poetry of Henrv Vauohan TPittsburghi University of Fittsburgh’^Press* 1972) Simmonds analyzed the meditative structure of sev­ eral poems. Studies of meditative structure in the verse of Vaughan redeem many of his poems from the charge of faulty organization. e g Various critics have considered whether or not Vaughan was a mystic. The verdict depends upon how one defines mysticism and to what extent one identifies poems written by a poet with the poet's actual experiences. Evelyn Underhill in her treatise on Mysticism, p. 470* cited Henry Vaughan as a "mystical poet." Elbert N. S. Thompson in his article on "Mysticism in Seventeenth- Century English Literature," p. 207* said that "Vaughan was the greatest of the nature mystics" of the seven­ teenth century. And T. S. Eliot* "The Silurist," The Dial. 83 (1927)* 260* claimed that there is a "mystical element" in Vaughan's poetry but conceded that Vaughan waa not a "great mystic*" 22

•The most recent debate among Vaughan's critics is be-

tween those who see Vaughan's poetic achievement mainly in

According to Helen C, White, Vaughan has the authentic thirst of the mystic for the reaching of God here and nout in the in­ dividual soul, , , , That Vaughan has the mys­ tic's desire for immediate contact with reality beyond the shows of things, there can be, I think, no question, • • , Definite as were his doctrinal commitments, he had also a sense of the environing mystery of the universe, of those things that are beyond the reach of the senses and of the formulations of the mind. He was frankly sceptical of the competence of the human reason to perceive all the relevant aspects of the world, • • • There is something other­ worldly about Vaughan's visions, • • , It is not a great mysticism or a developed mysticism this of Vaughan, but a very general and ele­ mental and diffused mysticism, of swift in­ sights and flashes of vision, quite out of the reach of most men, poets or devotees alike, in that white moment of full possession (pp, 276, 280, 281, 283, 288), In The mystical Element In the metaphysical Poets of the Seventeenth Century Itrat-Husain showed the develop­ ment of Vaugnan'a mysticism through the stages of conver­ sion, purgation, and illumination, comparing quotations from Silex Sclntlllans with quotations from such acknow­ ledged mystics as St, Augustine, St, Bernard, and St, John of the Cross, From investigating Vaughan's poetry, Itrat- Husain concluded, however, that Vaughan did not reach the final stage of union with God, But he cautionedt [We] must remember the important fact that Vaughan during the last thirty years of his life w s b si­ lent, his last poem which survives being his elegy on his brother's death . • , [in 1666], included in Thalia Rediviva (1678)i and thus we have no record of his further progress on the mystic Wayi perhaps like St, John of the Cross, he had real­ ized that the higher stages of mystical life re­ late 'to matters so interior and spiritual as to baffle the powers of language,' and so remained silent (pp, 223-236, The words of St, John of the Cross come from The Living FlamB of Love, trans, David Lewis [Londoni Yhomas Baker, 1934J, p, 1), 23 his religious poems» notably those in Silex Scintlllans.

* and those critics who argue for the equal or superior

Frank Kermode. "The Private Imagery of Henry Vaughan*" RES. N.S.* 1 (1950)* 206-225* tried to undermine all that had bBen said about Vaughan's mysticism based upon read­ ings of Vaughan's works. Refusing to identify Vaughan's poems utith the poet's experiences* he claimed that Vaughan was Min no sense at all a mystic" (p. 225) because Vaughan merely had borrowed elements from the mystical writings of others. Responding to Kermode's charges* Ross Garnerf E. C. Pettet* 0£ Paradise and Llohti £ Study of Vaughan's Silex Scintlllans (Cambridge! A*t the University Press* 1960)i and R. A. Durr defended Vaughan's sincerity. Ac­ cording to Garner* "Vaughan had read the literature of religion and knew what Christian experience could be* but he did not try to introduce into poems like 'Regen­ eration' and 'The Night' mere hearsay" (p. 139). Stating that "Vaughan's characteristic and most intense expres­ sion of religious experience may be described as longing rather than realization" (p. 120), Garner asserted that "if Vaughan was not a mystic in the fullest senBe (like St. John of the Cross* for example)* he was well on his way" (p. 131). Finally, he concluded, "[if] mystical poBtry, then* can be defined as poetry which rises from thB psychological evidence of Christian experience and points toward that which lias beyond illumination* Vaughan wrote mystical poetry" (p. 143). Pettet believed that Vaughan's poetry was sincere* but he saw Vaughan as "a predominantly devotional post of visionary moments* not a mystic" (p. 23). "[So] far as the essential ecstatic ex­ periences of .mysticism are concerned— the transcendence or extinction of self, the apprehension of an order of reality bayond and entirely different from our human* earthly reality, the merging into the divine spirit that is this transcendental reality* and the unique focusing, peace and fulfilment of spirit that is the consummation of these experiences— Vaughan has little or nothing to say about them in his poetry* nor does he ever claim to have known them" (p. 23). Durr listed several defini­ tions of mysticism by scholars ranging from Evelyn Under­ hill and Rufus Jones to D. T. Suzuki and Alan Watts and concluded* "these definitions embody the conception of the nature of mysticism which I have taken to be descrip­ tive of the nature of the religious life informing Vaughan's major poetry" (p. xlv). He claimed that some 24

poetic quality to be found in Vaughan's secular verse,

members of the first group include Helen C. White. Itrat-

Husain. Ross Garner, and R. A. Durr, Members of the sec­

ond group include E. L, Marilla and Frank Kermode,

of Vaughan's poems "are expressive of the highest spirit­ ual awareness man has it in him to attain" (p. 9). and he suggested that there might be a similarity between Vaughan's lapse into silence in the middle of his life and the experience of St, Thomas Aquinas, who. having been granted mystical knowledge, "considered all he had done before as so much straw and stubblB, and wrote no more" (p, 143n), E. L, Marilla, "The. Mysticism of Henry Vaughant Some Observations," RES. N.5., 18 (1967), 164-166, and James D. Simmonds, Masques of God, have taken Durr to task for the latitude of his definition of mysticism, Marilla said that the statements which Durr quoted "to demonstrate what he understands by mysticism do not offer any clear cut ac­ count of it" (p. 164), And Simmonds claimed, "Vaughan's reputation as a mystic consists mainly in a long tradition of vague and casual allusion to him as such" (p, 11), But countering Durr's broad definition of mysticism, Simmonds did not offer anything much betteri he defined mystical poetry so loosely that it differs little, if at all, from poetry based on experience, especially emotional, "affec­ tive” experience. Using this definition as a atraw-man, Simmonds proceeded to imply that any discussion of mys­ ticism and poetry, especially in relation to the poems of Vaughan, would be fruitless (p, 11), Cleanth Brooks, "Henry Vaughani Quietism and Mys­ ticism," in Essays In Honor of Esmond Linworth Marilla. ed, Thomas Austin Kirby and William John Olive (Baton Rouge i Louisiana State University Press, 1970), pp, 3-26, al­ though he is culpable for using a rather flimsy definition of "mystic” as one who deals with mysteries of the Chris­ tian religion or one who has visions, offers a sensible summary of scholarship on the question of Vaughan's mys­ ticisms "I think it is conceded by all that Vaughan prob­ ably never experienced the higher stages of mystical life, including the 'dark night' of the soul or the final state of feeling oneself granted the Beatific Vision, . But near­ ly all would also agree that Vaughan's poetry is a poetry of mystical moments and intuitions of a transcendental world" (pp, 4-5). 25

Until L. Marilla's articles on Vaughan's conver- 69 sion and on the re latio n sh ip s between Vaughan's secular 70 and religious poems, little attention, if any, was given to Vaughan's secular verse, M a rilla blamed nineteenth-

century editors of Vaughan for assuming "that the secular

poems represented false starts of poetic inspiration that 71 later found expression in an entirely different vein,"

Scholars like White and Itrat-Husain focussed their at­

tention on Vaughan's sacred verse. To change that focus,

Marilla called for s study of all of Vaughan's poems and urged that thG criterion for excellence be artistic crafts- 72 manship rathor than evangelical p ie ty . Attacking the

"notion that Vaughan's transition from socular to re li­

gious themes re fle c ts a curious metamorphosis by which he 73 suddenly came into possession of his poetic powers,"

Marilla argued for a gradual development and indicated that some of the images, themes, and attitudes expressed in * Vaughan's secular poems prefigure those of thB religious

69 "The Religious Conversion of Henry Vaughan," RES. 21 (1945), 15-22.

"The Secular and Religious PoBtry of Henry Vaughan," MLQ, 9 (1948), 394-411.

^ "The Secular and Religious Poetry," p. 394.

"The Secular and Religious Poetry," p. 394.

"The Secular and Religious Poetry," p. 394. 26 7A poems. To further promote Vaughan's secular verse,

marilla published a copiously annotated edition of The 75 Secular Poema of Henrv Vauohan.

frank Kermode, like marilla, argued that Vaughan's 76 poems should be appraised "as poBtry rather than prayer,"

Asserting that Vaughan was a "poet of predominantly lit­

erary inspiration," he said that it is "very doubtful

that Vaughan's poetry is any more closely related to his

religious experience than Sidney's A3 troohel and Stella 77 is to his amorous experience." Apparently.ignoring

Vaughan's devotional prose, his preface to the second

edition of Silex Scintlllans. and poems such as "Authoris

(da s b ) Emblems." "Anguish," and "Righteousness," Kermode stated that evidence for Vaughan's conversion is Tindeed very slight, and there is, on the evidence of his poetry,

no case for it sufficiently substantial to warrant further 7B search," Hb explained the success of Vaughan's poetry

by claiming merely that "for a few years, [Vaughan] achieved a remarkable mental condition in which much thought, reading, and conversation coalesced to form a

^ "The Secular and Religious Poetry," p. 410, 75 Essays and Studies on English Language and Lit­ erature, 21 (Uppsalat Lundequistska, 1956).

Kermode, p. 206, 77 Kermode, pp, 225, 210, 78 Kermode, p, 225, 27 79 unique corpus of homogeneous poetic material," But when

Kermode tried to explain what had brought about this "re­

markable mental condition," he could not help but resort

to imagery of rebirth» "a trumpet sounded and the bones

Both marilla and Kermode deplored excessive atten­

tion given to a post's biography. Like other New Critics,

they wanted to see greater attention given to the poems

themselves. In the past twenty years many fine explica­

tions of Vaughan's poems have been published. But I think

that any explication which views the poem in a vacuum,

which ignores the post's biography and the traditions in­

fluencing a poem, is short-sighted,

Ross Garner, defending Vaughan's sincerity against

Kermode's charges, delved into Vaughan's allegorical habit

of mind, examined the philosophical traditions of Alex-

andrianism and Augustinianism which shapBd Vaughan's ex­

pression of experience, and insisted on "a central core of

experience as the principle of organization in Vaughan's religious poetry," At times Garner's book seems bur­

dened with scholarshipi he tends to see Vaughan's poems as problems to be solved rather than works of art to be

^ Kermode, p, 225,

8 0 Kermode, p, 225,

01 Garner, p, 163, 28 understood and appreciated. He is best read with R, A, 82 Durr'a caveats in mind,

Durr defended Vaughan's sacred poetry against the charges of Marilla and Kermode, criticizing their lessen­ ing the importance of Vaughan's conversion and diminishing the differences betuesn his secular and sacred poems, Re- gretably, Durr did not refute Marilla's specific notions, for, he said, "these appear to be palpably unreal," but he found assurance for his point of view in acknowledging that "most readers of Vaughan continue to recognize a climactic change in his life and work, sharply discrimi­ nating the character of the secular verse from that of the 83 religious poems," Ulhen Durr stressed that the "differ­ ence between the secular and sacred poetry of Henry Vaughan AA cannot be minimized," he seems to have assumed and im­ plied that the greater the difference, the more does the quality of the sacred poems surpass that of the secular verse.

Between these poles are S, L, Bothell (The Cultural

Revolution of the Seventeenth Century) and E, C, Pettet

(Of Paradise and Lioht). who point out excellencies in some of Vaughan's secular poems without questioning

82 Durr, pp, 23-26,

8** Durr, p, 6 ,

84 Durr, p , .9, 29

Vaughan's conversion. Also between these poles, but in ­

clining more toward the side of his mentor Marilla, is

James 0. Simmonds, whose Masques of God; Form and Theme

in the Poetry of Honrv Vauohan is the most recent book-

length study of Vaughan's poetry. He deliberately fo­

cuses on some of the least discussed poems of Vaughan,

many of which are secular, to show th at the C lassical and

humanist traditions vie with the Christian in influencing

Vaughan's poetry and to illustrate that "Vaughan was a more 05 versatile poet than is generally understood." Simmonds

shies away from ta lk in g about conversion, for which ho

claims (erroneously, I think) that there is no "diroct por- 86 sonal testimony," and, unlike Vaughan himself, refuses

to consider secular and sacred verse as separate cate­

gories; instead, he prefers to talk about Vaughan's early

and later works, "two (overlapping) phases of [a] poetic

development" that is "essentially organic, continuous, 87 ,and n a tu ra l," Although I d iffe r from Simmonds on a

number of points, which w ill be evident in the ensuing

chapters of this dissertation, and although I criticize 80 his "'mosaic' or 'field'" organization as one more

befitting a loose collection of articles than a book, X

85 Simmonds, Masques of God, p. 3. 86 Simmonds, Masques of God, p, 5, 87 . Simmonds, Masques of God, p. 5. 88 Simmonds, Masques of God, p. ix . 30 sbb some virtues in his study, Hb adds new scholarship on

Vaughan's early poems, on Classical influancBS transmit­ ted through Ben Jonson and his followers to Vaughan's poems9 and on the meditative tradition's influence on the organization of many of his poems, Simmonds*s fine ex­ plications engender greater understanding of and appreci­ ation for many of Vaughan's poems9 both secular and sacred,

from this summary9 looking back on relevant scholar­ ship 9 ute turn our attention ahead to a summary of the con­ tents of this dissertation. Chapter One will present some attitudes about eloquence in the seventeenth century! to know a man and his works one must be familiar with the time when the man lived, Vaughan's poetic theory, as it is expressed in parts of his prose works, in the prefaces to hie Poems and to the second edition of Silex Scintil- lans. and in several of his poems, will be explored to diecover why Vaughan wrote, what kinds of writing he valued, and the style he preferred. Resemblances between the poetic theory of Vaughan and of George Herbert will be studied. Closing the chapter will be a consideration of

Vaughan's ideas on the relationship of the poet's life to his art.

The remaining chapters will be devoted primarily to the poetry of Henry Vaughan, Of the various.ways to look at Vaughan's poetry, I take my cue from the stylistic an­ alyst Leo Spitzer, He suggests that one carefully read a text* noting its striking or unusual elements* In trying to account for the presence of the striking elements, one makes a hypothesis about the style of the work* Then he looks at the other elements of the work to see how they fit or modify the hypothesis. When the details and hy­ pothesis account for each other, one has arrived at a OQ successful description of the nature of the text. Ac­ cording to Spitzer, "the life-blood of the poetic crea­ tion is everywhere the same, whether we tap the organism Qn at 'language* or 'ideas' at 'plot' or 'composition'."

One could, therefore, choose onB of the many significant details and arrive at the same hypothesis or generaliza­ tion as that arrived at by accounting for another signifi­ cant detail.

I think that a significant detail in the poetry of

Henry Vaughan is his frequent use of the words "silence,"

"silent," and "quiet." If we compare him with other seventeenth-century, religious, "metaphysical" pasts, the group of poets in which he is usually placed, ws notice that he mentions "silence," "silent," and "quiet" in his poetry more often than does John Donne or George Herbert

B9 "Linguistics and Literary History," Linguistics and Literary Historvi Essays in Stylistics {Princetoni Princeton University Press, 1948i rpt. New Yorki Russell it Russell, 1962), pp. 1-40,

90 Spitzer, p. 18. 32 91 or Richard Crashaw, In the poetry of Henry Vaughan the

utord "silence" appears thirteen times, "silent" appears

thirty-four times, and "quiet" appears twelve times•

Latin words translatable into "silence," "silent," and

"quiet" occur twelve times. Well over half of the poems and poetic translations written by Vaughan contain ref­

erences to "silence," "quiet," and related words,’ The

difference between Vaughan and each of the others cannot be explained away by any great variation in the number of

91 In John Donne's English poems. The Complete Poetry of John Donne, ed, John T. Shawcrosa (Garden City, New Yorki Anchor Books, 1967), "silence" appears five times, "silent" does not appear at all, and "quiet" appears once, according to Homer Carrol Combs and Zay Rusk Sullens, jA Concordance to the English Poema of John Donne (Chicago! Packard and Company, Publishers, T94QJ, pp. 319, 2B2, (fly own reading confirms this,' but I add that in a Latin epi­ gram recently attributed to Donne occurs the word "aui- escitet" sbb "Apotheosis Ionatil Lovolae." Complete Poet­ ic, p. 506, In the English poems of George Herbert, The Ulorks of George Herbert, ed, F. E, Hutchinson (Oxford! At the Clarendon Press, 1941), "silence" appears three times, "silent" appears three times, and "quiet" appears four times, A reading of Herbert's Latin poetry adds to the list "jnutus," "ftUegm," "quAfiPSVnt," "ajjentl," "tp^tfl," and "tacitoi" see Herbert, pp, 423, 431, 433, 437, My own reading is confirmed by Cameron Mann, £ Concordance to the English Poems of Georoe Herbert (Bostoni Houghton Mifflin Company, 192777 pp. ifl7, 2ll, In Richard Crashaw's English poems, The Complete Poetry of Richard Crashaw. ed, George Walton Williams (Garden City, New Yorki Anchor Books, 1970), "silence" appears three times, "silent" does not appear, and "quiet" appears four times. In his translations and Latin poems words translatable to "silence" and "silent" appear thirty- seven times, and words translatable to "quiet" appear seven times. All subsequent references to the poems of Donne, Her­ bert, and Crashaw are to the above-mentioned editions. 33 poems or lines of poetry written by each. But more than

just the sheer number of such references, what call for

attention are their useBv the contexts in which they are

found, and the ways Vaughan makes silence eloquent, I

think that "silence,n "silent," and "quiet" are key 92 words to unlocking the nature of Vaughan's poetry,

Vaughan's chief biographer F, C, Hutchinson has re­ marked upon Vaughan's "sensitivity to the distractions of noise" and the "quiet serenity about [the] timeless poems" 93 in Silex Scintillans. E, C. Pettet has mentioned

Vaughan's "yearning for 'calm* and 'peace',Robert

Ellrodt has asserted, "[jamais] podte n'e goute plus intensement le silence," and Ulilliam H, Halewood has suggested that "Vaughan's almost compulsively repeated image of reconciliation between Cod and man is . , , si- 95 lance." Vaughan's predilection for silence has been

92 Unless otherwise noted, all references to Henry Vaughan's works are to Henrv Vauohan« Poetry and Selected Prose, ed, L. C, Martin (Londont Oxford University taess, 1963j, 93 Hutchinson, Henrv Vauohan. pp, 166, 1B0,

Pettet, 0£ Paradise and Lioht. p. 151, 95 L* Inspiration Peraonnelle Et L' Esprit Du Temps Chez Lee Poetes Metaphvsiaues Anglais, Premiere Partie» L* Inspiration Personnalle. Toma 2 fParisi Librarie Josl Corti, 1960), pp. 205-206, 96 The Poetry of Grace» Reformation Themes and Structures in English Seventeenth-Century Poatrv (New Haveni Yale University i^ress, 1970}, p. 126, 34 noticed by some scholars, but none has focussed attention on the silences in his poetry and their contexts, on how

Vaughan uses words to express silen ce, how he attempts to express the ineffable, how silence is eloquent, and how eloquent silence helps to define the nature of Vaughan's poetry.

Chapter Two w ill deal with the silences of Cod and nature in Vaughan's poetry. God's silence, what that si­ lence means, and man's response to that silence will bB discussed} Vaughan's ideas about and response to God's silence w ill be compared and contrasted with the ideas and responses of Donne and Herbert, Vaughan believed that, although God was silent, He could communicate with man through nature. This is why Vaughan, lik e Daivd in the opening verses of Psalm 19, attributes sounds and vocality to aspects of nature ordinarily considered to be silent. Nature's silences in the poetry of Vaughan also w ill be examined. Vaughan emphasizes especially the silences of some creatures, of retirement in nature away from the noisy world of men, of deep water, of win­ ter, of night, of time, and of the heavens, Ulhat these silences mean, how they are eloquent, and why Vaughan mentions them w ill be considered.

Chapter Three w ill be about.the silences of men, including Vaughan's silences. The silences of the deaf and of the dumb, of infants, of man's gestures, eyes, 35 and blood, the silences of Christ, and the silences of lovers and friends, of readers, and of the dead uiill be explored. There are times when Vaughan urges men to be silent, is silent himself, and cannot help but be silent,

His attitudes toward his silences w ill be examined,

t. Vaughan's temporary losses for words w ill be compared with those of Donne and Herbert, Such silences in

Vaughan's poems w ill be studied to discover what ex­ periences produce them. Often Vaughan manages to say something despite his temporary silences. The chapter w ill close with a discussion of Vaughan's mysticism and his efforts to express the ineffable.

Chapter four w ill bB about Vaughan's style, which until recently has bsen more often disparaged in com­ parison with the style of George Herbert than studied for its contribution to the effectiveness of Vaughan's poetry,

Vaughan uses symbolic imagery, abstract diction, para­ doxes, a lle g o ry , a lle g o ric a l devices, and merging con­ trasts, among other means, to help convey to readers his thoughts and his experiences, both mystical and non- mystical. Unlike the styles of Donne and Herbert, Vaughan's style does not call attention to the artistry of the poet,

Vaughan writes less often about himsslf as speaker than does Donne or Herbert in order that, by silencing himself and the devices which would call a tte n tio n to him self, he may more faithfully and eloquently write as he is in spired by Cod,

The Conclusion will take up various speculations about Vaughan's late silence. He apparently wrote no poems, at least no poems which are extant, from 1666 until 1695, the year of his death, I shall briefly sum marize how Vaughan's living in war-torn seventeenth- century Britain influenced his preference for retire­ ment and his predilection for the eloquence of silence, which he expressed so well in his poetry. Chapter Ohai Vaughan's Poetic Theory

A man's historical context often plays a part in determining whether or not he w ill ever put his thoughts down on paper or publish what he w rites. I f a man does write, often the genre and subject-matter and to some de­ gree his style are determined by his place in time. The century in which Henry Vaughan liv e d in h erite d both rev­ erence for eloquence and criticism of eloquence, but many men looked upon eloquence as more to be criticized than revered. Not all men in the seventeenth century were as optimistic as Thomas Wilson had been in the preceding century about the power of eloquence to help men repair the effects of the Fall* they were hearing and reading too many deliberate abuses of eloquence to share Ulilson's optimism. Had Wilson lived through the seventeenth cen­ tury and read John W ilton's epics, he would have been made aware that eloquence is a tool that Satan too can

* * use,

S ir Francis Bacon in his Advancement of Learnino

(1605) viewed poetry as feigned history, which gives

"some shadow of s a tis fa c tio n to the mind of man in those points wherein the nature of things doth deny

3? 36 it." In poetry, he said, there is "a more ample great­ ness. a more exact goodness, and a more absolute variety. 2 than can be found in the nature of things." Poetry "utas ever thought to have some participation of divineness be­ cause it doth raise and erect the mind, by submitting the shouis of things to the desires of the mindi whereas reason doth buckle and bow the mind unto the nature of things."

So poetry, although Bacon considered it feigned history, did in his estimation have some virtues, but Bacon was not altogether comfortable with it. for in closing his discussion of poetry he cautioned, "it is not good to stay too long in the theatre."*

Bacon furthermore expressed, if not a distrust of eloquence, at least a criticism of the eloquence which values words above thingsi

these four causes concurring, the admiration of ancient authors, the hate of the schoolmen, the exact study of languages, and the efficacy of preaching, did bring in an affectionate study of eloquence and copie of speech, which then began to flourish. This grew speedily to an excessf for men began to hunt more after words than matter! more after the choiceness

1 The Advancement of Learning. II. iv, The Advance­ ment of Learning and New Atlantis (Londoni Oxford Uni­ versity Press. 1951| rpt. 1960). pp. 96-97. 2 Bacon. Advancement of Learning. II, iv, p. 97* 3 Bacon, Advancement of Learning. II. iv, p. 97. 4 Bacon, Advancement of Learning. II, iv, p. 100. 39 of the phrase, and the round and clean com- position of the sentence* and the sweet fall­ ing of clauses* and the varying and illustra­ tion of the works with tropes and figures* than after weight of matter* worth of sub­ ject* soundness of argument* life of inven­ tion* or depth of judgment* * . * In sum* the whole inclination and bent of those times was rather towards copie than weight* Here therefore is the first distemper of learning* when men study words and not mat­ ter* . . * It seems to me that Pygmalion's frenzy is a good emblem or portraiture of this vanity* for words are but the images of matter! and except they have life of reason and invention* to fall in love with them is all one as to fall in love with a picture. • * . substance of matter is bet­ ter than beauty of words,5

In claiming that "words are but the images of matter*"

Bacon echoed Plato's criticism of poetic art as being but images of images of reality (The Republic. X),

Bacon considered poetry less real than history and words less real than things.

His preference for matter rather than words coin­ cided with his preference for studying the phenomena of the world around him rather than what authorities had written. He wanted to move away from the formulae* log­ ical procedures and doctrines based on the authority of

Aristotle to a direct study of nature herself* away from the vicarious experience of reading such books as were g "fruitful in controversies* but barren of effects" to

® Bacon* Advancement of Learning. I, iv* pp. 29-31.

® "Preface," Great Instauration* The Physical and metaphysical Works of Lord Bacon Including the Advancement 40 direct experience of and experimentation with the world around him. He crlticired the "degenerate learning" of the schoolmen who pondered tpe "vermiculate questions" raised by their few books, For the wit and mind of man," he said, "if it work upon its b1 f, as the spider worketh his web, then it is endless, and brings forth indeed cobwebs of learning, admirabl e for the fineness of thread 7 and work but of no substance or profit." Instead, he found value in consulting not the authority of Aristotle nor his own mental speculations but rather things them- selves! "Those, therefore, wh10 determine not to conjec- ture and guess, but to find o ut and knows-not to invent fables and romances of worlds , but to look into, and dis- sect the nature of this real uorld, must consult only g things themselves."

Bacon's criticisms of th 3 preference for words over things are repeated by others throughout the seventeenth century. Henry Vaughan's twii brother Thomas, in making the following criticism of education in the universities, expressed his preference for Learning by experience rather

of Learning and Novum Oroanum ► ed. Joseph Devey (Londont George Bell & Sons, 1891), P* 3. Bacon, Advancement .earning. I, iv, pp. 31-32, 8 Bacon, "Preface," Graa;; Instauration. The Physical and metaphysical Works, p. 16 41 than by raading booksi "For in the universities we study

f . • only to attain a False book-theory, whereof no use

can be made but quackingt disputing, making a noise. . . .

If a man should rest in the bars theory of husbandry and

only read Vergil's Georgies, never putting his hand to the

plough^ I suppose this theory could not help him to his

dally bread. And if uie rest in the notions and names of

things themselves, we are likely to produce no effects, nor to cure any diseases, without which performances philosophy Q is useless,"

Later in the century the Royal Society's deoire to ' * "reject all the amplifications, digressions, and swellings

of stylet to return back to the primitive purity, and shortness, when men deliver'd so many thlnos. almost in

an equal number of words" was expressed in Thomas Sprat's 10 History of the Roval Society. The goals of discouraging the use of words which could paint to no particular ref­

erents and of encouraging strictly denotative language

were at least approached. For, according to George Stein­

er, it was "during the seventeenth century that the

9 "Euphrates Or the Waters of the East" (1655), The Works of Thomas Vauoham Euoenius Philalethes. ed. Arthur Edward Waite (London* Theosophical Publishing House, 1919), pp. 414-415. *t n History of the Roval Society (1667), ed, Jackson I. Cope and Harold Whitmore Jones (St. Louis> Washington University, 1958),' p. 113. 42 significant areas of truth, reality, and action [receded] 11 from the sphere of verbal statement," Ulhen in philos­ ophy language was "seen no longer as a road to demon­ strable .truth, but as a spiral or gallery of mirrors bringing the intellect back to its point of departure," mathematics and later symbolic logic provided neui means toward finding and expressing truths unmarred by "the ambiguities and imprecisions which history and usage

[had] brought into the common language,By the eight­ eenth century, according to Walter J, Ong, "the old acous­ tic syntheses had lost their appeal. 'Observation' ruled— and observation • • . is something only eyes can perform.

, • , The SBnsorium had been narrowed somehow to the sense of sight as never before, • • • Sight reveals only surfaces. It can never get to an interior, but must al- 13 ways treat it as somehow an exterior," Men in the eighteenth century became more preoccupied with apace than with sounds and came to think of God more as an ar- 1A chitect than as Word, One comes to sense Sir Francis

Bacon somewhere behind all of this, responsible to a degree

11 Language and Silence (New York* Atheneum, 1970), p, 14. 12 Steiner, p, 2 0 , 13 Walter J, Ong, The Presence of the Word (New Haven* Yale University Press, 1967), pp, 71, 72, 74,

14 Ong, p. 73, 43

for starting tha snowballing effects of preferring things

before words, observation and experience before intro­

spection and the authority of written wrods.

Criticism of words and eloquence wa3 not limited to

seventeenth-century men of science, John Donne complained

that language was "too narrow, and too weake" to ease

those sorrowing because of someone’s death ("Elegies

Death," lines 1-2), Ralph Cudworth in a sermon delivered before the House of Commons,' March 31, 1647, found words inadequate to relate spiritual truthst

Words and syllables which are but dead things, cannot possibly convey the living notions of heavenly truths to us. The secret mysteries of a Divine Life, of a New Nature, of Christ formed in our hearts) they cannot be written or spoken( language and expressions cannot reach them) neither can they ever be truly understood, except the soul it self be kin­ dled from within, and awakened into the life of them, A Painter that would draw a Rose, though he may flourish some likenBSse of it in figure ana colour, yet he can never paint the sent and fragrancyt or if he would draw a Flame, he cannot put a constant heat into his colours. , . . All the skill of cunning Artizans and Mechanicks, cannot put a princi- le of Life into a statue of their own making, either are we able to inclose in words and letters,B the Life, Soul, and Essence of any Spirituall truths] & as it were to incorpo­ rate it in them,15

The Quakers, aware of the shortcomings of words, encouraged

1 5 A Sermon Preached Before the Honourable House of Commons. at Westminster. March 31. 1647 (Cambridge« Roger Daniel, 1647) rpt. New Yorki The Facsimile Text Society, 1930), pp, 5-6, Cf, a similar but contrasting passage in John Milton's Areopaoitica (1644), quoted on p, 50 of this chapter. 44 silencB rather than preaching during their meetings for public worship*

Puritans criticized the Anglo-Catholic clergy's eloquence in preaching* Taking their text from I Corin­ thians 1i17,* they reproached them for "preaching the wis- 16 dom of words" rather than the "Word of wisdom*" George

Herbert* who considered himself more an Anglican than a

Puritan* valued simplicity rather than ornate eloquence!

I envie no mans nightingale or springi Nor let them punish me with losse of rime* Who plainly say, Mv God, fflv Kino, ("Jordan I," lines 13-1S)

According to Richard F« Jones, Herbert was not alone in his preference for simplicity! "The idea that truth's appropriate dress is plainness and simplicity, that it needs no ornament but itself, and that a rude and base style which reveals the truth',' especially religious truth, bare and unadorned,' is more fitting than an eloquent ex­ pression,* occurs [in the seventeenth century] with almost. 17 astonishing regularity*"

16 Joan Webber, Contrary fflusici ThB Prose Stvle of John Donne (Madisoni University of Wisconsin Press, 1963), pp. 123* 216*’ The Bible tBXt (KJV) follows! "For Christ SBnt me not to baptize, but to preach the gospeli not with the wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect* 17 "The Noral Sense of Simplicity," in Studies in Honor of Frederick W. Shipley. Washington University Studies in Language and Literature* 14 (Lancaster, Pa*i Lancaster Press,' Inc*, 1942), p* 271* 45

The seventeenth century witnessed a proliferation of the written word made possible by the increased use of printing presses. Such writers as addressed a new audi­ ence of unlatined readers avoided using neologisms, elab­ orate figures of speech, and other mark3 of eloquence, which might confuse readers who had but meager education.

For many writers the "desire to be understood transcended 18 the desire to be eloquent."

The p ro life ra tio n of the w ritten word engendered abuses

i of words, men saw words used not only to ed ify but also to damage, to wage verbal warfare. The publication of polem­ ic a l pamphlets provokBd the publication of counter-attack­ ing pamphlets. Eventually, pamphlets were w ritten deplor- 19 ing the plethora of pamphlets, The abundance, of polemi­ cal litoraturo which fed political and religious contro­ versies contributing toward the Civil War made some men fearful of the power of words and afraid of a free press.

While some w riters were bombarding th e ir readers with polemical pamphlets, others found it difficult or morally unprofitable to write of contemporary events, Abraham

Cowley wrote in the middle of the seventeonth century, after King Charles I had been beheaded and the Civil'War was well under way, that a "warlike, various, and a

1 A Richard F. Jones, p, 281, 19 • Fredrick Seaton Siebert, Freedom of the Press 1476- 1776 (Urbanat University of Illinois Press, 1952), p, 192. 46

tragical aga is best to write of but worst to write in ,"^

But John M ilton chose not to w rite even of the time, not so much because of any d iff ic u lty in w ritin g but because he

deemed the subject unworthy: "Of any such work as com­

piling the history of our political troubles . . . I have

no thought whatever: They are worthier of silence than of 21 commemoration," Anglican and Puritan a lik e were lik e ly

to be discouraged from writing about contemporary events.

Andrew Marvell in his dedicatory poem **Ta his Noble

Friend Mr. Richard Lovelace, upon his Poems" laments the

hostility of the degenerate age to poetry:

Our times are much degenerate from those Which your sweet Muse which your f a i r Fortune chose, And as complexions alter with the Climes, Our wits have drawne th' infection of our times. That candid Age no other way could te ll To be ingenious, but by speaking well. Who best could prayse, had then the greatest prayse, Twas more esteemd to give, then weare the Bayos} Modest ambition s tu d i'd only then, To honour not her s e lfe , but worthy men. These vertues now are banisht out of towns, Our C iv ill Wars have lo s t the Civicke crowno. He highest builds, who with most Art destroys, And against others Fame his owns employs, I see the envious caterpillar sit On the fa ire blossoms of each growing w it. The Ayre*s already tainted with the swarms Of Insects which against you ris e in arms.

^ "The Author’s Preface to His Edition in Folio, 1656," Poems (Chiswick: From the Press of C, Whitting- ham, n.dTTT p. 70. ^ "^L etter] To Henry Oldenburg," The Works of John M ilto n . X II (New York* Columbia U niversity Press, 1936), p. 109. 47

Word-peckers, .paper-rats, book-scorpions. Of wit corrupted, the unfashion'd S o n s . 22

Henry Vaughan in the preface to his Poems.published in 1646, complains of "these dull Times . , . [for] X know the veares. and what course entertainment they affoord

PoBtry" (p, 2). In Dior Iscanus. published in 1651, he laments the "dearth of wit / Which stary1d the Land since

in to Schismes s p lit" ("Upon Mr, Fletchers Playos, pub­ lished, 1647," 23-24), He bemoans the decline in the q u a lity of poetry caused by such dearth of w it as survived the Puritans* closing the theaters in 1642:

Long since great witts havB le ft the Stage Unto the Drollers of the age, And noble numbers with good sense «3 Are lik e good works, grown an offence. While much of vorse (worse than old story,) Speaks but Jack-Puddino. or John-Dorv. Such trash-admirers made us poor, And Pves tu rn 'd Poets out of door, ("To the Editor of the matchless Orinda," 1-8)

Thomas Vaughan in a dedicatory poem to Olor Iscanus expresses the expectation that his twin brother's verse

^ Lines 1-20 (1649), The Poems and L etters ofAndrew Marvell. ed, H, M, Margoliouth, 3rd ed, (Oxford: At thB Clarendon Press, 1971), I, pp. 2-3, 2 3 The reference to "good works" evokes one of the main controversies splitting the Christian Church during the Reformation, Reformers, including the English Puri­ tans, believed that one's salvation was not dependent upon the good works one did: salvatio n came ra th e r by the grace of God to those whom Hb elected, Two verses from St. Paul's letter to the Ephesians served as the Refor­ mers' touchstone: "For by grace are ye saved through faith: and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9), 4B will overcome the disaffection toward poetry in the mid* seventeenth century, especially the disaffection held by the Puritanst

And though this sullen aoe possessed be With some strange Desamour to Poetrie, Yet I suspect (thy fancy so delights) The Puritans will turn thy Proselytes. ("Vpon the fol­ lowing Poems■" 27-30)

Thomas Vaughan misunderstood the Puritans, for they were least likely to read poetry because a poet's fefncy de­ lighted them*' Puritans preferred the teachings of una­ dorned truth.

Henry Vaughan did not sharB his brother's optimism about the acceptance of his verse, for in a poem in the very same volume prefaced by Thomas's flattering lines

Henry expressed his disillusionment about the efficacy of his words in time of Civil War. He advises a friendt

let us 'Midst noise and War,' of Peace, and mirth discuase. This portion thou wert born fort why should wee Vex at the times ridiculous miserie? An age that thus hath fool'd it selfe, and will (Spite of thy teeth and mine) persist sg still. ("To his re­ tired friend , . 75-00)

The times were such as to cause a poet to wonder why he even wrote poemsi "I, know the veares. and what course entertainment thBV affoord Poetry. I£ anv shall Question that Courage that durst send me abroad so late, and revell it thus in the Dregs an Aoe. they have mv silencei" 49 but immediately he breaks his silence to add, "only.

Languescente seculo, liceat aegrotarii

Mv more calme Ambition, amidst the common rioise, hath

thus exposed me to the World" (p. 2),

When the age languishes, one is permitted to be illi

such is Vaughan's justification for writing his first

volume of Poems. Writing he diagnoses as a certain kind

of sickness, his particular symptoms being milder, however,

than thosB of his contemporaries. In an early poem he

states that "Afflictions turn our Blood to Ink" ("Oq Sir

Thomas Bodley's Library ,' . 21), Later, in his pref-

ace to the second edition of Sllex Scintlllans, he com-

pares idle poems to "Epidemic diseases," which "infect

whole Generations, corrupting always and unhallowing the best-gifted Souls" (p, 217), He complains of the "mal­

ady" and indeed the "danger and death" when good wit is

wasted on bad subjects (p, 218), and he attacks "infec­

tious and dissolving Legend" (p, 218),

[He] that writes Idle books, makes for him­ self another body, in which he always lives, and sins (after death) as fast and as foul. as ever he did in his lifet which very consideration de­ serves to be a sufficient AntidotB against this evil disease. And here, because I would prevent a just censure by my free confession. I must remember, that I my self have for many years together languished of this very slckne3st and it is no long time since I have recovered £p* 219],

Henry Vaughan, like others in his age, was aware of the power of words, enabling an author's writings for 50 better or worse to take on life of their own, outliving their maker, Wilton in hi9 Areooaoltica. published in

1644, eleven years before Vaughan's statements about idle books, claimed that "books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul whose progeny they aret nay, they do pre­ serve as in a vial the purest efficacy and extraction of that living intellect that bred them,' • . . Many a man « lives a burden to the earths but a good book is the pre­ cious lifeblood of a master spirit, embalmed and treas­ ured up on purpose to a life beyond life,"^ And in

1605, thirty-nine years before Wilton's words about the potency of life in books, Sir Francis Bacon remarked upon the seminal nature of knowledge placed in booksi "But the images of men's wits and knowledges remain in books, ex­ empted from the wrong of time and capable of perpetual renovation. Neither are they fitly to be called images, because they generate still, and cast their seeds in the minds of others, provoking and causing infinite actions 25 and opinions in succeeding ages."

2A John Wiltoni Complete Poems and Walor Prose, ed, Werritt V. Hughes INew Yorkt The Odyssey Press, 1957), p. 720. 25 Bacon, Advancement o£ Learning. I, viii, p, 70. X am indebted to Werritt Y. Hughes for pointing out this similarity between Wilton and Bacon. 51 Vaughan valued good books for much the same reasons

that Bacon and Milton gavei

Bright booksl the perspectives to our weak sightsi The clear pro lections of discerning lightst Burning and shining Thoughtst man's po3thume davi ThB track of fled souls, and their Mllkle-wav. The dead alive and busie. and the still voice Of inlarg'd Spirits, kind heav'ns white Decoys. ("Ifl ills. x Books.*1 1-6)

Vaughan's descriptions of books as being "Bright" and

being "Burning and shining Thoughts" introduces a second

justification or motive for Vaughan's writing poetryi

"You have here & Flame, bright only in its owne Inno­

cence, that kindles nothing but a generous Thought*.which

though it may warme the Bloud. the fire at highest is but

Platonick, and the Commotion, within these limits. ex­ cludes Danger" (p* 2), Vaughan's second reason for writing poetry, a reason more noble than writing simply because of succumbing to the ills of the age, is to kindle generous thoughts*' By so doing, he attempts not merely to mirror his age but to divert the minds of his readers from the

depressing aspects of his time* Poetry as flame suggests a refining of gross materials, enlightenment, and eleva­ tion of thoughts* That flames can be used to cauterize wounds suggests a possible healing effect of poetry* Fur­ thermore, poetry offers a safe diversion, giving to its readers harmless vicarious experiences, which, if they ex­ cite the passions at all, do so within acceptable limits* 52

Vaughan said that ha translated poetry "to, feather some slower Hours" (p, 2), but his choice of works to translate suggests a more serious purpose. He notes a resemblance between the "infirmities" of the Roman state, described in Juvenal's "tenth Satyrs," and the "distrac- tions" of his own time (p, 2), To discorning and ingen­ ious readers Vaughan was not merely translating Juvenal but also subtly criticizing contemporary affairs,

Vaughan's motives for writing changed from the time when he wrote the preface to his Poems in 1646 and the time when he wrote the preface to his second edition of

Silex Scintillans in 1655, Critics argue whether or not a sudden conversion of Vaughan to Christianity, like that of St, Paul, occurred sometime between these dates, per­ haps prompted by a combination of the crises of the be­ heading of Charles I and Royalist defeats in the Civil

War, the deaths of Vaughan's wife Catherine and his young- bt brother William and close friends, his suffering through a severe sickness, and his reading of the Bible and the poetry of George Herbert, I noticB a change but claim that Vaughan's conversion was gradual because Christian themes and imagery do occur in the volumes of PoBms and

Dior Iscanus, written before the more predominantly Chris­ tian poetry of the two Silax Scintillans editions. My in­ terpretation of Vaughan's conversion corresponds most closely to that of E. I, UJatkin: "It was not a conversion S3 from a life of sin* Nor was it a conversion from skep­ ticism to religious faith or from one form of faith to another. He had always laved a moral life, had always been a convinced Anglican. It was a conversion from mediocrity, from a respectable worldliness, to a pro- 26 found and fervent religious life," That a conversion of some sort occurred is evident from contrasting some of the statements made in Poems and Olor Iscanue with those made in the two Sllex Scintillans editions.

. For example, in the earlier volumes Vaughan claims to write poems in order to bring fame to others and to

* preserve his own namei

As some blind Dial, when the day is done, Can tell us at mid-night, There was a Sun. So these Clines]] perhaps, though much beneath thy fame, flay keep some weak remembrance of thy name, And to the faith of better times Commend Thy loyall upright life, and gallant End. (wAn Clegie on the death of fir. f i W. • . .,** S3-3b)

He also writes in an early verse that mwb / Commence when

Writing our Eternity** ("On Sir Thomas Bodley's Library

• • 21-22). But later, perhaps influenced by trans­ lating parts of the works of Boethius and reading the poetry of George Herbert, Vaughan abandoned his desires

26 Poets and fllvstlcs (New Yorki Sheed and Ward, 1953), p. 277. 54 to give and receive fame. His translation of Boethius's

Consolation of Philosophy. II, 6, indicates that the

grave eventually swallows up one's fame as well as one's

body i

Though fame through the world of men Should in all tongues your name relate, And with proud titles swell that storie The Darke grave scorns your brightest gloria.

But if dead you think to live By this sire of humane fame, Know, when time stops that posthume breath, You must endure a second death. (9-12, 21-24)

Vaughan probably remembered George Herbert's description

of the prolonged and painful death of man whose words die

a slower death than their bodiest

Better by worms be all once spent, Then to have hellish moths still gnaw and fret Thy name in books, which may not renti ("Content," 26-20)

By 1655 Vaughan criticized those who wrote merely because

of "a most vain, insatiable desirB to be reputed Poets"

(p. 217), and he changed his mind about writing for fame,

preferring an incorruptible heavenly garland to the tran­ sience of earthly famei Flowres oather'd in this world, die herei if thou Ulouldst have a wreath that fades not, let them orow. And grow f'o? Uieei who spares them here, shall find A Garland, where comes neither rain, nor wind. ("ThBGar­ land," 33-36)

Through the course of his poetic career Vaughan's sources of inspiration also changed. In Poems he claims \

55 that he wrote because "royall, witty Sacks, the Poets soule,M was his "Illuminator" ("A Rhapsodie," 5, 8), and "wine" was the "Spirit of wit, to make us all di­ vine" ("A Rhapsodie," 64), enabling men to transcend the limits of timsi

So, if a Nap shall take us, we shall all, After full Cups have dreames Poeticall, Lets lauoh now, and the prest grape drlnke. Till' the drowsie Dav-Starre winket And in our merry, mad mirth run Faster, and further then the S u m And let none his Cup forsake. Till that Starre aoaine doth wakai So we men kelow shall move Eauall'v with the gods above. ("A Rhapao- die," 69-78)

He also claimed that "gold's the best restorative of wit" ("In Amicum foeneratorem." 16), The poets whom hs admired— Ben Jonson, Thomas Randolph, John Fletcher,

27 Cf, Robert Herrick on the inspirational qualities of sacks 'Tie not Apollo can, or those thrice three Castellan Sisters. sing, if wanting thee, Horace. Anacreon both had lost their fame, Had'st thou not fill'd them with thy fire and flame, Phoabean splendourl and thou Thespian springl Of whlcn, sweet Swans must drink, before they sing Their true-pac'd-NumbBrs, and their Holy-Layes, Which makes them worthy Cedar, and the Baves. "His fare-well to Sack." 29-36, The Complete Poetry of RoherVHerrick. ed. J, Max Patrick (New Yorki New York University PrBSs, 1962), p, 63, Herrick was probably familiar with Horace's Odes. 1, 18 and III, 21, which praise wine. According to Graydon W, Regnos, "The In­ fluence of Horace on Robert Herrick," Pfl,, 26 (1947), p. 274, Herrick's "eloquent praise of wine particularly as a dispeller of care and grief, and as the poet's inspi­ ration is certainly expressed in the spirit of Horace if not literally," 66 William Cartwright, William D'Avanant, and Katharine

Philips— wrote predominantly secular verse.

But Sllex Scintillans demonstrates a change in the sources of Vaughan's inspiration. He criticizes "Ex-

cesse of friends, of words, and wine" ("misery," 25),

To write a different kind of poetry he needs a different

kind of inspiration! "he that desires to excel in this

kind of Hagiography. or holy writing, must strive (by all means) for perfection and true holvness. that a door mav

be opened to him In heaven. Rev, 4, 1, and then he will 9ft be able to write (with Hlerotheus and holy Herbert) £

true Hvmn" (p. 221), After his conversion Vaughan, like

George Herbert, believed that the ability to write true hymns was a gift of God and should therefore be used in the service of God, Vaughan revered George Herbert, deeming him a "most

glorious true Saint and a Seer" (p. 151), a "blessed man

, , , whose holy life and verse gained many pious Con- verts" (p, 22Q), of whom he claimed to be the least. In

"The Natch" Vaughan addresses Herbert as a Dear friendl whose holy, over-living lines Have done much good To many, and have checkt my blood (lines 1-3)

Hlerotheus was the author of hymns and teacher of Pseudo-Dionysius, according to french Fogle, ed,, The Complete Poetry of Henry Vaughan (Garden City, New Yorki Doubleday & Company, 1964| rpt. New Yorki W, W, Norton & Company, Inc,, 1969), p, 260n, 57 The many sim ilarities of Vaughan's sacred verse to the

verse of George Herbert— similarities of phrase, image,

line, conceit, verse-form, title, subject, theme, and

genre— indicate how much Vaughan imitated George Herbert,

f, E, Hutchinson claims that there is Nno [other] example

in English literature of one poet borrowing so Bxten- 29 sivsly from another,M Vaughan had no qualms about bor­ rowing from and imitating especially the work3 of his 3D contemporaries. Perhaps he viewed such imitation as a compliment to those from whom he borrowed! he probably thought that good writing deserved extra exposure. His borrowings show his spiritual kinship with those whom he imitated, A son of Ben Jonson in his secular poems, in his sacred writing he becomes a son of George Herbert,

A comparison of Henry Vaughan's dedication to Sllex

Scintillans with Herbert's dedication to The Temple re-

VBals in a single poem the extent of Vaughan's imitation,

Herbert's "Dedication" is brieft

Lord, mv first fruits present themselves to theet Yet not mine neltheri for from thee they came. And must return. Accentof them and me. Ant? make us strive, who shall* aTno best thy name. Turn tKeir eves hither, who shall make a oalnt Theirs, who shall hurt themselves or me. refrain.

Henry Vaughani A Life and Interpretation (Oxfordt At the Clarendon Press, T947), pp. 102-103, 30 L, C, Martin's commentary in his The Ulorks of Henrv Vaughan, 2nd ed, (Oxfordi At the Clarendon Press, 1957) records a large number of Vaughan's borrowings. 58 Vaughan's dedication "To my most merciful, my most loving, and / dearly loved Redeemerf the ever blessed, the / onely

Holy and JUST ONE / JESVS CHRIST / The Son of the living

GOD / And the sacred Virgin Mary" resembles Herbert'si

I [fly Godl thou that didst dye for me, These thy deaths fruits I offer theet Death that to me utas life and light, But dark and deep pangs to thy sight. Same drops of thy all-quickning blood Fell on my hearti those made it bud And put forth thus, though Lord, before The ground was curst, and void of store. Indeed I had some here to hire Ulhich long resisted thy desire, That ston'd thy servants, and did move To have the[e] murthred for thy lovei But Lord, I have expell'd them, and so bent, Beg, thou wouldst take thy Tenants Rent,

II Dear Lord', 'this finished! and now he That copyed it, presents it thee, 'Twas thine first, and to thee returns, From thee it shin'd though here it burnsi If the Sun rise on rocks, is't right, To call it their inherent light? No, nor can I say, this is mine, For, dearest Jesus, *tis all thine. As thy cloaths, (when thou with cloaths wert clad) Both light from thee, and virtue had, And now (as then within this place) Thou to poor rags dost still give grace. This is the earnest thy love sheds, The Candle shining on some heads. Till at thy charges they shall be, Cloath'd all with immortality. My dear Redeemer, the worlds light, And life too, and my hearts delight! For all thy mercies and thy truth Shew'd to me in my sinful youth. For my sad failings and my wilde Nurmurings at thee, when most mildet For all my secret faults, and each Frequent relapse and wilful breach, 59

For all designs meant .against thee, And ev'ry publish'd vanity Which thou divinely has Forgiven, While thy blood wash'd me white as heaven: I nothing have -to give to thee, But.this thy own gift, given to me; Refuse it not! for now thy Token Can tell thee where a heart is broken,

Vaughan closes his poem by quoting from Revelation 1:5-7,

He repeats much of the content of Herbert's "Dedication,M

Both dedicate their poems to God. Both think of their

poem3 as-fruits— Herbert's as "first fruits," Vaughan's as "deaths fruits." In Deuteronomy 26:2-12'the Israel­ ites were commanded to give their first fruits as a tithe

to God in thanks for His bringing them to the Promised

Land. In the New Testament, Christ, God's only bBgot- • ten son, by dying on thB cross, offered up Himself in behalf of sinful men as the sacrificial first fruits to

God (I Corinthians 15:20-23), fruit throughout the Bible is a metaphor for good works. Both Herbert and Vaughan look upon their ability to write poetry as a gift of God 31 and offer their poems as fruits to God in thanksgiving,

Vaughan probably chose to call his poems "deaths fruits'' rather than "first fruits" because ho considered his

first poems, which were more secular than sacred, as unfitting to offer God, His sacred poems were the fruit

of the death of his old self by his conversion, which the

31 Other poems by Vaughan which emphasize pOBtry as a gift of God to be returned include "H. Scriptures," "Praise," and "Psalme 104," 60 death of Christ had made fruitful* As Vaughan said in

"Authorls (do se) Emblema." the poem preceding the dedi­ cation* "Ifioriendo, revixl" (line 15). After his conver­ sion* Vaughan writes poetry as a means of offering thanksgiving to God.

Neither Herbert nor Vaughan claims sole authorship of his poems. Herbert claims that his poems come from

God* and indeed some of his poems represent God speaking directly to him. At the end of "Jordan II*' a friend whispers to Herbert* "There is in love a sweetnesse readle oenn'dt / Copie out onelv thatand save expense"

(lines 17-18). Vaughan claims that without having been redeemed by Christ he would have been unable to be fruit­ ful. He views his poetry-writihg as copying that which is God's. The view is not unlike that of Sir Philip

Sidney* who said that the purpose of divine poetry is to 32 "imitate the inconceivable excellencies of GOD."

Vaughan's poetry is a reflection* just as rocks mirror the sunlight back to its source (Vaughan* like Herbert* puns on the sun-son homonym). The rock imagery again reminds one of the preceding poem in which Vaughan states that bBfore his conversion he was "Silex*" "Saxae . . .

"The Defence Selected Prose and Po an Pranciscot Rineharr Press, 1969)* p. 110. 61

Pectora." and "Lapis" (lines 5, 9, 10)f the facial fea-

tures on the heart-shaped rock in the illustration ac- 33 corapanying the poem substantiate this.

The confessional tone of the last stanza of Vaughan's

dedication suggests a strong resemblance between writing

devotional poetry and praying.' It is interesting to note

the close correspondence in style between the opening of

Vaughan's "To his Books" (quoted earlier in this chapter) * and Herbert's "Prayer I"i

Prayer the Churches banquet, Angels age, Gods breath in man returning to his birth, ThB soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage. The Christian plummet sounding heav'n and earthi Engine against th' Almightie, sinners tawre, Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear, The six-daies world transposing in an houre, A kinde of tune, which all things heare and fears Saftnesse, and peace and joy, and love, and blisse, Exalted manna, gladnesse of the best, Heaven in ordinarie, man well drest, The milkie way, the bird of Paradise, Church-bels beyond the starres heard, the souls bloud, The land of spicesi something understood,

Vaughan, like Herbert, employs a style of accumulated de­

fining metaphors. The stylistic resemblance between Vaughan's lines and Herbert's poem in addition to their mutual use of "milkie way," "man," "day," "soul," and

"heaven" conspire to suggest that Vaughan believed that

33 Louis L, Iflartz, The Paradise Mithint Studies in Vauohan. Traherne and Milton (New Haven» Yale University Press, 1964), p. 5. 62

reading and writing books in some ways resemble praying*

Vaughan wrote three poems--"Repentance," "Begging,* and

"PraiSB"~which embody the three functions of prayeri confession, petition, and thanksgiving*

Vaughan’s insertion of references to Christ's In­ carnation and Atonement and his addition of confessional

elements make his dedicatory poem longer than and dif­ ferent from Herbert's. Vaughan, unlike Herbert, who wrote only sacred verse, confesses the "sad failings" and "wilde / Murmurings" of his "sinful youth" and offers his sacred poetry as a gift to express his gratitude that

God had forgiven "ev'ry publish'd vanity" of his unre- generate years (lines 34-40)*

Confession, enabling man to release pent-up and guilt- filled thoughts and emotions merely by speaking or writing, is a purifying catharsis* John Donne by an expanded sim­ ile explains how he'strives to purge his grief temporarily so long as he keeps his verse to himselfi

Then as th*earths inward narrow crooked lanes Do purge sea waters fretfull salt away, I thought, if I could draw my paines. Through Rimes vexation, I should them allay, Griefe brought to numbers cannot be so fierce, for, he tames it, that fetters it in verse* ("The Triple foole," 6-11)

Donne strives to overcome grief by submitting it to the ordering controls of art* Purgation is achieved by de­ liberate self-control, channeling emotions into reason's 63 confinements. Like Donnef Vaughan knouts the value of catharsisi

Lord, then round me utith weeping Clouds, And let my mind In quick blasts sigh beneath those shrouds A spirit-wind, So shall that storme purge this Recluse Which sinfull ease made foul, And wind, and water to thy use Both wash, and wlno my soul. ("The'Storm," 17-24)

Unlike Donne, however, Vaughan seeks to achieve cathar­ sis not by submitting emotions to the rigid channels of art and reason but by uninhibitedly expressing his emo­ tions in an internalized storm. Vaughan depicts the in­ ternalized storm by modifying storm elements with human attributes, such as "weeping Clouds" and "spirit-wind," and giving to a human attribute a storm-like activityi his "mind" sighs in "quick blasts." By the operation of the closing chiasmal scheme, the stylistic equivalent to making the sign of the cross, Vaughan shows what the in­ ternal storm will accomplish— the wind, his sighs of con­ fession and contrition, and the water, his tears of re­ pentance, will cleanse and uplift his soul— and he reminds readers that the crucifixion makes this accomplishment possible.

Many of Vaughan's poems contain elements of petition and thanksgivingi

0 lead me, where I may be free In truth and Spirit to serve theel 64 Where undisturbed I may converse With thy great self, and there rehearse Thy gifts uiith thanks, and from thy store Who art all blessings, beg much morel ("The Bee.** 73-78)

And thanksgiving gives rise to praisei

Wherefore with my utmost strength I wil praise thee* And as thou giv'st line, and length, I wil raise thee[,] ("Praise," 9-12)

Vaughan's sacred poetry, like prayer, is a co-operation

of man with God.

Herbert and Vaughan see themselves as stringed in­ struments tuned by God. Herbert bids Godt

Yet take thy wayi for sure they way is besti Stretch or contract me, thy poore debteri This is but tuning of my breast, To make the musick better. ("The Temper I," 21-24)34

Vaughan echoes Herbert's thought but generalizes the ex­ perience, applying it to generic man rather than only to himself, Herbert's lines are a personal petition to Gad, but Vaughan's are a description of what God doesi

Thus doth God Key disorder'd man (which none else can,) Tuning his brest to rise, or fallf And by a sacred, needfull art Like strings, stretch ev'ry part Dlaking the whole most Nusicall. ("Affliction LI]," 36-41) * Herbert defines his verse as "that which while I usb / I am with thee [God]" ("The Quidditie," 11-12), and Vaughan

^ Cf. also Herbert's "Deniall," 21-30* and "Dooms­ day," 25-30. 66 similarly sees sacred verse-writing as a means of grouting

closer to Godi

It is true indeed, that to give up our thoughts to pious Themes and Contemplations (if it be done for pieties sake) is a great step towards oerfectioni because it will refine, and dispose to devotion and sanctity. And further, it will procure for us (so easily communicable is that loving spirit) some small orellbatlon of those heavenly refreshments. which descend but sel­ dom, ana then very sparingly, upon mBn of an ordinary or indifferent holyness [pp, 2 2 0 -2 2 1 3 *

By giving up one's thoughts and becoming an instrument

transmitting sacred verse to men, Vaughan sought to per­

fect a humble holiness,

A large number of lines and entire poems in Sllex

Scintillans serve as prayers and hymns of praise to God,

Writing such poems must have been for Vaughan, as for

Herbert, acts of worship. As men and as poetB, both saw

themselves as nature's high-priests, whose- duty it was to speak for nature, offering her praise to God, According

to Herbert!

Of all the creatures both in sea and land Onely to Man thou [God] hast made known thy wayes, And put the penne alone into his hand, And made him Secretarie of thy praiSB,

Beasts fain would aingt birds ditty to their notesf Trees would be tuning on their native lute To thy renowni but all their hands and throats Are brought to Man, while they are lame and mute,

Man is the worlds high Priests he doth present The sacrifice for allf while they below Unto the service mutter an assent. Such as springs use that fall, and windss that blow, ("Providence," 5-16) 66 Vaughan echoes Herbert's thought, but hints at man's re­ luctance to be nature's hlgh-priesti

Awak, awak! heark, how th* mood rings, UJinds whisper, and the busie sorlnos A Consort make* Auiake, awakel (flan is their high-priest, and should rise To offer up the sacrifice, ("CHRISTS Na­ tivity," 7-12)

The poet speaking as high-priest carries out a higher duty than merely relating to God his personal concerns,

Vaughan before his conversion wrote poems mainly to delight his readers. He wrote in the dedication of 01or

Iscanus that his desire was to please (p, 37), But after his conversion he wrote also to teach and move. He wanted his sacred poems to be as useful to his readers as they had been to him (p, 221),'

Were not thy word (dear Lord!) my light, How would I run to Bndless night, And persecuting thee and thine, Enact for Saints my self and mine. But now enlighten'd thus by thee, I dare not think such villanyi Nor for a temporal self-end Successful wickedness commend. For in this bright, instructing verse Thy Saints are not the Conquerorsi But patient, meek, and overcome Like thee, when set at naught and dumb. Armies thou hast in Heaven, which fight, And follow thee all cloath'd in white, But here on earth (though thou hast need) Thou wouldst no legions, but wouldst bleed. The sword wherewith thou dost command Is in thy mouth, not in thy hand, ("The Wen of Ular," 9-26)

As in the dedicatory poem, so here appears the subject of

Vaughan's persecuting Christ and His followers. Evidently 67

Vaughan believed that all of his pre-conversion verse*

"pois'nous ware" ("The Match," 12), which did not promote

Christianity, was therefore detrimental to Christianity,

equivalent to persecution of Christ and Christians,

John Donne prayed, "0 decline / Mee, uihen my com­ ment would make thy word mine” ("A Litanie," 79-00),

George Herbert prayed, "my Master • . . let me hold my peace, and doe thou speak thy selfe, for thou art Love, 35 and when thou teachest, all are Scholars," And, like them, Vaughan valued dumbness when one's words were spoken or written merely for selfish purposes. He crit­ icized unenlightened contemporary authors who wrote only for self-endst

Most modern books are blots on thee. Their doctrine chaff and windy fitss Darken*d along, as their scribes be, With those foul stormB, when they were writj While the mans zeal lays out and blends Onely self-worship and self-ends, ("The Agree­ ment," 25-30)

The doctrinal chaff and windy fits call to mind David's description of the ungodly, who are "like the chaff which the wind driveth away" (Psalm 1i4), and St. Paul's ad­ monition to the Ephesians, "be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine"

(Ephesians 4t14), Vaughan's lines are a criticism of the

35 "A Priest to the Temple or, The Country Parson," Works, ed, Hutchinson, p, 233, 68 religious polemics of his day, and his references to zeal and selfishness are probably directed against Puritan en­ thusiasm and individualism* >

In another context Vaughan cries out to Godi

Come, cornel Strike those lips dumbt This restles breath That soiles thy namB, Will ne'r be tame Untill in death* ("ComB, come * . *," 15-20)

He also confesses that "Profanenea on my tongue doth rest"

("Repentance," 75). He criticizes those uiho have "poy- son'd" God's Ulord by.interpreting it according to their ouin "Witt / And deprav'd tastes" ("The World [ll]," 03-

65), Because of this,

The truth, which once was plainly taught. With thorns and briars now is fraught* Some part is with bold FableB spotted, Some by strange Comment's wildly blottedi And discord (old Corruption's Crest,) With blood and blame hath stain'd thB rest* So Snow, which in its first descents A whiteness, like pure heav'n presents, When touch'd by Wan is quickly soil'd And after trodden down, and spoil'd* ("The Bee." 62=7?)

Repeatedly, Vaughan stresses that words are more powerful than swordst hence, there is greater danger in their abuse. The comparison of the power of words with that of swords probably is derived ultimately from the

Cf* Herbert's "Aaron," line 6* 69 37 Bible. Vaughan counselsi

If thou giv'st word9 Dash not thy friend, nor Heav'nt 0 smother A vip'rous thought! some Syllables are Swords. Unbitted tongues are in their penance double, They shams their owners, and the hearers trouble. ("Rules and Lessons,"60-72)

And he asks God to "strike them dumb* who for meer words /

Wound thy beloved* more then swords" ("L* Envoy," 41*42).

Just as Vaughan*s motives for writing poetry changed

• • because of his conversion— his poBm3 changing from being primarily diversions from the world around him to being mainly criticisms of the world and finally to being as* pecially expressions of his conversion from the ways of the world— so also Vaughan's conceptions about the audience for his poetry changed. His first volume, Poems, was ad* dressed to an audience of "Ingenious Lovers of POESIE," to those "alonB. whose more refined Spirits" out-winged "these dull Times, and soarefdl above the drudgerie of durtv In­ telligence" (p. 2). He wrote to a select group of readers, not to the vulgar crowd but to lovers of elevated thoughts.

His was the kind of poetry which Sir Francis Bacon had

37 In Psalm 57*4 David speaks of the tongue of his enemy as "a sharp sword." Hebrews 4*12 states that "the word of God is quick, and powerful and sharper than any twoedged sward," Revelation 1t16 states that out of the mouth of one like unto the Son of Man "went a sharp two- edged sword," and in Revelation 19«13—2*1 one allegorically named "the Word of God" is described as having within his mouth a sharp sword. 70 described as giving "some shadow of satisfaction to the mind of man in those points wherein the nature of things 38 doth deny it," Vaughan closed his introductory poem to

Olor Iscanua with the clauses "Satur Ille recedat / Qui sapit, & nos non Scriosimus Insipidis" ("Ad Po3teroa."

27-28), His attitude toward his audience is not unlike that conveyed by an old Orphic sayings "I shall speak to whom it is right to do sot shut your earat profane 39 ones," Vaughan's consciousness of writing for a select group of cognoscenti may have been influenced by his read­ ing some of his twin brother's works* Thomas Vaughan

* thought that the "best way to convince fools is to neglect thsm,"^ and he was selective about the audience for his esoteric workss "talking* babbling people . • * who run to Bvery doctor for his opinion and follow like a spaniel every bird they spring* are not fit to receive these se­ crets* They must be serious* silent men,"^

In the preface to his prose work The Mount of Olives or. Solitary Devotions (1652) Vaughan after his conversion

38 Bacon* Advancement of Learning. II* iv, pp. 96-97* 39 Eusebius* Praeoaratlo Evanoelica. Ill* 7, Patro- looiae Cursus Comoletus. Series Graeca* 21* ed. J. P* Migne (0aris, 1857)* pp. i79-180* In Latin* "Fas quibus est* narraboi fores claudunto profani*" Cf* Hugo Rahnsr* "The Christian Mystery and the Pagan Mysteries*" trans* Ralph Manheim* The Mysteries. Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks* 2 (New Yorki Pantheon Books* 1955)* p* 264*

40 "Anima Magica Abscondita" (1650)* Works, p. 118*

^ "Coelum Terras" (1650), Works, p, 232, addressed his work "TO THE Peaceful* humble* and piou9

READER" (p. 104) and intended it to be a practical help

to all men in their meditations* "It is for thy good.

and for his glory, mho in the daves of his flesh prayed here himselfe. and both taught and commanded us to pray.

that I. have published this, . , , And thus. Christian

Reader, do £ commend It to thy practise, and the benefit

thou shalt flnde thereby" (p. 104). Instead of writing

to Bxpress his own sickness* as he had done in Poems.

Vaughan intended that the precepts in his biography of

Paulinus would "perfectly cure" the "Atrophia" or spir­

itual sickness of its readers (p. 162). Vaughan in the

preface to the second edition of Sllex Scintillana ex­

presses his awareness of the contrary affects of reading

poetry that either corrupts or edifies the reader* Aware

of his awesome responsibility to write verse worthy of and helpful to many generations of readers* he begs his audience not to read the idle verses written during his pre-conversion years. He shares his sacred poetry with his readers* hoping to "turn many to righteousness" (p.

220) and praying that Christ will "make it as useful now in the publlck. as it hath been to me in private" (p.

221), Although after his conversion he no longer writes to delight an audience limited to "Ingenious lovers of

POESIE*" Vaughan does not condescend to write in order 72 to be easily understood by all of his readers. He intro­ duces a note of curiosity-arousing mysteryi "In the pe­ rusal of it fsilex Scintlllansl. you will (peradv/enture) observe some passages, whose history or reason may seem something remotet but were they brought nearer, and plain­ ly exposed to your view, (though that (perhaps) might quiet your curiosity) yet would it not conduce much to your greater advantage" (p. 221), The readers* advantage is all important! Vaughan doss not bend his verse down to them but tantalizingly raises it above their heads , en­ couraging their minds to stretch* to extend their under­ standing* to transcend the mundane world— and that truly is to their advantage*

Vaughan saw much that he felt was not to the advantage of readers when he surveyed much that was published in the mid-seventeenth century. He criticized thoBe who "have been so irreverendly bold, as to dash Scriptures, and the sacred

Relatives of God with their impious conceits" (p, 219),

Varying interpretations of Bible passages* especially among Non-conformists* sparked controversies feeding the fires of the Civil Ular, "Others," Vaughan said* "being corrupted (it may be) by that evil Genius, which came in with the publique distractions* have stuffed their books with Oathee. horrid Execrations, and a most gross and studied filthiness" (p. 219), He urged the Stationers' 73

Company to censor such harmful* polemical publications* claiming that "he that prints lewdness and impieties* is that mad man in the Proverbs, who casteth firebrands. arrows and death** (p, 220), He also urged that the "true remedy** for removal of harmful writings lies with the writers themselves* whom he encouraged to **exchange . , , vain and vitlous sub lects. for divine Themes and Celestial praise** (p, 220), Meanwhile, he counselled readBrai

And the great task to trv. then know the goods To discern weeds, and Judge of wholsome Food. Is a rare* scant performance! for Man dyes Oft e're #tis done, , , , ("To his 8ooksY"17-20)

And he asked God's help in his own attempts to censor temptations from appealing to his sensesi

Keep still my weak Eyes from the shine Of those gay things* which are not thine* And shut my Ears against the noise Of wicked* though applauded Jovs. For thou in any land hast storB Of shades and Coverts for thy poor* Where from the busle dust and heat* As well as storms* they may retreat, ("The Re- quesT*’r7-14)

Vaughan'8 words in the above two passages resemble

Milton's* but the two men do not share the same attitudes about censorship, Milton writes in his Areooaoiticai

Good and evil we know in the field of this world grow up together almost inseparably! and the knowledge of good is so involved and inter­ woven with the knowledge of evil* and in so many cunning resemblances hardly to be discerned* that those confused seeds which were imposed on Psyche as an incessant labor to cull out and sort asunder* were not more intermixed, • • , 74 He that can apprehend and consider vice with all her baits and seeming pleasures* and yet abstain* and yet distinguish* and yet prefer that which is truly better* he is the true warfaring Christian* I cannot praise a fugi­ tive and cloistered virtue* unexercised and unbreathed* that never sallies out and sees her adversary* but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to bB run for* not without dust and heat* * * * Since* therefore, the knowledge and sur­ vey of vice is in this world so necessary to the constituting of human virtue* and the scanning of error to the confirmation of truth* how can we more safely and with less danger scout into the regions of sin and falsity than by reading all manner of trac­ tates and hearing all manner of reason? And this is the benefit which may be had of books promi8cously read,42

Curiously* it is Vaughan the Anglican who defends cen­ sorship and Milton the Puritan who attacks it* Before the outbreak of the Civil Uar the Anglicans had a vested interest in maintaining the status quo* and therefore discouraged the expression of dissenting views* Richard

Hpoker* the Anglican mentor* had said that three words spoken in charity were better than three thousand vol­ umes written in sharp wit* and he had criticized those

A If who were "full of tongue and weak of brain." AnglicanB believed that sufficient truth had already been conveyed to m e m men* therefore* needed more to be reminded of

i n Milton, Araopaoltica. Complete Poems and Ma lor Prose* pp, 72B-729,

Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity. I (New Yorki E* P, Dutton & Sons, Ltd**. 19Q7J* pp* 94, 175, 75 such truth than to be distracted by competing claims from dissenters. They saw censorship as an imposed silence* suppressing opposition* In the words of John Donnei

Arguing is heretiques game* and Cxerciee As wrastlers, perfects themf Not liberties Of speech, but silencer hands, not tongues, end heresies* ("Metempsycho­ sis, " 118-120)

On the other hand, Milton, a dissenter, seeing censorship as oppression, favored a free press, believing that in an open and unhandicapped battle of ideas truth would tri­ umph* Censorship, he said, would be "primely to the dis­ couragement of all learning and the stop of truth, not only by disexercising and blunting our abilities in what we know already, but by hindering and corrupting the dis­ covery that might be yet further made both in religious and civil wisdom,"4*

Vaughan and Milton did agree, however, that censor­ ship of certain kinds of writing was necessary, Vaughan undoubtedly would have agreed with Milton that "scandal- AC ous, seditious, and libellous books" be suppressed, and that better alternatives be offered to counteract what

Milton called "the corruption and bane which they [es­ pecially youth and gentry^ suck in daily from the writings

44 Milton, Areooaoitlca. Complete Poems and Mafor Prose, p, 720, 45 Milton, Areopaoitica. Complete Poems and Ma lor Prose, p, 720, 76 and interludes of libidinous and ignorant poetasters, who, having scarce ever heard of that which is the con­ sistence of a true pOBtn, the choice of such persons as they ought to introduce, and what is moral and decent to each one, do for the most part lap up vicious principles in sweet pills to be swallowed down, and make the taste of virtuous documents harsh and sour*

Henry Vaughan tried to censor some of his own secu­ lar works* In the preface to the second edition of Sllex

Scintillans he confessed to have written idle words* He said that he had suppressed his "greatest follies" and claimed that "those which escaped [were]] * * * as in­ noxious, as most of that vein use to bef besides, they

[were] * * * interlined with many virtuous, and some pious mixtures*" Nevertheless, he begged "that none would read them" (p, 219). "Idle Verse” summarizes the kinds of verse Vaughan condemned after his conversioni

Go, go, queint folies, sugred sin, Shadow no more my doori I will no longer Cobwebs spin, I'm too much on the score.

For since amidst my youth, and night, Ply great preserver smiles, Uee'l make a Match, my only light, And Joyne against their wileBf

46 Plilton, The Reason of Church Government Urged Against Prelatv. II, Comolete Poems and Major Prose, p, 670, 77

Blind, dB3D*rats fits, that study houi To dresse, and trim our shame* That gild rank poyson, and allow Vice in a fairer namei

The Purles of youthfull bloud* and bowles, Lust in the Robes of Love* The idle talk of feav'rish souls Sick with a scarf* or glove)

Let it suffice my warmer days Simper'd and shin'd on you* Twist not my Cypresse with your Bays* Or Roses with my Yewghf

Go, go* seek out some greener thing* It snows* and freezeth here) Let Nightingales attend the spring* Winter is all my year*

Vaughan's poem contrasts his past and present, his youth 4 and age* his pre-conversion and post-conversion states*

He is eager to put hi9 past behind him* casting away in­ genious, foolish verse* the same kind of "sugred sin" that

Milton condemned for promoting "vicious principles in swBet A *7 pills*" Vaughan's request that 3uch verses no longer

"shadow" his door calls to mind Plato's allegory of the cave (The Republic. VII), shadows being those things which

WBre mistaken to be Reality* Ulhen Vaughan describes the verse of his past as cobwebs* he evokes the image of slight* temporary verse, the kind described by Bacon as thB product of a mind working only upon itself* that which is "admirable for the fineness of thread and work* but of

A*7 Milton, ThB Reason of Church Government Urged Against Prelatv. II, Complete Poems and Ma lor Prose« p* 670. 78 48 no substance or profit." Vaughan confesses that he is 49 "too much on the score" or indebted to God, his "great preserver," to offer Him only the products of his self- preoccupied and self-glorifying mind.

Vaughan links his youth with night, and looks toward a future time when he and his "great preserver" will "make a Match, my only light." "Match" is a complex wordf it can mean a "pair," or a "contest," or, associated with light, it can be a candle wick or a wick used to ignite a 50 candle. Vaughan titled one of his poems "The Match," in which he claims his indebtedness to George Herbert's "ever- living lines" (line 1)| "Match" may refer to Vaughan's desire to make his versB a counterpart to or a facsimile of Herbert's verse. The "Match," whatever it is (and it may well mean several or all of the suggested meanings) serves as light working against the darkness of his youth.

Lines 9 through 16 summarize the poetic efforts of his youth. Benighted, he produced "blind" verse, "dosp'rate

48 Bacon, Advancement of Learning. I, iv, p. 32. 49 fogle, p. 204n. 50 According to the Oxford English Dictionary. 6, p. 225, "match" was used to mean "the wick of a candle or lamp" from 1377 until at least 1646. "Match" as an "arti­ cle of domestic use, consisting of a piece of cord, cloth, paper, wood, etc., dipped in melted sulphur, so as to be readily ignited by the use of a tinder-box, and serving to light a candle or lamp, or to set fire to fuel" was referred to as early as 1589, Matches which did not need to comB in contact with fire in order to be lit are not referred to until 1831. 79 fits." hopeless attempts to harness bursts of fBaling or

thought, the kind of verse uthicht like Hilton's sweet

vicious pill* presented itself as adorned and decorated

shame, gold-encased poison and dignified vice. His youth­

ful verse comprised sounds of self-expressing passion'

lust disguised as lovet the "idle talk" of love-sickened*

"feav'rish souls,

ThB heat of youthful passion expended in idle verse

he wants to forget completely' not mixing youthful imagery

of "Roses" and "Bays" with the more solemn "Cypresse" and 52 "Yewgh," The exchange of imagery 1b extended in the

final stanza' where he urges idle verse to "seek out some

greener thingi" let triviality seek the transient. He re­

places youth's heat with old age's snowy coldness, tran­ sient greenness sprung from the earth with frozen white- i ness descended from the heavens* the nightingale's singing

in temporary spring with the silence of eternal winter. In short* he renounces the mutable world in exchange for un­

changing eternity, Vaughan's Poems comprises "fancies" (p, 2), But later in the Dior Iscanus volume Vaughan praises verse

inhere no Coorse trifles blot the page With matter borrow'd from the age*

51 Cf, Vaughan's criticism of the doting lover in "The World C 1!*" B-11* and George Herbert's "Love I," 13-14, 52 In his elegiac eclogue* "Daphnls." Henry Vaughan describes cypress as "sad" and yew as "gloomy*" line 128, BO

But thoughts as Innocent, and high A® Angels hava, or Saints that dye, ("To • , . Kirs, K. Phil­ ips." 11-141

In the Silex Sclntlllans volumes ha clearly favors sacred

rather than secular subjects. Echoing the thought of Her­

bert's sonnet beginning "my God, where is that ancient heat

, , , ," Vaughan askst

Sweete, sacred hillt on whose fair brow my Saviour sate, shall I allow Language to love And Idolize some shade, or grove, Neglecting thee? such ill-plac'd wit, Conceit, or call it what you please Is the braines fit, And meere diseaset ("mount of Olives [I]," • 1- 8)

He looks upon his pre-conversion verse as "polo'nous

ware" ("The match," 12) and "vanity" (dedication "To my •

• , Redeemer • • , ," 40) and urges the "wise exchange of

* vain and vltious subjects, for divine Themes and Celestial

oralse" (p. 220). Especially after his conversion, he

criticizes poetry that is polemical ("Ad Posteros." 25-26i

"The Agreement," 25-30i "The Ass," 24), lewd ("Rules and

Lessons," 74-75| p. 220), boastful ("The Ass," 27| "The

hidden Treasure," 5), selfish ("The Agreement," 30), idle

(pp, 153, 217, 218, "Idle Verse"), vicious (p. 218), cor­

rupt (p, 218), and impious (p. 219), And he condemns

legends and romances (p, 218) and expressions of weak, lean conceptions (p, 220), impure thoughts, scurrilous conceits and lascivious fictions (p, 218), All of these 81 kinds of poetry he considers bad because they substitute

unimportant things and vice for virtue. In their place

he urges serious and staid poetry (p, 139), poetry which

is virtuous and pious (p. 219), and poetry which gives

"nourishment or help to devotion" (p, 220).

As Vaughan's ideas about the content of verse changed,

so also did his stylistic aims change because of his con­

versions

01 *tis an easie thing To write and singt But to write true, unfeigned verse Is very hardl ("Anguish," 13-16)

Vaughan found that writing sacred poetry was more difficult than writing secular verse. Like Herbert, he sometimes

despaired of the inadequacies of his poetry* Herbert la­ mented i

Verses, ye are too fine a thing',' too wise For my rough sorrowsi cease, be dumbe and mute, Give up your feet and running to mine eyes, And keep your measures for some lovers lute, Ulhose grief allows him musick and a rymei For mine excludes both measure, tune, and time* ("Grief," 13-10)

But Vaughan sees Inadequacies in his poetry not because the verse is too "fine" and "wise" for the content but because the content is too Important for the "jugling sounds" and

"forc'd accents" of versei

Be dumb course measures, jar no morei to me There is no discord, but your harmony* False, jugling soundsi a grone well Brest, where care moves in disguise, and sighs afflict the airi 82 Sorrows in white, griefs tun'd* m sugerd Oosis Of Wormwood, and a Deaths-head crouin'd with Roses, He weighs not your forc'd accents, utho can have A lesson plaid him by a winde or wave. ("Joy,” 1-8)

Herbert sees his poetry's function better performed by sub­ stituting for his words the action of his eyes* Vaughan, despairing of the possibilities of both his words and action, sees the wind and waves as more capable of per- 53 forming what his poetry set out to do. But both Herbert and Vaughan agree in desiring their verse to be dumb or silent and, ironically, continuing to complete the poem after so saying. Both agree that the verse or style of a poem can distort the subject-matter. For example, ac­ cording to Vaughan, when coarse measures are harmonious, i.e., when vulgar subject-matter is dressed in harmonious verse, the result is discordf form and content do not agree, and when this is so, he urges form to bow to con­ tent* when the content is vicious, it is thus unmaskBd for what it is. He criticizes the falseness of verse which seeks to disguise the vicious by dressing up a groan, disguising a care, tuning griefs, dressing sorrows in white instead of black, disguising wormwood as a sugar- coated pill, and crowning a skull with roses. This use of outward form to disguise inward content is the same thing

Vaughan deplored in "Idle Verse,"

53 Cf. "for the singing of birds is naturalis muslca mundi, to which all arted strains are but discord and hardnessa" in Vaughan's "Wan in Darkness," p. 142. 83 Sim ilarly, in his translation of Juvenal's "tenth

Satyre" Vaughan expressed a criticism of eloquence, which

is all too often used to deceivet

An oilie tongue with fatall, cunning sence, And that sad vertue ever, Eloquence, Are th* others ruinet (11, 17-19)

Instead of ornamentation—

Ulhy then these curl'd, puff'd points, Or a laced story? Death sets all out- of Joint And scornes their gloryj ("Content," 17-20)—

Vaughan preferred "plain., modest truth,” "simplicity,"

and "mild, chast language” ("Isaacs Marriage," 33, 37,

41).

He also preferred the matching as closely as pas­ sible of style and content. Thus, like Boethius, whom he

translated, he found a "broken stile" of "slow sad num­ bers" most aptly expressive of grieft "And only tears

give weight unto my words” ("Boat. Lib. I, fflBtrum I," \ 55 2-4), He valued sincere integrity by which one's words

The original followsi " • . , torrens dicendi copia multis / et sua mortifera est facundia • • • ” (lines 9-10), Juvenal, "SATVRA X," Juvenal and Perslus (New York* G, P, Putnam's Sons, 1918), p, 192, 55 The original followsi CARMINA qui quondam studio florente peregi, Flebilis heu maestos cogor inire modos, Ecce mihi lacerae dictant scribenda camenae Ut ueris elegi fletibus ora rigant, (11. 1-4) Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy. I, i. The The­ ological Tractates . . . and The Consolation of Philo­ sophy (New York* G, P, Putnam's Sons, 1918), p. 128, B4 match his thoughts and deedsi one's

• • • acts, utords and pretence Have all one sense, One aim and end ("Righteous­ ness, " 19-21) i

and one*8 verse matches his life* He admired Herbert not

only for his verse but also for his holy life (p, 220),

It utas Herbert who said, "The fineness which a hymne or

psalme affords, / i s , whBn the soul unto the lines ac­

cords" ("A True Hymn," 9-10), And Milton stated, "he who would not be frustrate of his hope to write well here­ after in laudable things, ought himself to be a true poem, that is, a composition and pattern of the best and honour- ablest things— not presuming to sing high praises of hero­ ic men or famous cities, unless he have in himself the ex- 56 perience and practice of all that which is praiseworthy,"

When Vaughan apologized for his pre-conversion verse, he at the same time apologized for himself, for he understood that the poet is a part of the poetry. The kind of poetry he wrote was dictated by the man he was. Criticizing those who, not having a "true practick piety" (p, 220), tried to

Milton, Apology for Smectvmnuus (1642?), Complete Poems and Ma lor Prose, p, 694, Cf, Ben Jonson's asser­ tion of "the impossibility of any mans being the good Poet, without first being a good Man." "The Epistle," Vol- pone. in Literary Criticism of Seventeenth-Century England, ed, Edward Ul, Taylor (New Yorks Alfred A, Knopf, 1967), p, 79, I am indebted to James D, Simmonds, Masques of God» Form and Theme in the PoBtrv of Henry Vaughan (Pittsburohi University of Pittsburgh Press, 1972), pp, 32-33, for sug­ gesting this quotation from Jonson, 85 uirite devotional verse, he said that "it was impossible they should effect those things abroad, which they never had acquaintance with at home" (p. 220),

Beyond matching style with content and art with life, a poet must, by submitting himself entirely to God, become one with God before his devotional verse can reach true holiness. Thus Vaughan prayed for God-given integ­ rity*

0 that I were all Soul! that thou Wouldst make each part Of this poor, sinfull frame pure heartl Then would I drown Oly single one, And to thy praise A Consort raise Of Halleluiahs here below. ("Chearful- ness," 17-24)

And he prayed to God that Christ,

Who died to stake His life for mine, tune to thy will my heart, my verse. ("Disorder and frailty," 58- 60)57

And he resolved*

To thBe therefore my ThouQhts« Words. Actions 1 do resign, Thy will in all be done, not mine. ("The match," 25-27)

It is only after one truly gives up his "thoughts to pious

Themoa and Contemplations" that he reaches the perfection of being one with God (p. 220).

Cf, Herbert's. "Easter," 13-18. 86 In this state of perfection one recognizes the In­

adequacies of verse to match Reality and of words to de­

scribe or define the Ulordi

But since of all, all may be said, And likellnes doth but upbraid, And mock the Truth, which still is lost In fine Conceits, like streams in a sharp frosti I will not strive . . . to speak.

Speaking or writing about Truth or about any experience

distorts it, freezing it into artifact. Some poets surely must endure a terrible tension in deciding whether their

communication of experience by way of art is more worth­ while than letting the experience continue unshared but

pure in its ineffability. Ironically, after saying that

he "will not strive . . . to speak," Vaughan continues the

poem for seventy-five more lines, and he employs a simile

in his condemnation of similes and conceits.

Vaughan cites the example of one who gave up writing

lest he hurt any of his readers and reading lest ho in­

crease God's condemnation upon those who had written harm­

ful words. Giving up words and thoughts, the man finally

gave up life itself, having realized the occasions for CO sinfulness it presented. In silent death, his body thus

CD Cf. Owen felltham, Resolves. Oiviner.T Moral and Political fSTC. 1623?] (Londont Pickering, 4840), p. 2261 "I will write none, lest I augment his mulct that is gone before met neither write nor read, lBSt I prove a foe to mysBlf, A lame hand is better than a lewd pent while I live, I sin too muchi let me not continue longer in wicked­ ness than life." I am indebted to fogle, p. 257n, for 87 freed from sin, he could achieve the perfection of one- nese with God (p, 216),

But this is an ideal too extreme for most people,

Vaughan SBts forth a more viable alternative! instead of advocating the annihilation of one's words, thoughts, and life, he recommends an exchangei

0 that I had deep Cut in my hard heart Each line in thee [Holy Scriptures]! Then would I plead in groans Of my Lords penning, and by sweetest Art Return upon himself the Law, and Stones. Read here, my faults are thine. This Book, and I Will tell thes soi Sweet Saviour thou didst dvel (H. Scrip­ tures ,H 9-14)

Vaughan, having given up himself to be written on by God, begs to have his hard heart engraved by God's Word, This too is a death, a death to all that hinders Life in its

fullest, a death which permits one to remain in the world yet not be of the world (cf, John 17i13-21), It is the death whereby one exchanges his old nature for a new one

(cf, Romans 6 i3-11), or, as Vaughan puts it, "Itioriendo, revix!" ("Authorls fde sal Emblema." 15), With God's

Word written on his hard heart, not only the Law, which condemns him, but also the Gospel of Christ, who has re­ deemed him, Vaughan can say that his faults are no longer his, Christ by His sacrificial death on the cross, a

pointing out the resemblance between felltham's and Vaughan's words. B8

"Death that to me was life and light" (dedication "To my

• • • Redeemer • • • *" 2), took upon Himself Vaughan's faults, exchanging them for Vaughan's Atonement with Cod,

With God's Ulord thus engraved on his heart and Vaughan at one with God, the old Vaughan is silent and the renewed

Vaughan aims at the perfsction of conveying words that are not so much his as God's, This is what Vaughan means when he says that "he that desires to excel in • • , holy writing, must strive (by all means) for perfection and true holvnass. that a door may be opened to him In heaven.

Rev, 4, 1, and than he will be able to write • , , A true

Hymn" (p. 221), Chapter Tuioi Silences of God and Nature in Vaughan's Poetry

Ulhen one perceives thB silence of God, he can makB one of several Inferences, The silence indicates that there is no Godj God is dead. The silence is one of God's attri­ butes, The silence indicates that God has nothing to say to man or does not speak to man. The silence indicates

God's refusal to speak to man, God by or through His si­ lence is speaking to man, (Han is incapable of hearing

God's speech. (Han is incapable of comprehending that God by or through His silence is speaking to him,

John Donne and George Herbert believed that God speaks to man. But nowhere in his Divine Poems does Donne pre­ sent God verbally speaking to man, and rarely in his poems 1 does he present God speaking to man by non-verbal means.

If one considers prayer as the God-in-man addressing God, then Donne presents God speaking by "voice and word," but speaking only to Himselfi

^ In "La Corona" Donne mentions that Christ the Word "speakes wonders • • * / Bji miracles exceeding power of man" (lines 48, 56), In the "Holy Sonnet" beginning ''Bat­ ter my heart • • •" Donne mentions that God knocks, breathes, shines, and seeks to mend, but Donne pleads for mors violent communication. In "A Litanie" he recognizes that God speaks both through the Scriptures and through creatures (11, 215-216), 89 90

Hearc us, for till thou hears us, Lord Wo know not what to say. Thine eare to'our sighes, toares, thoughts gives voice and ward, 0 Thou who Satan heard'st in Jobs sicke day, Hoaro thy selfe now, for thou in us dost pray, (MA Litanie," 203-207)

In the language of Petrarchan love sonnets, Donne pre­ sents God as evoking much the same response as the court­ ly lady, who is aloof, silent, and fear-inspiringi

As humorous is my contritione As my prophane Love, and as soone forgotti. As ridlingly distemperd, cold and hott, As praying, as mute} as infinite, as none, 1 durst not view heaven yesterday} and to day In prayers, and flattering speaches I court Godx To morroui'I quake with true feare of his rod, ('■Holy Sonnetx *0h, to vex me , . . ,'" 5-11)

According to Margaret M. Blanchard, "Donne's religious poetry reflects .most often a dialectic within himself rather than a dialogue with Divinity— not necessarily because he does not bBlieve that his God can speak to him, but because he dOBS not trust that he is close o enough to hear," To Donne, God's apparent silence in­ dicates Donne's and indeed man's shortcomings and in- 3 adequacies, most notably his inability to hear,

Donne's God may have evoked intense feelings, but He did not afford thB relationship of friendly intimacy which

2 "The Leap into Darknessx Donne, Herbert, and God," Renascence. 17 (1964), 39, 3 See "Upon the translation of the Psalmes , . , ," line* 24r "Heaven, hath a song, but no man heares," 91 Herbert enjoyed uiith hie God. Like Donne* Herbert had conflicts and religious doubts* but* unlike Donne's* they were checked and allayed by God's concise verbal admoni­ tions and reassurances.^ If Donne was concerned by his inability to hear God* Herbert was dismayed by God's oc­ casional apparent deafness or refusal to hear him*

Lord hearel Shall he that made the eare. Not hears? C"Longing*" ------35-36)

When my devotions could not pierce Thy silent earesr Then was my heart broken* as was my verse* ("Denial*" 1-3)

The phrase "silent eares" effectively compresses in two words the fact that Gad's apparent deafness is detected by His not responding to Herbert's pleas. Just as Donne realized that his inability to hear was responsible for his not hearing God* so Herbert realized that he was the cause of God's apparent deafness*

I Know it is my sinne* which locks thine eares* And binds thy hands* Out-crying my requests* drowning my tearesi Or else the chilnesse of my faint demands. ("Church-Lock and Key," 1-4)

According to Donne and Herbert, it is man's sin which in­ terferes with full communication between man and God.

Herbert writes, however* that if man is penitent* God will

^ Poem3 by Herbert in which God verbally speaks in­ clude "Evensong," "Dialogue," "The method," "Artillerie," "The Collar," and "The Pulley," 92 5 restore communication, Helen Ct White summarizes Her­ bert's view of Godi

The wrath of God, the justice of God, the will of God, the order of God, the power of God, these mainsprings of seventeenth-century re­ ligion are to be found in Herbert as in all his contemporaries. But, also, playing an active part in the inspiration of thought, awakening the imagination and kindling feeling, ere to be found the wonder of God, the closeness of God, the pity of God, the tenderness of God, all those gentler manifestations of divinity that implement the love of God, • • , Herbert sees the essence of Gad's providence in His in­ dwelling in the world he [sic] has made, • , , The most distinctive thing about Herbert's God . • • is hia [sic] yearning for man,6

Vaughan's God is not as personal as the God of Oonne or Herbert, According to White, Vaughan's God is morB a

"Divine Providence , , . the light and life of the uni­ verse, , , , [opposing] the darkness and Illusion of the world of man's perception and consciousness." In the words of Elizabeth Holmes, "Vaughan is less sharply aware of his spiritual states than Herbert, or Donne. , • . He does not suffer the terror of alienation as they do, nor in quite such an intimate and personal manner the joy of

♦ redemption, , , • His religious experiences do not appear

c Poema by Herbert which indicate God's hearing man include "Prayer II," "The method," "Praise II," "The Bag," and "Praise III,"

** The metaphysical Poetsi A Study in Religious Ex­ perience Inbw Vorki macrnillan Company, 1936* rpt. New Yorki Collier Books, 1962), pp, 169-170,

7 WhitB, p, 277, 93 g as acutely-defined problems or conflicts." Vaughan is not distressed by God's apparent silence or deafness.

Instead^ he wonders why God is silentf he accepts God's silence, and he understands that God can communicate through His silence. In "Religion" Vaughan expresses his wonder at God's silence and speculates that God no longer communicates directly with man but rules by the appeals mads by Christ* the mediator!

Nay thou thy selfe, my Godt in flrev « Whirle-wlnds. and Clouds, and the soft voice Speak'st there £to men in the Old Testament! so much* that I admire Ule have no Conf'rence in these daiesi

Is the truce broke? or 'cause wb have A mediatour now with thee, Doeat thou therefore old Treaties wave And by appeales from him decree? (11. 17-24)

In "The Night" Vaughan claims that it is in silence that God especially communicates with m a m

Dear nightl this worlds defeat! The stop to busie foolest cares check and curbi

0 Henrv Vauohan and the Hermetic Philoaoohv (Oxford! Basil Blackwell, 1932),'pp. 51-52,

9 French Fogle, ed,, The Complete Poetry ££ Henrv Vauohan (Garden City, New Yorki Doubleday and Company, 1964i rpt. New York! W. Ul, Norton & Company, Inc., 1969), p. 149n, gives the sources of Biblical allusions in "Re­ ligion," 11. 17-18i "Vaughan compresses a number of pas­ sages which tell of God's speaking from fire (Exod. 3,2-6i Lev. 9.24| Deut, 4.12| 5.4), from cloud (Exod. 24.16| Num. 11.25), from fire and cloud (Deut. 5.22), in a still small voice (I Kings 19.12), and out of the whirlwind (Job 3B.1t 40.6)," 94

The day of Spirits % my souls calm retreat Which none disturbl Christs progress, and his prayer timet The hours to which high Heaven doth chime,

Gods silent, searching flightt When my Lords head is fill'd with dew, and all His locks are wet with the clear drops of nightf His still, soft callt His knocking timet The souls dumb watch, When Spirits their fair kinrBd catch.

Ware all my loud, evil days Calm and unhaunted as is thy dark TBnt, Whose peace but by some Anoels wing or voice Is seldom rentt Then I in Heaven all the long year Would keep, and never wander here, (11, 25-42)

This passage, like the opening of "Tg his Books** and like

George Herbert's "Prayer I" (both quoted in chapter one), is developed by means of accumulated defining metaphors, which F. E, Hutchinson characterizes as a feature of Welsh poetry called "dvfalu. the piling up of comparisons, some­ times fanciful and even riddling, but all intended to pre- 10 sent the object with greater effectiveness," After de­ scribing night by a series of comparisons, Vaughan pro­ ceeds to establish a set of contrasts between night, which is "Calm and unhaunted," and day, which iB "loud" and

"evil," Daytime, when the noisy world presses its busy cares and bustling activities upon man, affords no time to thB needs of the soul. In contrast, night, paradoxically the "day of Spirits," is when in silence God can

Henrv Vauohan* A Life and InInterpretation (Oxford* At the Clarendon Press, T947J, p, 163 95 communicate uulth man. Vaughan in his translation of

Nieremberg's "Of Life and Death" addedi "Paracelsus writes, that thB watching of the body is the sleep of the soul* and that the day was made for Corporeal Ac- 11 tions, but the night is the working-time of Spirits."

According to William H. Halewood, "Vaughan's almost com­ pulsively repeated image of reconciliation between God 12 and man is * , . silence, often preceded by noise."

In the daytime the noises of the world drown God's "still.

8 oft call." but at night man is receptive. Vaughan adds references to Mark 1i35 and Luke 21(37 to substantiate that "Christs progress" was in times when He was alone before the break of day. So also does man progress spir­ itually when in silence he becomes receptive to God's

"still, soft call." The quiet communion between God and man works only by their co-operation! God. In "silent, searching flight." must approach man. and man. durably watching, must be receptive to God's advances.

That God can speak silently Vaughan conveys in the

Latin clause, "me / Consultum volult Vox, sinB voce. freouens" ("Authoris, fde sel Emblema." 1-2), French

11 The Works of Henrv Vauohan. ed, L. C. Martin, 2nd ed. (Oxfordi At thB Clarendon Press, 1957), pp. 305, 722. 12 The Poetry of Gracei Reformation Themes and Structures in English Seventeenth-Century Poetry (New Haveni Yale University Press, 1970J, p. 126. 96

Fogle translates it* "Your speechless voice has tried 1 3 unceasingly to bring me to my senses." But Vaughan confesses, "Surdus eram, mutusofu b ~}" (line 5), So God chose to speak in other silent ways, acting to attack and shatter Vaughan's stony heart. It is by breaking Vaughan's heart that God breaks through to Vaughan, giving him new • life.

Gerald Bullett affirms that the "life of religion is * not in words, nor yet in ideas as such} it is when words are.done with and disputation ended that the spirit flow- 1 A ers into grace,n According to max Picard, "mystery is always separated from man by a layer of silence, . . .

[It] is in silence that the first meeting between man and 15 the mystery of God is accomplished." Vaughan expresses his first meeting with God in "mount of Olives [il]" not by means of oral-aural imagery but by imagery of seeing, feeling, tasting, and smelling*

When first I saw true bBauty, and thy Joys Active as light, and calm without all noise Shin'd on my soul, I felt through all my powr's Such a rich air of sweets, as Evening showrs Fand by a gentle gale Convey and breath On some parch'd bank, crown'd with a flowrie wreath} Odors, and myrrh, and balm in one rich floud O'r-ran my heart, and spirited my bloud,

13 Fogle, p. 137.

^ The English mystics (London* michael Joseph, 1950), p. 37, 15 The World of Silence, trans. Stanley Godman (Chi­ cago* Henry Regnery Company, 1952), p. 229, 97

My thoughts did swim in Comforts, and mine cie Confest, The world did only paint and lie. "TTinos 1-11)

Vaughan's experience of the beauty and joys of God is here expressed in a rush of simile and metaphors, a confusion.of syntax, and a touch of synthesis. An ex­ perience which transcends ordinary sense perception must bB described in terms of sense perceptions in order to be communicated to ordinary man. ThB Joys are active as light is active. (Vaughan's feeling such air as showers convey and breathe is not a simile because the "as" clause

describes what kind of air it is rather than comparing the air to something else.) The metaphors are more complicated than the simile because it is difficult to tell which im­ plied comparisons are literal and which are figurative.

Because joys are morB often experienced rathBr than seen shining on one's soul, "Joys . , . Shin'd" is a metaphor.

The "rich air of sweets" is a synesthetic metaphor, which attributes to air the imagery of taste, A bank crowned with a wreath is a personifying metaphor* Showers breath­ ing? odors, myrrh, and balm over-running a hBart; and thoughts swimming are animating metaphors. The eye con­

fessing is an example of synesthesia.

The syntax is complex and rather confusing, especially

in the first three lines, The main clause kernel is "I ,

. . felt , . . air," It is modified by two adverbial

clause kernels: "When . , . I saw , • • beauty" and "[when] Joys •' • « Shin'd," The direct object of the main

clause is modified by the adjective clause kernel "Such •

. as , , , showres • • , Convey and breath[e],n But it

is easy to be confused as one first reads these lines. One

is apt to trip over the syntax. One wonders whose joys are

"thy" joys? Does "thy" refer to the title» "mount of

Olives"? Is "mount of Olives" then an implied apostro­

phe? Or does "thy" refer to God, the assumed giver of the

joys and audience for the poBm? One is tempted to read

"Joys" as a direct object co-ordinate with "beauty" rather

than as the subject of another adverbial clause introduced

by an understood "when," One wonders whether "calm" is a

noun co-ordinate with "Joys" as compound subjects of the verb "Shin'd," or whether "calm," like "Active," is an adjective modifying "Joys," Commas before conjunctions are not necessarily clues that the "and" connects co­ ordinate clauses (see line ?)• Before one reaches the clue rhyme-word "wreath," he may wonder if "breath" is to be taken as a noun parallel with "showres" rather than as a verb parallel with "Convey," The eight "ands" in these eleven lines convey the copiousness of Vaughan's experi­ ence. Ulhen all aspects of an experience vie for equal attention or when one is too. deeply overwhelmed by an ex­ perience to separate the important from the less impor- tant,the aptest way to relate the parts is by co-ordina­ tion. The metaphors, syntactical complexity, and synes­ thesia effectively present Vaughan's experience in its fullness, an experience which challenges conventional ways of saying things. The personifying and animating metaphors show that the experience is dynamic. Vaughan is not just passively witnessing a static landscape.

His senses of sight, touch, taste, and smell are active­ ly participating in the experience, insofar as we can extrapolate the original experience from the poem telling about it. Conspicuously, the only sense not stimulated is the sense of hearing. The syntactical complexity serves to blur relationships (is "calm" a noun or adjec­ tive?), especially the subject-object relationship (is

"Joys" a subject- or pbject?), just as in a mystical ex­ perience the subject and object merge, and conventional distinctions dissolve. According to Paul Tillich, "God is not a person who speaks to himself and to his crea­ tures in words which grasp an object and reveal a subject.

But God manifests himself in ecstatic experiences, and those who have these experiences express them in words which point to the divine self-manifestation. , . • The ground of our being is not silent, but he does not speak 16 the language of finite beings," As in the syntax the

1 6 "The Word of God," in Lanouaaei An Enquiry into its Meaning and Function, ed, Ruth Nanda Anshen (New York* Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1957), p. 123, 100 subject and object distinction is blurred* so by the ex­ amples of synesthesia the functions of the senses are con­ fused (air can be felt or smelled* but it is not ordinarily tasted* nor do eyes ordinarily confess things), nan's or­ dinary descriptions of ways of. experiencing things cannot fully account for the suprasensation of an ecstatic* mys­ tical experience, Vaughan uses unusual means to describe an unusual experience* how he uses words is as important as what words he chooses* the means are essential to the meaning.

Philo* the father, of allegorical interpretation* used synesthesia to help explain the language of Godt

"while the Human voice is made to be heard, the voice of

God is made to be s e e m what God says consists of acts* 17 not of words." Thus nature can be seen as the language of God* God* though silent* is eloquent. John Donne's exegesis of the first verses of Psalm 19 tells how God speaks not to men's ears but to their eyes through His worksi

GOD multiplies his mercies to us* in his divers ways of speaking to us, Coeli enarrant. says David. The heavens declare the glorv of God* and not onely by showing* but by saving* there is a language in the heavens* for it enarrant. a verbal declaration* and* as it foilowes 111- erally* Day unto dav uttereth speech. This is the true harmony of the Spheara* which every

17 De Decern Orac.. XX* quoted in Ulilliam Ralph Xnge* Christian Mysticism. Bampton Lectures* delivered at Ox­ ford* 1B99 (Methuen & Company* Ltd,* 1899* rpt. New Yorks Meridian Books* 1956), p. 254. 101

man may heare. Though he understand no tongue but his owns, he may heare God in the motions of thB same, in the seasons of the years, in the vicissitudes and revolutions of Church and State, in the voice of Thunder, and lightnings, and other declarations of his pouter. , , , When the holy Ghost fell upon the waters, in the Creation, God spoke so, in his language of Workes, as that all men may understand them. For, in this language, the language of workes. the Eve is the eare. seeing Is hearlno.'tb

The idea that God speaks through nature to man's eyes is re-expressed throughout the seventeenth century. Ralph

Austin in his Treatise of Fruit-Trees . . . TooeathBr with

The Spiritual Use of an Orchard, published in 1653, pref­ aced his book with some thoughts about thB Book of Nature*

The World is a great Library, and Fruit trees arB some of the Bookes wherein we may read & see plainly the Attributes of God his Power. Wisdom. Goodnesse, &c. and be Instructed and taught our duty towards him in many things even from fruit-trees. . . . We must be con­ tent to stoope to their way and manner of teach­ ing, as the Egyptians and others in former times, who were instructed by Characters and Hvero- olvphlaue3. by something represented to the eye. Notions were conveyed to the understanding [sicj.

"Sermon XXXIX, Preached at St, Pauls," PonnB's Sermons, ed. Logan Pearsall Smith (Oxford! At the Claren­ don Press, 1919), pp. 142-143, 255, Cf. Thomas Traherne's similar synesthetic expression of eyes as hearersi No ear, But Ey3 them selves were all the Hearers there [in a silent fort]. And evry Stone, and Evry Star a Tongue, And evry Gale of Wind a Curious Song. The Heavens were an Orakle, and spake Divinityi The Earth did undertake The office of a Priest) (11. 59-65) "Dumnesse," Thomas Trahernei Poems. Centuries and Three Thanksgivings. Bd, Anne Ridler (New Yorki Oxford Univer- sity Press, 1966), p. 24. 102 Dumb Creatures speake virtually and con­ vincingly. to the mvnde and Conscience.T9

Henry Vaughan's tuiln brother Thomas said, "To speak then

t of God without Nature is more than we can do, for we have not known Him sot and to speak of Nature without God is more than we may do, for we should rob God of His glory and attribute those effects to Nature which belong prop­ erly to God and to the Spirit of God, which works in

Nature,"^0

Philo mentions God's speaking through His acts,

Donne mentions God's speaking through thB "language of workes." Austin says that God speaks through the world and through creatures, and Thomas Vaughan states that by

Nature God is revealed. Clearly, by Henry Vaughan's time, it was well established that God not only revealed Him­ self through the Scriptures but also continues to reveal

Himself through Hie creation. Nature for Henry Vaughan meant the macrocosm, all which God created that was non­ human. Nature thus included the cosmos as well as flora, fauna, and inanimate elements such as earth, air, fire,

19 A Treatise of Fruit-Trees . . . Tooeather with The Spiritual Use of an*Orchard {1653). Part 2, sig. L*3rjf.i quoted in Maren-Jjofie Rpstvig, The Hapov Want Studies in the metamorphosis of a Classical Ideal 1600- 1700 (Oxford* Basil Blackwell, T954)',' pp. 183, 462,

"Euphrates, Or the Waters of the East" (1655), The Works of Thomas Vauohani Euoenlus Philalethes. ed. Arthur Edward Waite (London* Theosophical Publishing House, 1919), p. 395. 103 and iuater( Separata from nature uiaa fallen man, the microcosm* and his utorld of business and artifice*

It is interesting to note that while George Herbert ' saw Scripture's verses as constellations ("The H, Scrip­ tures II*" 4), Vaughan saw a constellation as revelation*

Herbert disparaged natural revelation* saying that "Starres are poors books, & oftentimes do misse" ("The H, Scrip­ tures II*" 13), but Vaughan had faith in God's revelation via the starst

for where desire, calestiall* pure desire Hath taken root, and grow3, and doth not tire* There God a Commerce states, and sheds His Secret on their heads* ("The Starre," . 25-28)

According to legend, Abraham was converted as a result of meditating on the movements of heavenly bodies (cf* "Re­ tirement." 3-12),^ Plato stated in the Timaeus that

"God invented and gave us sight to the end that we might behold the courses of intelligence in the heaven* and apply them to the courses of our own intelligence which are akin to them* the unperturbed to the perturbedi and that we* learning them and partaking of the natural truth of reason, might imitate the absolutely unerring courses of God and regulate our own vagaries." Vaughan was more

21 Joseph R. Jones, "From Abraham to Andrenio* Ob­ servations on the Evolution of the Abraham Legend, Its Diffusion in Spain, and Its Relation to the Theme of the Self-tauaht Philosopher." Comparative Literature Studies. 6 (1969), 69-72. ' 104 influenced by Platonism and by the Latitudinarian move­

ment's emphasis on natural revelation than George Herbert

was.

Vaughan was also more apt to see nature as the lan­

guage of God. Like his twin brother Thomas, who said that

nature was "the Voice of God, not a mere sound or command

but a substantial, active breath, proceeding from the Cre- 22 ator and penetrating all things," Henry Vaughan viewed

nature as God spoke through it to his eyes and influenced his heart and soul. To one who understands God's language aright, God, though silent, is eloquent.

Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, Nicholas of Cusa, and St* John of the Cross believed that man could approach

God by the via negative, by way of denying the senses and all that the senses perceive, and the intellect and all

that it conceives. Any description of God had to be in negative terms, indicative of that which was non-humani

God was infinite, incomprehensible, and ultimately in­

effable, because to employ man-made words to describe what

is wholly other than man would be at best meaningless and at worst an attempt to reduce God to man's terms. Vaughan,

on the other hand, affirmed the via oositiva as a way to approach God. He believed that because God had created

the universe and because He had sent His Son into the world,

22 Thomas Vaughan, "Anima tflagica Abscondita," Works. p. 84. 105 putting on flesh, enclosing "heav'n in a shell" ("The

Incarnation, and Passion," 12), the universe, man's uiorld, and the flesh, although corrupted by the Pall, 23 utere not absolutely despicable, Vaughan viewed nature as a means used by God to direct man's attention to Hi m , ^

Nature is not God and God is not nature, but God, "Who art in all things,’ though invisibly" ("I walkt the other day , , , ," 54), speaks through nature.

In language similar to that used by George Herbert when in "Sin I" (11, 7-0) he listed means which dis­ tracted him from sin ("Fine nBts and stratagems to catch us in, / Bibles laid open, millions of surprises") Vaughan explains how God uses natural revelation»

Sure, mighty love foreseeing the discent Of this poor CreaturB, by a Gracious art Hid in these low things snares to gain his heart, And layd surprizes in each Clement

All things here shew him heaveni Waters that fa ll ChidB, and fly upi Wists of corruptest „fomB

23 According to Thomas Vaughan, God, although the world is corrupt, can be approached by a study of His creaturesi "For in them lies His secret path, which though it be shut up with thorns and briars, with out­ ward worldly corruptions, ybt if we would take pains to remove this luggage we might enter the terrestrial para­ dise, that Encompassed Garden of Solomon, where God de­ scends to walk and drink of thB Sealed Fountain," "Anima Nagica Abscondita," Works, p, 05, A i According to Karl Barth, "[were] Gad to speak to us in a non-worlaly way, He would not speak to us at all," The Ooctrine of the Word of God. Prolegomena to Church Dogmatics, I, pt, 1. trans, G, T, Thomson (Edinburgh! T. & T. Clark, 1936), p. 192, 106

Quit their first beds & mount* trees, herbs, flouires, all Strive upwards stil, and point him the way home, ("ThB Tem­ pest," 21-28)

Just as Christ in His parables used earthly stories to convey heavenly meanings to a wide audience, so also God, paradoxically, uses low things to reveal heavenly truths.

This is indeed a metaphysical yoking of heterogeneous ideas.

Vaughan in his sacred poemp looks at elements of nature not to anatomize them but to see what they silent­ ly point to beyond themselvest

Sometimes I sit with thee [God]), and tarry An hour, or so, then vary. Thy other Creatures in this Scene Thee only aym, and mean* Some rise to seek thee, and with heads Erect peep from their beds, , • • ("And do they so?" 21-26)

He looks upon the creatures as guiding examples, whose constant aspiration to seek God man would do well to emu­ late, He looks at a star not so much to admire its beauty or to analyze its physical characteristics as to see what it can tBach him*

Yet, seeing all things that subsist and be, Have their Commissions from Divinitie, And teach us duty, I will see What man may learn from thee, ("The Starre," 9-12)

25 Samuel Johnson, The Life of C o w I b v . in Literary Criticism of Seventeenth-Century England, ed, Edward Ul, Tayler (New York* Alfred A, Knopf, 1967), p, 420,

♦ 107 26 Surely, ha saw nature as a teacher uhen in "The Con­

stellation” he prayedi

Settle, and fix our hearts, that we may move In order, peace, and love, And taught obedience by thy uihole Creation, Become an humble, holy nation. (11. 53-56)

Several of Vaughan's poems indicate that Vaughan

valued the silence of various elements of nature, which 27 hB often held up as examples to noisy man. Ulhereas

Richard Crashaw chides the ass which carried Christ for

not praising the Lord it carried ("Upon the Asse that

bore our Saviour,” 7-12), Vaughan praises the ass's un­

questioning silence ("The Ass," 17-24). He also praises

the steadfast, incorruptible silence of stonest

Man I can bribe, and woman will Consent to any gainful ill,

^ In "I walkt the other day * . . 36-37, thB doc­ trine of resurrection springs from a root. In "Provi­ dence," 25, birds sing a doctrins of providence. In "The Check," 20, Vaughan writes that "All things teach us to die," 27 Of twenty-nine references to "noise" and "noisy" in Vaughan's poems, on only three occasions does Vaughan link noise with any aspect of nature. He usually associates noise with man and his world of business and artifice. In "To his retired friend . . ."he includes the noise of pigs and dogs, domesticated animals, with the man-made noises of "bang'd Mortars, blew Aprons, and Boyes, / . . . and Drums, with the hoarse hellish notes / Of politickly-deafe Usurers throats" (11, 16-1B), In "Monsieur Gombauld" ha writes of the noise of a flooding spring (11. 32-40J, and in his translation of "The Phoenix out of Claudian" he writes of the burning phoenix's saluting the Sun with "pleasant noise" (11. 57-5B), These few references to noise in a non-human context occur in Vaughan's secular poems only, and one is dictated by faithfulness to a trans­ lated original. 10B But these dumb creatures are so true. No gold nor gifts can them subdue. ("The Stone," 10-13)

In "Man" Vaughan contrasts the steadfast and orderly obedience of "some mean things which hBre beloui reside" with the restless waywardness of m a m

I would (said I) my God would give The staidness of'these things to manl for these. To his divine appointments ever cleave. And no nBW business breaks thBir peaces The birds nor sow, nor reap, yet sup and dine, The flowres without clothes live, Yet Solomon was never drest so fine. (11. 2, 8—14) t These lines allude to Christ's words in His Sermon on the

Mounti "Behold the fowls of the airi for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barnsi yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. . • . Consider the lilies of the field, now they grows they toil not, neither do they spint And yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these" (Matthew

6(26-29), In his prose work The Mount of Olives (1652)

Vaughan referred to lilies and birds when he prayed,

"turns my Byes from all transitory objects, to the things which are sternal, and from the Cares and Pride of this world to the fowles of the alre and the Lillies of the field" (p. 109), If Vaughan considered the carBS and pride of this world to be transitory and the fowls and lilies to be eternal, was he ignorant about the mortality of birds and flowers? These telling lines indicate that

Vaughan viewed the lilies of the field and fowls of the 109 air not so much as transient nature perceived by the senses but mare as lasting symbols of God's unfailing providence as understood by man's mind. The lilies and fowls, unbur­ dened by worldly cares and pridBf silently convey eternal truths to those men who, like Vaughan, look beyond nature's surfaces.^®

The lilies of the field and fowls of the air arB sym­ bols originating from a literary context, but Vaughan also found symbols in his own experience with nature* In "The

Ulater-fall," for example, the water-fall symbolizes man's descent into death preceding his resurrection* And in

"Resurrection and Immortality" the silk-worm's metamorpho­ sis into a butterfly symbolizes thB body's notion of resur­ rection as man's assumption of a glorified body. According to Kitty bl* Scoular, to "argue ex visibills lnvislbilis 29 was a common procedure" during Vaughan's time*

on . Spren Kierkegaard recognized the symbolic impact of the birds and lilies whBn he said that they by their silence express "reverence before God, that it is He who disposes, and He alone, to whom belongeth wisdom and un­ derstanding* And * . * this silence is * , * worship." Kierkegaard further exclaimedt "What wonder indeed whan everything keeps silencB in reverence before Himl Even if He does not speak, the fact that everything keeps si­ lence in reverence before Him affects one as if He were speaking." "The Lilies of the Field and the Birds of the Air," Christian Discourses (Copenhagen, 1849), trans* Walter Lowrle (New York* Oxford University Press, 1940), p. 328. 29 Natural Magic» Studies in tha Presentation of Nature in English Poetry from Spenser to Marvell (Oxford» At the Clarendon Press, 1965), p. 22. 110

Vaughan saw elements of nature not only as examples for men to follow but also as symbols, pointing beyond themselvesi reflecting spiritual truths as through a glass darkly* In "The Ulater-fall" he exclaims*

What sublime truths* and wholesome themes, Lodge in thy mystical, deep streams I (11, 27-28)

In "Rules and Lessons" he claims that

Each tree, herb, flowre Are shadows of his wisBdome. and his Pow*r, (11. 96-97)

And in "ThB Retreate" he looks at a cloud and a flower not only, as William Wordsworth might look at them, to make himself a better man, but also to "spy / Some shadows of *»n eternity" (11, 13-14), Stars, stones, clouds, and flow­ ers do not have voices, and birds and waterfalls, although they do make sounds (and thus, strictly speaking, cannot be considered silent), cannot spBak verbally to man. But in Vaughan's sacred poems their symbolism is eloquent, un- 31 folding a multiplicity of meanings,

3D Cf. Vaughan's translation of Casimire's "The Praise of a Religious life," where the speaker, like a bee search­ ing flowers for honey, contemplates the green fields. and Bowres Where he in Vevles. and shades doth see The back Parts of the Deltve. (11, 44-46) The last line, according to fogle, p, 124n, alludes to Exodus 33*23, where God told Moses, "thou shalt see rtiy back parts* but my face shall not be seen." 31 According to Itrat-Husain, The Mystical Element in the Metaphysical Poets of the Seventeenth CBnturv (London* Oliver and Boyd, 1948), p, 193, "Vaughan was a specialist in experience which he could only suggest in his poetry 111 Vaughan is careful to point out, however, that nature

does not by itself reveal divine truths to everyone, for

"dull man can never finde" "sublime truths, and wholesome themes" unless the Spirit of God "lead his minde" ("The

Ulater-fall," 27-30), Unless one is led to contemplate na­ ture aided by the Spirit of God, a waterfall is simply a waterfall, and the sounds of a bird are simply sounds, meaningful to birds perhaps but undecipherable by man and of little use to him. The truths that Vaughan learns from the waterfall come not so much from his having heard the waterfall as from his observation of the process of cir­ culating water and his enlightened application of the ob­ servation to the human condition. The sounds of a bird tell nothing specifically to Vaughan, but he assumes that, like the shining of a star, the singing of a bird is its way of praising God,

Vaughan was not content merely to contemplate nature as a teacher or a collection of symbols revealing God and

His divine truthsi he wanted to renounce his fallen humani­ ty and become a part of lass tainted natures

I would I were some Bird, or Star, Flutt'ring in woods, or lifted far

through nature symbolism, by thB sudden illumination of a conceit, by the help of analogies drawn from Christian mys- . ticism, Neo-Platonism and Hermetic physical it is because he succeeded in communicating to us the ardour, the felic­ ity and the nature of this mystical experience that we chiefly value him as a poet," 112

Above this Inne And Rode of sinl Then either Star* or Bird, should be Shining, or singing still to thee,32 ("CHRISTS Na­ tivity," 13-10)

Neither Donne nor Herbert believed that birds were morB 33 capable than man of praying to and praising God, but

Vaughan believed that man, because of his willful dis­ obedience to God, fell lower and tended to remain lower than the rest of creationi

• • . trees, herbs, flowres, all Strive upwards stil, and point him the way home.

All have their keves. and set ascentsi but man Though he knows these, and hath more of his own, Sleeps at the ladders foot, • • • ("The Tempest," . 27-28, 37-39)

Nature, however, did not escape the consequences of man,s fall*

He drew the Curse upon the world, and Crackt The whole frame with his fall, ("Corruption," 15-16)

But nature, closer than man to God in Vaughan's version of the Great Chain of Being, could more effectively praise

God,

Vaughan was not happy with his fallen condition nor with the depravity of mankind, illustrated vividly ip the

32 Cf, also "Distraction," 5-6| "And do they so , • • ," 11-13) and Herbert's "Affliction I," 55-60) and "Employment II," 21-25, 33 Donne, XXVI Sermons, p, 31) quoted in Holmes, p, 46, Herbert, "Providence," 9-12. 113

religious strife and Civil War occurring in mid-seven-

teenth-century Britain. If he could not turn into a bird

or star, at least he could attempt to become close to na­

ture by retiring from the uiorld of man's busyness.

Vaughan shows a predilection for writing about si- 3d lent shades and groves, and trees growing silently.

These belong to the vocabulary of the literature of re­ tirement , a seclusion to which Vaughan calls men, leading them "from the Sun into the shade, from the open Terrace into a private grove, & from the noyse and pompe o£ this 35 world into a silent and solitary Hermitage" or to a 36 "quiet Cell." Vaughan praises the humble, quiet life of shepherdsi

No costly pride, no soft-cloath'd luxurie In those thin Cels could lie, Each stirring wind and storm blew through their Cots Which never harbor'd plots, Only Content, and love, and humble joya Lived there without all noise,

3d See "To my Ingenuous friend, R. W.," 43| Vaughan's translation, "Ausonli Cuoido. Edvl. 6," 13, 461 "Regenera­ tion," 51i and *The Life of Holy PAULINUS." p. 340,

35 Henry Vaughan, "TO THE TRUELY NOBLE And Religious sir CHARLES ECERTON. Knight," Works. ed. Martin, p. 213. 36 Vaughan mentions "quiet Cell" in his translation, "The old man of Verona out of Claudian," 6| and in "To his Learned Friend . . , Thomas Powel • • • ," 43, He also mentions "silent Cell" in reference to a silk-worm's cacoon in "Resurrection and Immortality," 8| "Secret soli­ tude" in "Richteousness," 6| and "silent paths" in "The Search," 69. In his translation of Boethius's "Lib. II, Metrum 4," 3, Vaughan mentions someone sleeping securely "stov'd in silence." 114 ✓ Perhaps some harmless Cares for the next day Did in thBir bosomes play* As uihere to lead their sheep, what silent nook, What springs or shades to look, But that was all* * • « ("The Shop- boards," 31-41)

Vaughan*e pastoral poem is a vehicle for social criticism.

In the Puritan uprisings against the Anglican Church and

king, Vaughan saw reason to criticize, if not luxury, cer­ tainly pride and plots against the king* Charles I was behsadsd in 1G49, just one year before this poBm in the

first edition of Silex Scintillans was published* In contrast to luxury, pride, and plotting, Vaughan posed

the ideal of a life of retirement, characterized by con­ tentment, love, humble joys, and quietness*

Like many others, Vaughan associated city life with noise and schism, and country life with quietness and con­ tentments

All various Lusts in Cities still Are foundt they are the Thrones of 111, The dismal Sinks, where blood is spill'd, CaoBS with much uncleanness fill'd. But rural shades are the sweet fense Of piety and innocence* They are the Meek's calm region, where Angels descend, and rule tbfl spheres Where heav'n lyes Leiouer.37 and the Dove Duely as Dew, comes from above* If Eden be on Earth at all, 'Tis that, which we the Country call* ("Retirement." 17^28) Retirement and the contemplation of nature's symbolic

37 foglB defines "Leiouer'1 as one residing "as agent or ambassador," p* 41 Bn. 115 revelations of divine truths werB for Vaughan a temporary substitute for the experience of God* which he believed man had enjoyed before the Fall and could again realize after his death and resurrection. According to Maren-

Sofie Rjrfstvig* retirement was a common theme and ideal ex-

•TQ pressed in seventeenth-century Anglican literaturet

If we are justified in considering the epic of the fall of man and his subsequent salvation through the Puritan way of life the great lit­ erary expression of the English nation which proved victorious in the Civil War* we may with equal right consider the poem of the happy country life the most typical expression of the Royalist and Anglican spirit of the seven­ teenth century. • • • The Puritan concept of the happy life was that of the Christian war- * riar who fights a never-ending battle with Satan and the unregenerate Adam. He served God actively through his particular calling* and so not for him was the peaceful enjoyment of woods and fields and gardens. To him peace was rather something suspect* if not a tempta­ tion of the devil. . . . When confronted with the spectacle of heedless slaughter and de­ struction* issuing in the victory of a party whose aim seemed the annihilation of all the traditional values, the reaction of the Royal­ ist gentleman was that of the Stoic who with- draws from the world in philosophical contempt.

3fl John Donne is an exception* probably because he wrote before the Civil War. He urged men not to "run away from that Service of God* by hiding our selves in a super­ stitious Monastery* or in a secular monastery* in our owne house* by an unprofitable retiredness, and absenting our selves from the necessary businesses of this world*N "The first Sermon upon this Text Cl Corinthians 15s29l, Preached at S, Pauls, in the Evening, upon Easter-day* 1626,'' The Sermons of John Donne. 7* ed. Evelyn m. Simpson and George Potter (Berkeley! University of California Press, 1954), p. 104. 39 R/stvig* pp. 22-23, 116 Rejecting both physical and verbal warfare* Vaughan

turned to the cultivation of his inner life or soul. The

devotional prose of The mount of Olives and Flores Soli-

tudlnls. the sacred poems of Sllex Scintlllans. and the

"Pious Thoughts and Ejeculations" of Thalia Redlvlva are

the fruits of that cultivation.

In "Da Salmons." an allegorical poem in which a salmon

represents man* Vaughan muses on the fact that the salmon is caught because he was lured up to the surface of the water rather than in contempt for the world having been happy to swim obscurely hidden in the quiet depths. Si­ lent water indicates depth* and motionlessness connotes security, motionlessness also characterizes "dumb rivers*" bound by the cold freeze of winter in "To my worthy friend

Master T. Lewes" (11. 5-6). Analogous to winter as a time of year is night as a time of day. According to Vaughan* midnight is a "dead and silent hour" ("The Night*" 14).

And he links night with death when he describes "nights, and shades" as being "Silent as tombs" ("The Stone," 6-

7 ) The silences of retirement* winter* and night are perhaps unbeneficial to the concerns of men who are ac­ tively engaged in the affairs of this world* but*

^ Vaughan also writes about the silence of night in his verse paraphrase of "Psalme 104," 53-56t the King James version of verse 20 mentions darkness and night* but Vaughan adds the "thick shades and silence." 117 conversely* they may be beneficial to men* like Vaughan and others, whose thoughts extend beyond the earthly, uiho value retirement as a time for lifting one's thoughts above the temporal to the eternal, winter as a restful time for assessing the past and preparing for the resur­ rection that is springtime, and night as the true "day of

Spirits,"

An examination of Vaughan's treatment of silent stars reveals something of the development of his poetic tech­ niques. In his secular poem "A Rhapsodie" Vaughan de­ scribes how the stars seem to break forth

In silent glaunces o're the hills, and speake The Evening to the Plainest where shot from far, They meet in dumbB salutes, as one great Star, (11. 12-14)

These arB stars artificially painted on the ceiling in a chamber of the Globe Tavern. And Vaughan describes the stars by means of artful personification, as if they were eyes gesturing by eloquent silence. The description serves no other purpose than to elaborate on the poem's setting.

In "To Etesia (for Timander,) the first Sight," another secular poem, Vaughan writes about the silence of a day- star's rays

Have you observ'd how the Day-star Sparkles and smiles and shines from f a n Then to thB gazer doth convey A silent, but a piercing Ray? So wounds my love, but that her Eys Are in Effects, the better Skys. (11, ‘37-42) 118 Again Vaughan portrays a star at least partly by per­ sonifying description. The star functions in this poem as part of the vehicle of an extended simile, describing houi the speaker*8 lover wounds him. Silent stars also function as the vehicle of a simile, one describing heaps of gold, in Vaughan's translation of Boethius's "Lib. 2.

Ifletrum 2," 11. 4-8.

In Vaughan's translation of Casimire's "The Praise of a Religious life," the silent 3tars begin to serve higher purposes*

CThe saint] in the Evening, when on high The Stars shine in the silent skve Beholds th'eternall flames with mirth, And olobes of lloht more large then Earth. Then weeps for Jov. and through his tears Looks on the flrB-enamel'd Spheres, Where with his Saviour he would be Lifted above mortalitie. (11. 21-28)

The stars in the silent sky evoke an emotional response because to the observer they are more than just stars.

Although they are part of the macrocosm created by God, the stars are considered to be "eternall flames." "olobes of lioht." and "fire-enamel'd Spheres," which transcend the transience of the earth and its inhabitants. Above thB Barth with the stars is where "with his Saviour" the speaker "would be / Lifted above mortalitie." The silent stars come to symbolize transcendence above earthly con­ cerns. Certainly, this transcendence is what the stars help to convey in "Peace"* 119 My Soul, there is a Countrie Tar beyond the stars

There above noise and danger Sweet peace sits crown'd with smiles. And one born in a Manger Commands the Beauteous files[,] (11. 1-2, 5-8)

In "The Constellation" the light9* supposed motions meas­ ure t ime,^

Fair, order'd lights (whose motion without noise Resembles those true Joys Ulhose spring is on that hil where you do grow And we here tast sometimes below,)

With what exact obedience do you move Now beneath, and now above, And in your vast progressions overlook The darkest night, and closest nookl (11. 1-8) But when the silence of the motion i3 considered, the lights begin to take on symbolic meaning, suggesting a mystical experience of eternity similar to that described in "Mount of Olives [ll3»" Certainly, the light and noiselessness and the reference to a hill suggest that poem.

^ Time passes silently as it is measured by the movements of stars and planetsi What stock of nights, Of dayes, and yeares In silent flights Stole by our eares[.] ("The Call," 14-17) Vaughan writes of the "Silence, and stealth of days" in a poem titled in part by the beginning of this first line. In "The Water-fall," 1, he also writes of "times silent stealth." In "Man," 3-4, he mentions "the noiseless date / And Intercourse of times," And in "To the best, and most accomplish'd Couple," 17-18, he writes of peace as silent as time's feBt. 120 In one of Vaughan's sacred poems a silent star is part of a simile*

And yet, as in nights gloomy page One silent star may interline* So in this last and leuidest age, Thy antient love on somB may shine. ("White Sun­ day," 37-40)

But, unlike the earlier simileB of which silent stars were a part, describing such mundane subjects as a mistress or a heap of gold, this one describes the action of God's love, shining down from above. Within the vehicle of the simile is a metaphor by which night is related to a "gloomy page" on which a silent star shines between the lines.

When Vaughan contemplated eternity and its relation to man's world of time, he did so in a mood of calm assur- 42 ance,

I saw Eternity the other night Like a great Ring of pure and endless light. All calm, as it was bright, And round bBneath it, Time in hours, days, years Oriv'n by the spheres LikB a vast shadow mov'd. In which the world And all her train were hurl'd; ("The World Cl]." 1-7) Vaughan did not hear eternityi in a vision, whereby God spake through eloquent silence to Vaughan's eyes rather than in a voice to his ears, he saw it and contrasted it

in This response is quite unlike that recorded by another seventeenth-century observer of stars, Blaise Pascal, who, considering eternity and roan's brevity of life in the world of time, exclaimed, "le silence eternal de ces espaces infinis m'effraie," Pansees (1670) Oeuvres Completes (Paris* Aux Editions du Seuil, 1963), p. 528. with time! using similes to describe each, He saw eter­ nity at night* a time, as we recall from "The Night," when man, undistractBd by the cares of the day, is most receptive to spiritual truths, Eternity is like a ring of light, pure, endless, calm, and bright. The ring suggests nature's "Hymning Circulations." by which God through nature reveals Himself to man and by which na­ ture praises God in "ThB Morning-watch." The light, calm, and brightness remind us again of the ecstatic joys Vaughan expressed in "Mount of Olives [il].** Be­ neath eternity measurable time moves like a shadow, de­ pendent, for a shadow cannot exist without that which projects it, Vaughan uses no VBrbs to describe eternity, although some action might be inferred from the noun

"Rlno." He describes the action of the world of time mostly by means of passive verbst time moves as it is driven by the spherest the world and its train are hurled.

Time as a shadow reminds us of Plato's myth of the cave

(The Republic. VII), Eternity is reals the world of time, when it is uninformed by eternity, paints and lies

(cf, "Mount of Olives [II]," 10)« Especially after read­ ing "The Night," "Mount of Olives C 11]*** "The Constella­ tion," and "The World C O * " we can better understand what

Ignatius meant when he said that it was better to keep A3 quiet and be real than to speak and be unreal.

"To the Ephesians,” XV, i, trans. Cyril C. Rich* ardson, in Earlv Christian Fathers, ed. Cyril C, Richard* son, Library of Christian Classics Series, 1 (Philadel­ phia* The Westminster Press, 1953), p. 92, Chapter Three* Silences of Man in Vaughan's Poetry

Man breaks forth from silence with a cry at birth and,

after spending a brief time in this world, passes away into

the silence of eternity. Before birth man has no name ("I

walkt the other day « • * ,H 47), and after ho dies, the

elements of his body are confounded ("The Evening-watch,"

3-6), and his name is blotted eventually by the elements of

time ("Day of Judgement," 5-8). In the time between the

silences before man's birth and after his death, it is his

birthright to be able to hear and speak. But there are in­ stances when man is denied that birthright, times when he

refuses it, and occasions when temporarily he cannot hear

or speak. Although Rosemond Tuve claims that it is not the business of criticism to deal with the "word unspoken • , •

the thing unheard, unshaped, unknown, unmeant," I think

that to know and appreciate Vaughan's poetry we must exam­

ine the silences of men, ■ Vaughan writes about the silences

of the deaf and of the dumb, of infants, of man's gestures,

eyes, and blood, the silences of Christ, lovers, friends,

readers, and the dead. He urges men to be silent,

1 L Reading of Caoroe Herbert (Chicago * University of Chicago Press, 1952), p. 93,

.123 124 describes or mentions their various silences, and relates experiences in which men cannot help but be silen t,

Daafness is a silence not of the production of sounds but of their reception. The deafnesses about which

Vaughan writes are not permanont* they are temporary, caused either by man's refusal to hear what he should 2 hear or by his willingness to close his ears to what he should not heart * so shew me home That a ll this fome And frothie noise which up and down doth f ile May find no lodging in mine Eie, or Ears, 0 seal them upl that these may f ile Like other tempests by, ("The Mutinie," 23-28)

K s b p s t i l l .my weak Eyes from the shine Of those gay things, which are not thine, And shut my Ears against the noise Of wicked, though applaudBd Joys, ( "The Request," 7-T5J

As in Homer's epic, Odysseus planned that his crew seal their ears with wax in order to resist the calls of the

Sirens (The Odyssey, X II), so Vaughan pleads for temporary deafness as a form of self-imposed censorship to help him 3 resist temptation, Vaughan would have men be selective .

2 See "In Amicum foeneratoram. " 36* "To his retired friend, an Invitation to Brecknock." 18* "Authoris (de s b ) Emblema," 5* "The Search," 29-32* and Vaughan*s transla- tion of Ovid's "De Ponto, Lib. 4°, EIbq. 3a. . . 19- 21. ~ \ Cf, Vaughan's translation of Antonio de Guevara's "The Praise and Happinesse of the C o u n trie -life," where Vaughan states that in cities and courts therB are "splen­ did and swelling words. gros3e calumnie. defamation. 125 of what they choooa to hear* censoring distracting noises, rather than permanently deny themselves the God-qivon sense of hearing. On the other hand, he would not have men lim it themselves only to what the senses, perceive (cf.

"The Search," 75-96).

LikB Vaughan's expressions about deafness, his ex­ pressions about- dumbness , an involuntary silence, are set in contexts relating to morality. Vaughan would have those men struck dumb who destroy thB unity of the Church and wound Christ by their words ("L'Envoy," 39-42), But he la­ ments the death-brought dumbness of a just man ( "Upon sud­ den news of the much lamented death of Judge Trevors," 9-

12). According to Vaughan, dumbness is fittin g fo r those whose speech works evil but undesirable for those whose words promote justice.

The word "infant" traces its etymology to the Latin

"infans." meaning non-speaking. One might expect Vaughan to emphasize the speechlessness of infants, but he does not. Df seventeen references to "infant" and "infancy" only two refer to the in fan t's speechlessness, In "Abols blood" Vaughan writes about infants' sleep as being

"Speechless and calm" (lin e 35), and in "The Retreats"

cursing, [and]] swearing, (which would make a good Christian wish himself deafeTT" The 'Works of Henry Vauohan. ad, L, C, Martin, 2nd ed, (Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1957), P. 1*27. 126 ha bloc: . his happy m gell-infancy,"

Br-- /a I taught ■ tongue to wound My onscienoG uj, a sinfull sound, Or had tho black t to dispence A s e v 'ra ll sinno ev'ry senco, But Felt through 1 this fleshly dri~;. Bright shootos c uverlastingnesse.4 (11. 15-20)

Vaughan celebrates in these lines the innocence accompa­ nying pre-verbal infancy, but he does not give much empha­ sis to the silence of infants because their silence is not

particularly eloquent. Silence is more eloquent coming

from one who is able to speak but who on occasion chooses not or finds i t impossible to spBak, As S^ren Kierkegaard explains, "just because a man is able to speak, i t is an art to be able to keep silen t; and just because the advan­ tage of man is so easily a temptation to him, it is a 5 great art to be able to keep silent,"

4 Echoing these lines of Vaughan's "The Retreats" are the opening lines of. Thomas Traherne's "Dumnesse": Sure Man was born to Meditat on Things, And to Contemplat the Eternal Springs Of God and Nature, Glory, Bliss and Pleasure; That Life and Love might be his Heavnly Treasure: And therfore Speechless made at fir s t, that ho, Might in himself profoundly Busied be: And not vont out, before he hath t'ane in Those Antidots that guard his Soul from Sin. Wise Nature made him Deafe too, that he might Not be disturbd, while he doth take Delight In inward Things, nor be dspravd with Tongues, Nor Injurd by the Errors and the Wrongs That Mortal Words convey. (11. 1-13) Thnma3 Traherne: Poems, Centuries and Three Thanksnivinns. ed, Anne Ridler (New York: Oxford University""Press, 1966j, P. 22.

^ "The L ilies of the Field and the Birds of the A ir," 127

Llor|ucnt silence can bo expressed by tho language of gesture. According to Sir Francis Bacon, the lineaments of the body do disclose the dis­ position and inclination of tho mind in general; but the motions of the countenance and parts do not only so, but do further disclose tho present humour and state of the mind and w ill. For as your majesty saith most aptly and elegantly, 'As the tongue speakoth to the ear so thB ges­ ture speaketh to the eye,' And therefore a number of subtile persons, whose eyes do dwell upon the faces and fashions of men, do well to know the advantage of this observation, as being the -most part of their ability; neither can it be denied, but that i t is a great discovery of dis­ simulations, and a great direction in business,6 7 John Donne found gestures a great direction in love.

Christian Discourses (Copenhagen, 1B49), trans, Walter Low- rie (New York: . Oxford University Press, 1940), p, 322,

, ^ The Advancement of Learning, I I , i i (1605), The Advancement of Learning ancl New Atlantis (London: Oxford University Press, 1951; rpt, I960), pp. 124-125, 7 See Donne, "When my harte was mine owne"t What looks, teares, passions and yet a ll but showes ’ Did mutely bogg and steals my harte from mo. (11, 3-4) and the dissimulation implied in Varied our language through a ll dialects, Of bocks, winks, looks, and often under-boards Spoak dialogues with our fBet far from our words (11, 50-52) in "Elegie: His parting from her." Love's language of gestures and speaking eyes was not original with Donne. Sir Philip Sidney wrote in "Angel's sophistrie": Oft with true sighs, oft uiith uncalled tears, Now with slow words, now with dumb eloquence. I S tella's eyes assay'd, invade her earsQ,^ (11, 1-3) Astroohel and Stella, LXI (1591), Sir Philip Sidney: Selected Prose and Poetry, ed, Robert Kimbrough’*"(San" 128

George Herbert recognized the eloquence of eyes** and noted

the eloquence of tearst

Joyes oft are there, and griefs as oft as joyesj But griefs without a noiset Yet speak they louder then distemper'd fears. UJhat is so shrill as silent tears? ("The Fami- liB," 17-20) The paradoxical loudness of noiseless grief and shrill­

ness of silent tears are far removed from the playful

courting gestures in Donne's love poetry. Herbert is

not writing about contrived gestures but about emotion

Franciscot Rinehart Press, 1969), p, 196. Samuel Daniel in "ThB Complaint of Rosamond" (1592) wrote about the Sweet silent Rhetorique of perswading eyes* Dombe Eloquence, whose powre doth move the bloud, More then words or wisdome of the wise* Still harmony, whose Diapason lyes Ulithin a brow, the Key which passions move, To ravish Sense, and play a world in love, (11. 128-133) The Complete UJorks in VersB and Pt o s b of Samuel Daniel. ed. Alexander B, Grosart (1885} rpt. New York* Russell & Russell, 1963), I, p. 85. Robert Southwell described the eloquence of tears in a sacred context* "But fear not Mary for thy teares will obtains. They are too mighty orataurs, to let any suite fall, and though they pleaded at the most rigorous bar, yet have they so perswading a silence, and so conquering a complaint, that by yeelding they overcome, and by in- treating they' commaund" (f. 55V,). Marie Magdalena Funeral Teares (London* Gabriel Cawood, 1591)} quoted in Louis L, Martz, The Poetry of Meditationt K Study in English Religious Literature of the Seventeenth^ Century (New Haven*. Yale University Press, 1954} rpt. 1962), pp. 201-202, 360. B "A pittifull looke askes enough," "The eyes have oho language every where," "Outlandish Proverbs," 790 and 959, Works. ed,1 Hutchinson, pp, 347, 352, 129 too profound to be expressed by words (and yet* even more paradoxically, it is only by words in the poem that Her­ bert can convey to the reader the eloquent silence of pro­ found grief).

By Vaughan's time the eloquBncB of the eyes and tears g was a commonplace* which he usBd in both his secular and sacred verse. In nTo his Friend Being in Love" Vaughan writes of the "silent Courtship of a sickly Bye" and

g Richard Crashaw, probably influenced by Herbert's "The Familie," 11, 17-20, wrote in "Upon the Death of p Gentleman [Mr. Chambers]" that no language is "more flu­ ent" than the "sad language of our eyes"* Nothing speakes our Griefe so well As to speake Nothing, Come then tell ' Thy mind in Teares who e're Thou be, That ow'st a Name to misery. Eyes are vocall, Teares have Tongues, And there be words not made with lungsi Sententious showers, 8 let them fall, ThBir cadence is Rhetoricall, (11. 24-34) Although the content of the above lines resembles Herbert's lines, Crashaw's tone is quite different. The word play on "fluent" sets the tone. Such wit would seem out of place in Herbert's lines. The paradox of nothing speaking so well a3 to speak nothing is an intellectual conundrum that perhaps draws morB attention to the wit of the poet than to what the paradox contributes to the poem, Herbert seems to stand closer to the experience he de­ scribes i Crashaw observes the experience, admiring from a distance the rhetorical cadence of the falling tears, Herbert's lines are generated by deep emotions, but Cra­ shaw's appear to be developed by generalizations trans­ formed into art. For other examples of the eloquence of eyes and tears see William Habington, "A, Dialogue betweene ARAPHIL and CASTARA," Castara (1640)T The Poems of William Habinoton. ed. Kenneth Allcott (London* The University Press of Liverpool, 1946), pp. 25-26t and Robert Herrick, "Teares are TohgUes," Hesoerldes (1648), ThB Complete Poetry of Robert Herrick, ed, J, Max Patrick (New York* New York University Press, 1963), p, 86, 130 reasonsi "if words cannot move, / The language of thy 1 n teares may make her love" (11, 6, 11-12), In "To his friend— " (1, 31) he notes the "Vocall silence" of a poverty-stricken poet's eye, a silBnce, which, according to Louise I, Guiney, indicates "the pathos of gallant un- 11 complaining anguish which is yet guessed-at by the wise,”

Vaughan does not limit the language of the eyes to lovers. In his sacred poems he converts the silent lan­ guage of loversi, making it a means for communicating with

Godt

A silent teare can peircs thy throne, Ulhen lowd Joyes want a wing, And sweeter aires streame from a grone, Than any arted stringi ("Thou that know'st , , 49-52)

Grief is more aptly moaned than sung. Vaughan values the simple sincerity of emotions directly expressed rather than intellectualized and transmuted into arti

What ever arguments, or skill Wise heads shall use Tears onely and my blushes still I will produce. And should those speechless baggers fail, Which oft have wont Then taught by thee, I will prevail. And say, Thy will be doneM 2 ("The Throne," 9-16)

10 Vaughan also refers to the silent language of lovers in "In Amlcum foeneratorem." 14.

^ "Lovelace and Vaughan," Catholic World. 95 (1912), 694. 1 2 Cf, a similar ending for Herbert's "The Crosse." 131

Here Vaughan does not presume to address God with words of his own. Instead, submitting himself to God's will, ho repeats the Bfficacious words of Christ, In "Admission," echoing the words of Herbert, Vaughan marvels, "How shril are silent tears" (1. 1), and later compares tears of 1 3 contrition to life-renewing rain. To the suffering of

Christ crucified Vaughan can reply only with a silent » tear ("The Feast," 67-72).

In contrast to.Hilton in "On the Morning of Christ's

Nativity,Vaughan in "The Nativity" does not present

Christ's birth as greeted by jubilant music. And in another poem Vaughan emphasizes Christ's incarnation, the

Ulord made flesh, as an action of eloquent silence:

Lordt when thou didst thy selfe undresse Laying by thy robBS of glory, To make us mors, thou wouldst be lesse, And becam'st a wofull story.

To put on Clouds instead of light, And cloath the morning-starre with dust, Was a translation of such height As, but in thee, was ne'r ■ exprest{[.3 ("The Incarna­ tion and Pqs- sion," 1-8) 13 Vaughan also compares tears with rain in "An Epitaph upon the Lady Elizabeth , , , ," 12-14: and in "Ascension-day," 51-54, In "Jesus weeping [ilj," 48-50, Vaughan speaks of A grief, whose silent dew shall breed Lilies and Myrrhe, where the curs'd seed - Did sometimes rule, 14 John Milton» Complete Poems and Major Prose, ed, Merritt Y, Hughes (New York: The Odyssey Press, 1957), pp. *42-50, 132

Paradoxically, Christ, by descending to earth, achieved

a high translation. By becoming the subject of a "wofull story," He expressed what no other man could.

In his prose work The Mount of Olives l/aughan remarks

that Christ preceding His crucifixion "was dumb like a

Lamb before his shearers" (p, 132), This is an allusion to the prophecy in Isaiah 53*7* "He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouthi he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth," a prophecy confirmed in Acts 8 i32-35, Vaughan mentions the silence of Christ * before His prosecutors as an example for himself and others to emulatet15

Thy Saints are not the Conquerorsi But patient, meek, and overcome Like thee, when set at naught and dumb.

Give me humility and peace, Contented thoughts, innoxious ease, A sweet revengeless, quiet minds, And to my greatest haters kinds, ("The Men of War," 18-20, 41-44)

In "Misery" (11. 105-106) Vaughan remarks upon the eloquence of Christ's blood, an eloquence first expressed

15 The silence of Christ before His accusers was de­ veloped by George Herbert in "The Sacrifice," 89-96, and by Richard Crashaw in "Matth* 27*12, Christus accusatus nihil resoondit." Centuries later and in a different context, Feodor Dostoevsky gave the silence of Jesus before His accuser eloquent treatment in "The Grand In­ quisitor" chapter of The Brothers ’Karamazov. 133 by the blood of Abel, who, according to typological in- terpretation, prefigured Christ, According to Genesis

4t10, the voice of the murdered Abel's spillBd blood cried out to God (cf* "Abels blood," 1-4),*^ But, unlike the blood of Abel, Christ's blood doBS not cry out to con­ demn a murderer. According to Vaughan, the blood of

Christ brings peace ("Abels blood," 39) and life ("To , , ,

JESVS CHRIST , , , 5-7), cleanses ("Ascension-Hymn,"

35* "To . . . JESVS CHRIST . . , 42) and heals ("East- er-day," 15* "St. Mary Magdalen," 40), clears men's eyes

("The Holy Communion," 26-29), and intercedes uiith God for men, removing their sin and shame ("The Passion,"

43-45* "The Relapse," 21-22), Vaughan writes that Christ's blood silences the law's unrelenting demand for perfection!

Yet have I found A plenteous way, (thanks to that holy onel) To cancell all that e're was writ in stone, His saving wound Ulept bloud, that broke this Adamant, and gave To sinners Confidence, life to the grave* This makes me span My fathers journeys, and in one fairs step O're all their pilgrimage, and labours leap, for God (made man,) Reduc'd th'Extent of works of faith* so made Of their Red Sea, a Soring* I wash, they wade. ("Mans fall, and Recovery," 21- 32)

16 Vaughan also mentions the eloquence of blood in "Ad Posteros." 21* "An Epitaph upon the Lady Elizabeth , . . ," 12-14* "The Check," 41-42* "Misery," 105-106* "The Stone," 24* and "ThB Character, to Etesia," 3-6, * 134

Vaughan's hnH nf.in ,jun l.i r j notion liy Tnith in Christ rather than hy nocrJ works aligns him iu.i th the s p irit of tbr: Reformation, although ho secs himself as an An­ glican, unsympathetic toward Puritan zeal and violence,

Vaughan sees solvation from tho law's condemnation of

fa llib le man not in piling up good works, striving to outweigh civil by goodness, but in realizing that Christ has done for man a ll that needs to be donof a ll that man must do is recognize his deliverance. Salvation thus is not something to be achieved but something to be received, silently waiting upon God,

Donne, Herbert, and Vaughan on various occasions and for differing reasons urge mon to bo silont, Per­ haps the most well known exhortation to 9ilBnce in

English metaphysical poetry is Donne's "For Godsake hold your tongue, and le t me love” ("The Canonization,"

1), Characteristic of tho tensions often present in his poetry, i t is a rather vociferous plea for silence. Her­ bert's and. Vaughan's pleas for silence are I b s s directed toward a particular situation of tho moment but are ad­ dressed to the reader as general principles. Both, for 17 example, urge men not to brag and boast, Vaughan

^ H e r b e r t, "The Church-parch," 49-52j also in "The Church-porch," 55, 61-62, 73-74, 189-190, 217-218, 305- 306, Herbert prohibits such sins of the tongue as taking God's name in vain, reciting oaths, lying, quarreling, 135

invibes men to follow an ethic of silencet

Then bless thy secret growth, nor catch At noise, but thrive unseen and dumb* Keep clean, bear fruit, earn life and watch Till the white winged Reapers comBlIB ("The Seed , , . ," 45-48)

and garrulity, Vaughan, "The hidden Treasure," 4-6, and "L’Envoy," 29-32, 16 These lines resemble lines in Vaughan's transla­ tion of Plutarch's "Of the Benefit wee may get by our Enemies"i I observe thee* 0 Cornelius Pulcheri though wholly given to a quiet and calme course of life, sequestred from all Publique imploy- mentsi yet out of that stillnesse, and most private Recession*to afford much fruit and satisfaction to the Publique, , , , Works, ed. martin, p. 97, There is also a resemblance between these lines and Joseph Hall's character sketch of a wise mani He seekes his quietnesse in secrecy, and is wont both to hide himselfe in retirednesse, and his tongue in himselfe. He loves to be guessed at, not knownei and to see the world unseenef and whan he is farced into the light, shewss by his actions that his obscurity was neither from affectation nor weaknesse. , . , He stands like a center unmoved, while the circumference of his estate is drawne above, beneath, about him. Heaven vpon Earth and Characters of Vertves and Vices (1608), ed, R, KirkINew Brunswick, New Jersey* RutgBrs University Press, 1940), pp, 147-148, George Wither urged men to enjoy themselves in silence and in hope* If thou desire to cherish true Content. And in a troublous time that course to take, Which may be likely mischieves to prevent, Some use, of this Hieroolvphick make, , . , in retvrednessB. lye closely hid, , , , Let this our Emblem, therefore, counsell thee, Thy lifB in safe Retvrednesse. to spend* Let, in thy breast, thy thoughts reserved bee, Till thou art layd, where none can thee offend.

1 136 He urges men to become like plants, which, as they groui,

dD not call attention to themselves. Plants neither

hear nor speaks yet, alert and watching, they thrive,

and the fruit they bear makes the living worthwhile,

Throughout Sllex Sclntlllans Vaughan emphasizes watching 19 more than he does listening.

Sometimes Vaughan links silence with transcending

the 3enses altogether. In "To Etesia parted from him,

and looking back" Vaughan, describing the silence of 20 lovers, mentions a "Subtile Love," which

And, whilst most others, give their Fancle scope. Enjoy thy selfe, in Silence, and in Hope. A, Collection of Emblemes Ancient and Moderns (Londont Printed by ALugustineJ MLathewesJ for Richard Royston, 1635), p. 72. 1 9 In Sllex Scintillans Vaughan refers to forms of the word "watch" 25 times and to forms of the word "see" 100 times, He refers to verbs of listening 2 times and to verbs of hearing 29 times. See Imilda Tuttle, Con­ cordance to Vauohan's Silex Scintillans (University Parki Pennsylvania State University Press, 1969), pp, 93-94, 119, 171, 174-175, 225, 2D The silence of lovers is not original with Vaughan, In Shakespeare's The Two Gentlemen of Verona (II, ii, 16- 18) Proteus spoke of Julia's silent departures Whatl gone without a word? Ah, so true love should dot it cannot speakt For truth hath better deeds than words to grace it. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, ed, W, J, Craig (Londons Oxford University Press, 1943), p, 28, Sir Philip Sidney described the silence of lovers in the "Eighth Song" of Astrophel and Stellas Thair ears hungry of each word Which their dear tongue would afford, 137 works unknown to any sense, Like the Decrees of Providence, And uiith strange silence shoots

him through (11, 1, 3-5). Love, like silence and decrees

of God, sometimes can be experienced apart from the action

of the senses. This is why love and profound Platonic

friendship can be shared by lovers and friends absent from

each othBrt

friendship is nought else But a Joint, kind propensiont and excess In none, but such whose equal easie hearts Comply and meet both in their whole and oartsi And when they cannot meet, do not forget To mingle Souls, but secretly reflect And some third place their Center make, where thBy Silently mix, and make an unseen stayi ("To his Learned friend , , , Thomas Powel," 29-36)

Although love and friendship in their initial stages may

rely heavily on the actions of the senses, on appearances seen and words heard, in the profoundest experiences of

love and friendship the senses are transcended by the in­

tellect and soul, and words are transcended by silence.

Thus silencB comes to be associated more with the activi­

ties of the intellect and soul than of the senses, Ulords signify distinctions, segregating friend and foe, bond and

But their tongues restrain'd from walking Till their hearts had ended talking But when their tongues could not speak, L o v b itself did silence breaki (11, 21-26) Selected Prose and Poetry, ed, Kimbrough, p, 221. John Donne referred to the eloquent silence of lovers in “A Valediction forbidding mourning," 5-8, and in "The Ex- tasie," 15-28, 138 free (cf. "Faith," 9-12), but in silence love and friend­ ship flourish,

Vaughan speaks of readers, whose visual sense is ex-

erciZBd exclusively to stimulate the intellect, as on oc­ casion struck dumb ("To , , , Mrs, K. Philips." 4) and calls books the "dead alive and busie, the still voice /

Of inlarg'd Spirits, kind heav'ns white Decoys" ("To his

Books." 5-6). Reading books employs thB sense of sight to convey to the reader that which is beyond seeing. To one reading, silence speaks and the dead are made alive.

Thus, according to Vaughan, although Sir Thomas Bodley's 21 bodily remains are silent, Bodley's library will "never let [his] • • • honour sleep"22 ("On Sir Thomas Bodley's

Library , . • ," 49-50), The books in Bodley's library not only revive the ideas of their dead authors but also are a silent testimonial, honoring Bodley for his love of books.

In "Retirement" Vaughan urges men to meditate upon the grave,

A faithful school where thou maist see In Heraldrie «3 Of stones, and speechless Earth

21 Vaughan also writes about the "quiet head" of a dead man in "An Elegie on the death of Mr, J£. W, , , ,," 77, 00 Vaughan also writes about the "still shrouds / Of sleep" in "The Morning-watch," 5-6, 23 Vaughan mourns at a "dumbe urn," a "quiet urn*" in "I walkt the other day • • • ,"62, and in "Daohnis." 93, 139 Thy true descent) Where dead men preach, who can turn feasts, and mirth To funerals, and Lent,24 (11, 45-50)

This is indeed eloquent silence, not unlike that in "The

Charnel-house," where Vaughan, after describing how the place feels and what he sees there, relates his own re­ sponse to the scenet

How thou arrests my sense? how with the sight My Winter'd bloud growes stiffe to all delight? Torpedo to the Eye! whose least glance can- Freeze our wild lusts, and rescue head-long man) Eloquent silence! able to Immure An Atheists thoughts, and blast an Epicure. (IT. 9-14)

The eloquent silence of the charnel house or of death is 25 not original with Vaughan, Earlier, William Habington had directed readers* thoughts to what a tomb could teacht

Tyrant o're tyrants, thou who onely dost Clip the lascivious beauty without lust) Ulhat horror at thy sight shootes through each sencei How powerful is thy silent eloquence,

^ Cf, also Vaughan's "The Check," 1-3, At the end of "The Garland," 29-36, a dead man speaks. Translating Nis- remberg's "Of Life and Death," Works, ed, Martin, p, 295, Vaughan states that "a dead body, , , • is a silent, ab- struce Philosopher, and makes others so too," 25 Thomas Carew in his."Elegie ucion the death of the Deane of Pauls, Dr. Iohn Donne" (1633) demurred! □h, pardon mee, that breake with untun'd verse The reverend silence that attends thy herse, Whose awfull solemne murmures werB to thee More than these faint lines, A loud Elegie, That did proclaime in a dumbs eloquence The death of all the Arts, whosB influence Growne feeble, in these panting numbers lies Gasping short winded Accents, and so diesi (11. 71-78) in Donne, Complete Poetry, p, 4, 140 Which never flatters? Thou instruct'st the proud, That their suiolne pompe is but an empty cloud, Slave to each wind. The faire, those flowers they have Fresh in their cheeks, are strewd upon a grave. Thou tell'st the rich, their Idoll is but earth, The.vainely pleas*d, that Syren-like their mirth Betrays to mischeife, and that onely he «g Dares welcome death, whose aimes at virtue be,

Vaughan's poem gives more concrete, sensuous details than

Habingtan's) Habington exclaims "What horror," but Vaughan gives details which convince the reader of the sense of horror he experienced, Habington is more overtly didactic,

Vaughan makes the startling oxymoron "Eloquent silencel" an exclamation by itself, but Habington buries "silent eloquence" in a loose sentence. Vaughan expresses the eloquent silence of death more effectively than Habington does,

Ulhen Vaughan wrote about the silences of the deaf and of the dumb, of infants, of man's gestures, eyes, and blood, the silences of Christ, and the silences of lovers and friends, of readers and of the dead, usually he was not content merely to mention the fact of their silences but procBBded to indicate the eloquence of the silences.

Writing about his own silences, Vaughan in a rather

Platonic and Pelagian spirit rejoices in the pre-verbal innocence of his infancy!

26 Habington, "To a Tombe" (1640), 11, 1-12, PoemB. p, 71. 141 Happy those early dayesl when I Shin'd in my Angell-infancy

Before I taught my tongue to wound My Conscience uiith a sinfull sound£,] ("The Re­ treats," 1-2, 15-16)

But in another context Vaughan castigates himself for

having been deaf and dumb to God's calling before his

conversion ("Authoris fde sel Emblema." 5). This and

the remaining lines of Vaughan's poem, as Louis L, Martz

points out, bear striking resemblance to some lines from

Augustine's Confessions t "Thou calledst, and criedst unto mee, yea thou Bven brakest open my deafnesse. Thou dis- coversdst thy beames, and shvnedst out unto mee, and didst chase away my blindnesse, Thou didst most fragrantly blow upon me, and I drew in my breath and panted after thee(

I tasted thee, and now doe hunger and thirst after thee.

Thou didst touch mee, and I even burns againB to enjoy thy 28 peace," In the opening stanza of "Disorder and frailty"

Vaughan displays Calvinistic attitudes about the total depravity of man and the irresistibility of God's grace

27 Cf, a similar attitude expressed in Traherne's "Dumnesse," epitomized in line 20i "I then my Bliss did. when my Silence. brBak," Poems, p, 23. According to A, L, Clements, because "language 'defines,' conventional­ izes, and standardizes vision, acquiring language is tan­ tamount to eating the apple, acquiring knowledge of good and evil," The Mystical Poetry of Thomas Traherne (Cam­ bridge, Mass,t Harvard University Press, 1969), p. 63, 2B Saint Auoustine's Confessions. trans, William Watts (London, 1631); quoted in Louis L. Martz, "Henry Vaughani the Man Within," PMLA, 70 (1963), 45, 49. 142 BxtendBd to the e le c t:

When first thou didst even from the grave And womb of darknes becken out My brutish soul, and to thy slave Becam'st thy self, both guide, and Scoutt Even from that hour Thou gotst my heartt And though here tost By winds, and bit with frost 1 pine, and shrink Breaking the link 'Twixt thee, and met And oftimes creep Into th' old silence, and dead sleep, Quitting thy way All the long day, Yet, sure, my Godl I love thee most, Alas. thv lovel (11, 1-15)

The "old silence" is not unrelated to St. Paul's dis­ tinction between the old man, which is corrupt, and the new man, "which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness" (Ephesians 4:22-24),

A distinction must be made in the poetry of Vaughan between the old silences, which reflect corrupt man's indifference to God, and the new silences, which indi­ cate the righteousness and holiness of man renewed. In

"The Check," the poem immediately preceding "Disorder and frailty," Vaughan chides his fleshi

thou sleep'st ont wher's now thy protestation, Thy Lines,29 thy Love? Away, Redeem the day, (11. 44-46)

The silence of the unrenewed man, sleeping unaware of

29 Cf, Herbert's self-reproach for not writing love poems to God as easily as others write them for women: Where are my lines then? my approaches? views? Where are my window-songs? ("Dulnesss," 17-18) 143 God's callings* indicates his indiffBrence, for he nei­

ther protests nor accepts God's invitation.

But after l/aughan has awakened to hear God's callings

and accept His invitation, he acknowledgest

for until thou didst comfort me 1 had not one poor word to sayt ("The Agree­ ment," 37-38)

Ulhen Vaughan declares this, he undoubtedly agrees with

Herbert, who confessedi

If all the hope and comfort that I gather, Were from my self, I had not half a word, Not half a letter to oppose What is objected by my foes. ("Assurance," 21-24)

But even after Vaughan doBS have something to say, he practices a new silencB, a silence of humility. Thus he plead3 to Gadi

Come, cornel Strike these lips dumbi This restles breath That soiles thy name, . Will ne'r be tame Untill in death, ("Come, come , . , 15-20)

(Hen throughout history have feared to name God or to describe or define Him, knowing that finitude cannot com­ prehend the infinite and that imperfection cannot presume to set forth perfection. In the words of Richard Hookeri

"Dangerous it were for the feeble brain of man to wade

far into the doings of the Most Highj whom although to know be life, and joy to make mention of his name) yet our soundest knowledge is to know that we know him not 144 as indeed he is, neither can know him: and our safest oloquence concerning him is our silence, when we confess without confession that his glory is inexplicable, his greatness above our capacity and reach. He is above; and we upon earthi therefore it behovath our words to be wary 3D and few,** John Donne, recognizing the inability of man to comprehend Cod, claims that man's success in defining

God is as impassible as squaring the circle:

Eternall God, (for whom who ever dare Seeke new expressions, doe the Circle square. And thrust into strait corners of poor wit Thee, who art cornerlesse and infinite) I would but blesse thy Name, not name thee now* ("Upon the translation of the Psalmes , , , 1-5)

According to Donne, man's attempts to define God limit

Him to tha littleness of man's mind, Robert Herrick tersely states:

GOD is above the sphere of our esteem, » And is the best known, not defining Him.

George Herbert, claiming that man cannot praiSB God, nevertheless attempts to do so, deeming inadequate praise better than none at all:

My God, Man cannot praise thy name: Thou art all brightnesse, perfect puritie; The sunne holds down his head for shame, Dead with eclipbes, when we speak of thee: How shall infection Presume on thy parfaction? 3D Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, I (New York: E, P, Dutton & Sons, Ltd., 1907), PP* 150-151• 31 Herrick, "Ulhat God is," The Complete Poetry, ed, Patrick, p. 451. 145 As dirtie hands foul all they touch, And those things most, which are most pure and finei So our clay hearts, ev'n when we crouch To sing thy praises, make them lesse divine* Yet either this, Or none, thy portion is* ("Miserie," 3 1 -42 )

Henry Vaughan, although he acknowledges that Gad ie past man's comprehension, does not hesitate to praise God's name i

Though then thou art Past thought of heart All perfect fulness, And canst no whit Accesse admit Prom dust and dulnBSs;

Yet to thy name (As not the same Ulith thy bright Essence,) Our foul, Clay hands At thy Commands Bring praise, and Incense; ("Praise," 3 3 -44 )

UlherBas Donne prefers to bless God's name rather than namB Him, and Herbert decides that praise, however inade­ quate, is better than nD praise at a ll, Vaughan sees it as his duty to praise God* He is careful, however, to 32 separate God's name from His essence, to distinguish

^ Cf, "The Character to Etesia"i Give me a Maiden-beautie's Bloud* A pure, rich Crimson, without muddi In whose sweet Blushes that may live, Ulhich a dull verse can never give* (11* 3-6) If the assumption that words cannot truly match things and experiences is pushed to its extreme, then all things and experiences can be considered to be ineffable* One holding a more moderate position may consider that, although words 146 the descriptions which .men attribute to God from what Gad really is, Vaughan seeks to praise God not so much by word3 as by deeds.

Like Donne and Herbert, Vaughan sees himself inade­ quate to praise Godt

How shall thy dust thy praises singl I would I were One hearty tearl One constant springl Then would I bring Thee two small mites, and be at strife Which should most vie, my heart, or eye, Teaching my years In smiles, and tears To weep, to sing, thy Death, my Life. ("The Passion," 45-56)

Vaughan would imitate the poor widow who in giving two mites gave all she had (mark 12t40-44i Luke 21i1-4),

As Vaughan closed the final stanza of "The Storm," so he closes "The Passion” with a chiasmal scheme, this one being the crossing of "smiles • • • sing" with "tears , • , weep," And, like the other, this too serves to remind readers of the cross upon which Christ's death became man's life,

Vaughan in "The Passion" saw his present condition as inconducive to praising God, He wanted to unify his parts or become transformed in such a manner that what he became would serve one purpose only. To praise God he would use

do not fully match experience, they are not totally worth­ less.

4 147 not his tongue but his heart and eye because he knew that speech is not the only means nor the best means of giving 33 praise. Even "poor stones[, which] have neither speech nor tongue," can nevertheless be "deep in admiration"

("The Bird," 14-16),

Man too can worship God in silence. Silent worship has Biblical precedence. The Psalmist records Gad's wordst

"Be still, and know that I am God" (Psalm 46t10), Habakkuk

33 Vaughan feels more comfortable with his silences than Donne and Herbert do, Donne writes* To know and feele . , , and not to have Words to expresse • , . [an experience] makeg a man a grave Of his owns thoughts, , , , ("Ecclogue," 92-94) Herbert, somewhat less threatened than Donne by silence, sees virtue in silence when speech alone Doth vanish like a flaring thing, And in the ears, not conscience ring, ("The Win­ dows," 13-15) Vaughan, furthermore, complains less often than Donne and Herbert do about inadequacies of words, language and verse, Donne complains of a "leans dearth of words" ("El- egiei The Anagram," 18) and of verse's "lame measure" ("To Mr, T. W, 'Hast thee harsh verse , . , ,'" 1), And he criticTzesTt "Language thou art too narrow, and too wBake / To ease us now" ("Elegiei Death," 1-2). Herbert, knowing the verse-writing facility of secular love poets, asks himself why love poetry about God is less easily written ("Dulnesse," 16-19), When Herbert feels that his versB is inadequate, he is less apt to blame words than his own wit ("The Sonne," 3-4), He is not demoralized by his inadequacies but sees them as aids to remind him to rely more an God, Several of his poems, especially "Db- niall," "A true Hymne," and "Love III," indicate that they are mended or completed by God, 14B records the commandi "the Lord is in his holy templet

let all the earth keep silence before him" (Habakkuk

2t20), Hierotheus, a man uihom Vaughan greatly re­

spected (p. 221), counselled, "it seems right to speak

without words,* and understand without words t this I ap­

prehend to be nothing but the mysterious silence and mys­ tical quiet which destroys consciousness and dissolves

forms. Seek, therefore, silently and mystically, that #» A perfect and primitive union with the Arch-Good." The

Ancrene RIw Ib quoted St..Gregory as having said, "luoe silencium cooit celestia metitari / longe silence he r*c * self gadirif Pe Poujt to heuenward," According to St.

John of the Cross, "[that] which w b most require for our spiritual growth is the silence of the desire and of the tongue before God, Who is so high* the language He mast 36 listens to is that of silent love." And Isaac Penington, a contemporary of Vaughan, differing from him in politics and formal religion but resembling him in devotional

Quoted in William Ralph Inge, Christian Mysticism. Bampton Lectures, delivered at Oxford, 1899 CMethuen & Company, Ltd., 1699* rpt. New Yorki Meridian Books, 1956), p. 103. 35 The Enolish Text of thB Ancrene Riwle. ed, from British Museum MS Royal BC.1 by A, C. Baugh, Early English Text Society, 232 (London* Oxford University Press, 1956), p. 7.

The Living FlamB of Love, trans. David Lewis (Lon- dont Thomas Baker, 1934), pp. 234-235. 149 spirit, stressed the efficacy of silent worships

After the mind is in some measure turned to the Lord, his quickenings felt, his seed beginning to arise and spring up in the heart, then the flesh is to be silent before him, and the soul to wait upon him, and for his further appearings, in that measure of life which is already re­ vealed. Now this is a great thing to know flesh silenced, to feel the reasoning thoughts and discourses of the fleshly mind stilled, and the wisdom, light, and guidance of God's Spirit waited for. For man is to come into the pover­ ty of self, into the abasedness, into the noth­ ingness, into the silence of his spirit before the Lard) into the putting off of all his know­ ledge, wisdom, understanding, abilities, all that he is, hath done, or can do, out of this measure of life, into which he is to travel, that he may be clothed and filled with the na­ ture, Spirit, and power of the Lord.3'

To achieve silence Vaughan bids his coarse measures to be dumb ("Joy," 1). He prays for humility, peacB, con­ tented thoughts, and a quiet mind ("The Men of Ular," 41-

44). He admires a good man's heart, an "inward place," where "No outward tumults reach'd"!

'Twas holy ground* where peace, and love and grace Kept housei where the immortal rsstles life In a most dutiful and pious strife Like a fix'd watch. mov'd all in order, stilli ThB Will serv'd God, and ev'ry Sense the Willi ("To the pious memorie of C, W. Esquire . . . ," 69-74)

And he strives to cultivate .within himself an atmosphere of peacei

37 "A Brief Account Concerning Silent Meetingsi the Nature, Use, Intent, and Benefit of Them," Selections from the Works of Isaac Peninoton (New Bedford* B. Lindsey, Printer, 1B18), PP. 226-227, 1S0 I School my Eyes, and strictly duel Within the Circle of my Cel, That Calm and silence are my Joys Which to thy peace are but meer noise. ("Misery," 57-60)

He realizes that his efforts to cultivate silence and calm are but noise when compared to the "peace of God, which passeth all understanding" (Philippians 4t7).

Sometimes Vaughan is silent not so much because of his humility but because of his refusal to answer a petty question or to continue a digression (p. 2), to prolong an unpleasant topic ("An Elegy," 25), or to tell a lie

("To , . . JESVS CHRIST . . . 21-22), He refuses to flatter for selfish purposes ("In Amicum foeneratorem."

27-20) and to write for fools ("Ad Posteros." 20), telling them what is too much for them to know ("To his Sooks."

25-26),

Vaughan also writes about silences which are in­ voluntary, In a poem directed "To The Officers o£ the

Excise" he complains with tongue in cheek about their re­ striction of his freedomt

30 When Vaughan wrote "Misery," 57-60, he may have had in mind these lines from Herbert's "Mortification"i When man grows staid and wise, Getting a house and home, where he may move Within the circle of his breath, Schooling his eyes) That dumbe inclosure maketh love Unto the coffin, that attends his death, (11. 19-24) 151

vour monopolizing Sense, affords h. Ravishment, beyond the Pow'r .of Words* To Silence thus confin'd, J_ must obey. »g And only freBly say, that 7 can nothing say.

He foresees a time when his flesh will be but a "dusty

story / A speechlesse heap" ("The Check," 2-3) and prays *

"when in death my speech is spent, / 0 let that silence

then prevailI" ("The Agreement," 63-64),

Apart from external constraints imposed upon his

versB by Bxcise men or by his death, there are still

other times of involuntary silence, When in "Death A

Dialooue" thB soul asks the body how the body will bear

death, thB body confessest

I cannot tell,— But if all sence wings not with thee, And something still be left the dead, I'le wish my Curtaines off to free Me from so darke, and sad a bed) (11. 6-10)

The body cannot truly speak about something it has not yet experienced)^ it can only speculate from the limited

extent of what it already knows from seeing and responding

to the experiences of others. In "To the Holy Bible"

"ALIUD , , . 3-6, The Comolete Poetry of Henry Vaughan, ed. French Fogle (Garden City, New York* Double­ day and Company, 1964) rpt. New Yorkt W, W. Norton & Com­ pany, Inc., 1969), p. 503. The poem is not in the Martin edition of Poetry and Selected Prose.

^ Cf. "To his Learned Friend . , . Thomas Powel • • . ," 13-16, where Vaughan asserts that "we cannot state / A Commerce" between senseless, inanimate materials) and "Etesia absent." 13-16, where Vaughan says that the body separated from the soul "Cannot be said to live,” 152 (1, 35) Vaughan states that "no tongue can tell" the next effects to come about from men's reading the Bible, for no one can speak confidently of future events*

furthermore, there are experiences and knowledge which defy attempts to put them into words* Vaughan men­ tions the experience of the sleeping dreamer, who tries to voice his thoughts but cannot until he awakens ("Au- sonii Cuoldo* Edyl. 6," 67-70), Perhaps, if one were awake to a reality truer than earth's appearances, he would find expression much easier*

Vaughan's poem "Quickness" indicates his struggle for full expression of what true life 1st

false lifel a foil and no more, when Wilt thou be gone? Thou foul deception of all men That would not have the true come on*

Thou art a moon-like toili a blinde 5 Self-posing statef A dark contest of waves and windef A meer tempestuous debate*

Life is a fix'd, discerning light, A knowing Joyi 10 No change, or fiti but ever bright, And calm and full, yet doth not cloy*

*Tis such a blissful thing, that still Doth vivifie, And shine and smile, and hath the skill 15 To please without Eternity*

Thou art a toylsom mole, or less A moving mist But life is, what none can express, A quickness. which mv God hath kist. 20 153

Addressing "false lif o ," Vaughan seeks to define "Life" by contrasting one with the other. Linos 1-8 define and lines 17-10 summarize false lif e ; lines 9-16 de­ fine and lines 19-20 seek to summarize true l if e . One is characterized by falsehood, foulness, deception, darkness, and debate; the other is characterized by knowledge, brightness, dependability, light, and calm.

The false l if e (somewhat lik e time, which depends upon eternity in "The World [i]") is not self-sustaining but exists as a foil, dependent upon true life for its existence and its definition. After separating the two kinds of l i f e , peeling the false away in order to get to the essence, Vaughan defines l if e fir s t by what i t is and then by what i t does. The description bears resemblance to that of eternity in "The World [ l } , "

Both life and eternity are characterized by light, calm, and brightness. Indeed, Vaughan claims that l i f e competes with eternity in its skill to please.

In the concluding lines of the poem Vaughan easily summarizes the false l if e , but, afte r beginning to sum­ marize lif o , confesses that adequate definition is impos­ sible. But he does not end the poem here, despairing of man's limited powers of expression. Rather, as if chal­ lenged by his statement that life is what none can express, he sets forth a final definition, heightened by its final 154 position and its italic print. The reader is given the impression that Vaughan briefly has been granted the grace to penetrate the curtain of his finitude to achieve a glimpse of truth* He has gone beyond the inexpressible to seize words to share with mankindt life is "A, quick* ness, which mv God hath kist." Heretofor Vaughan's defi­ nition of life included only natural terms * light and joy, which vivify, shine, smile, and pleases but in the ultimate definition God, the supernatural, enters in.

To say that life is a quickness is merely to supply a synonym, and the definition threatens to become a tau­ tology, but it is saved from that end by the final qual­ ifier, which, far from limiting the nature of quickness, specifies it in a way that both expands and clarifies what life is.41

^ E, C, Pettet, "A Simile in Vaughan," TLS. Janu­ ary 27, 1956, p. 53, points out that "A, quickness which my God hath kist" is a "verbal echo" from Thomas Vaughan's writings. Thomas Vaughan wrote in "Anima Magica Ab- scondita," The Works of Thoma3 Vauohan» Euoenius Phlla- lethes, ed. Arthur Edward Waite (London* Theosophical Publishing House, 1919), p. 93, that "all secrets— physical and spiritual, all the close connections and that mysterious kiss of God and TJature— are clearly and punctually discovered Lin the Scriptures]." According to Pettet, Henry Vaughan "has completely transformed his brother's meaning. Where Thomas Vaughan is describing this life, the creative penetration of God through na­ ture, Henry Vaughan's 'quickness* is heavenly existence, the only true life," p. 53, If by heavenly existence Pettet means the same thing as eternity, his definition is marred by the fact that in lines 15 and 16 of "Quick­ ness" Vaughan states that life "hath the skill / To please without Eternity," unless the last line of the poem super­ cedes and nullifies all that has been said before about 155 Vaughan's confrontation with "uihat none can express" and his subsequent, brief, successful expression suggest that this poem strikes a chord of mysticism, for, accord­ ing to William James, ineffability, or the "incommuni­ cableness of the transport^,] is the keynote of all mys­ ticism."42

what life is. I think that "quickness" is best illumi­ nated by the immediate context of the poem and by other contexts of "quickness" in all of Vaughan's poetry* It is no accident that Vaughan placed "Quickness" between two poems in which "quick" and other forms of the word appear. In "The Water-fall," the poem immedi­ ately preceding "Quickness," Vaughan referred to the stream's "quick store" (1. 15) and to God's "quickning love" (1, 32), and he used "quickned" to refer to the resurrection of ment All must descend Not to an endt But quickned by this deep and rocky grave, Rise to a longer course more bright and brave. (11. 9-12) And in "The Wreath," the poem immediately following "Quickness," Vaughan begged for Christ's quickning breath, which gladly bears Through saddest clouds to that glad place, Where cloudless Quires sing without tears, Sing thy just praise, and see thy face. ( U . 16-19) That Vaughan set the poem "Quickness" into such a context is a mark of the coherent unity of the poems in Silex Scintillans. Words pick up resonance from their repeti­ tion in various contexts. To sensitive readers former meanings leap from the silent recesses of the'memory to clarify repeated words, and repeated words report new meanings to earlier contexts. 42 ThB Variety of RBliQlous Experiencei t\ Study of Human Nature. Gifford Lectures on Natural Religion, de­ livered at Edinburgh, 1901-1902 (Londont Longmans, Green and Company, 1902| rpt. Random House, £19363), p. 396, 156 The handiest of the marks by which I classify a state of mind as mystical is negative. The subject of it immediately says that it defies expression. that no adequate report of its contents can be given in words. It follows from this that its quality must be directly experiencedi it cannot be imparted or trans­ ferred to others. In this peculiarity mys­ tical states are more like states of feeling than like states of intellect. No one can make clear to another who has never had a certain feeling, in what the quality or worth of it consists. One must have musical ears to know the value of a symphony! one must have been in love one's self to understand a lover's state of mind,43

But ineffability alone does not identify mysticism.

Although, according to William James, all mystical experi­

ences are ineffable, not all instances of ineffability are

necessarily mystical experiences! ineffability is only one

of four characteristics which together define mystical ex­

perience. The other three mentioned by James are neotic quality, transiency, and passivity. By "neotic quality" he means that mystical states, although they seem similar to states of fBeling. "seem to those who experience them to be also states of knowledge. They are states of in­ sight into depths of truth unplumbed by the discursive intellect. They are illuminations, revelations, full of significance and importance, all inarticulate though they remaini and as a rule they carry with them a curious sense of authority,By "transiency" he means that mystical

i M James, p. 371.

James, p. 371, 157 states "cannot be sustained for long," and afterwards the memory of them fades somewhat but is revived sometimes by subsequent mystical states,Finally, by "passivity"

James means a feeling that one's will is in abByancei

"Although the oncoming of mystical states may be facili­ tated by preliminary voluntary operations, as by fixing the attention, or going through certain bodily perform­ ances, or in other ways which manuals of mysticism pre- * scribe* yet when the characteristic sort of consciousness once has set in, the mystic feels as if his own will were in abeyance, and indeed sometimes as if he were grasped and held by a superior power,

Vaughan's "Quickness" not only indicates his tempo­ rary "incommunicableness" at trying to express what true life is, but it also presents the other characteristics of mysticism. The last line, coming surprisingly soon after Vaughan has said that none can express what life is, indicates Vaughan's sudden acquisition of new knowledge. Before this, Vaughan had gone as far as his "discursive intellect" could take him, but the last line displays a new "insight into depths of truth." The insight or reve­ lation conveyed is a brief seven words long— "£ quickness. which mv God hath kist"— but the words are resonant. Not

James, p, 372,

46 James, p. 372, 15a only is the true life defined as a passively received state, but the definition comes to Vaughan after he ap­ parently has given up trying to define true life* Only after he had been quickened by God's kiss could he know and express the mystical state that is true life*

According to James's criteria, "Quickness" is a mys­ tical poem* OthBr poems, such as "Mount of Olives Cll}" and "The World [l]," embody some of the characteristics of mystical states, and still more poems, such as "Re­ generation," "The Search," and "The Night," express a longing for the mystical experience of oneness with God.

Persuaded by evidence from Vaughan's poetry and prose

(see pp. 81-85 of this dissertation) that Vaughan's sacred poetry is an accurate reflection of his soul, I think that

Vaughan's poetry reveals him to be a man who has had a feui mystical experiences but who more often longs for fuller communion with God.

In "Dressing" Vaughan praysi

Give to thy wretched one Thy mysticall Communion. That, absent, he may see, Live, die, and rise with theej (11* 13-16)

And in "CHRISTS Nativity" he asks that "once more by mys- tick birth / The Lord of life be borne in Earth" (11* 29-

30), Presumably, both of these poems were written after

Vaughan's conversion, when Vaughan experienced the death of his old nature and a spiritual rebirth* In his rebirth 159 or conversion he felt the presence of God but not neces­ sarily oneness or union with God* Rebirth is not the culmination of Christian experience or of mystical ex­ perience! it is the beginning. Vaughan's poems indicate his progress on the "uiay uthich from this dBad and dark abode / Leads up to Gad" ("The World Cl]," 53-54)* a progress not without its backslidings* In his poem3 he writes of experiencing God's assault ^" fluthoris f de 3el

Emblema," 8-10), God's quickening ("To * , . JESVS CHRIST

* • • ," 5-7), God's glancB ("Mount of Olives [ll]*" 16!

"The Favour," 1), and God's presence ("Mount of Olives

[II]," 1-11i "The dwelling-place," 15), He hBars God whisper ("Regeneration," BO), feels God's breath sustain­ ing him ("Chearfulne3S," 3), and feels God's eye-beams shooting at him ("Misery," 86). In "The hidden Treasure"

Vaughan submits his heart to Godt

I will do nothing, nothing know, nor see But what thou bidst, and shew'st, and teachest me. (11. 31-32)

And in concluding "Love-sick," he celebrates his com­ munion with Christ's blood, "thy blood which makes thee mine, / Mine ever, e v e n and me ever thine" (11. 21-22).

The "thee" and "thine" cross significantly with "me" and

i i s "mine," After expressing his total reliance on God,

^ Cf. William Ralph Inge'3 definition of religious mysticism as "the attempt to realize the presence of the living God in the soul and in nature, or, more generally, 03 the attempt to realize, in thought and feeling, the 160 Vaughan could oay no more.

immanence of thB temporal in the eternal, and of the eter­ nal in the temporal." Christian Mysticism. p. 5,

r Chapter Four* Vaughan's Poetic Style

Until recently, most remarks about Henry Vaughan's

poetic style have been rather impressionistic and de­

cidedly disparaging, F, C. Hutchinson stated in his chap­

ter on "The Sacred Poets" in The Cambridge History of

English Literature (1911) that many of Vaughan's "poem3 are little more than resettings of Herbert's thought and very utords, . . . In the matter of form, Vaughan failed to learn what Herbert had to teach. He knows less uiell than Herbert uihen to stop, and, after beginning with lines of such intensity as Herbert could never have written, he is apt to lose his way and forfeit the interest of his readers. , , . His workmanship becomes defective, his rhythms halting and his expression crabbed," Herbert J,

C, Grierson in the introduction to his edition of Meta­ physical Lyrics k PoBms of the Seventeenth Century claimed that "Vaughan is a less effective preacher, a far less neat and finished artist than Herbert, His temper is more that of the mystic," Whereas Herbert's "temper and

* (Cambridge! At thB University Press, 1911), VII, pp. 40-41,

161 162 poetry” are “restrained and ordered,'* Vaughan's aro "qui- 2 eti3t and mystical." T, S. Eliot compared Vaughan to

Herbert less favorably: "the emotion of Herbert is clear, definite, and sustained; whereas the emotion of Vaughan is 3 vague, adolescent, fitful, and retrogressive." According to Joan 9ennett, Vaughan "lacks form, order, economy . . . whereas the perfection of form is characteristic of Her­ bert's poBtry."^

4 Others wore more able to note differences between

Vaughan end Herbert without making invidious comparisons,

Helen C, White suggested that one "never feels of . . ,

[Vaughan's]] verse that hero is infinite riches in a little room, but, on the other hand, there is an unmistakable c power of radiance in it," Margaret Willy pointed out the distinctiveness of Silex Scintillans: "Herbert's in­ fluence, though nowhere stronger, has been assimilated and transmuted by Vaughan's individual way of seeing. At his best he speaks with the distinctive voice of a poet in his

(New Yorks Oxford University Press, 1921; rpt, 1959), pp. xlv-xlvi.

3 "The Silurist." The Dial. 83 (1927), 263.

^ Four Metaphysical Poets: Donne Herbert Vaughan Crashaw (Cambridge: At the University Press, 1957;, p. 85. c The Metaphysical Poets: £ Study in Religious Experience (New York: Macfnillan~Company. 1936; rpt. New York: Collier Books, 1962), p', 287. 163 own right."** And Joseph H. Summers stated that "while it seems that Vaughan might never have been an interesting poet at all without Herbert's inspiration and example, at his best he is quitB unlike Herbert. . . . At his best

Vaughan is not a poet of rational examination* careful craftsmanship, and technical examination in the tradition of Sidney and Herbert but a poet of astounding, if ar- 7 ratic, visionary and aural powers." R. A. Durr defended * Vaughan's uniqueness and gave good counsel to all who would study Vaughan's stylet

Tuiel have no right to demand of Vaughan the kina of form so readily discoverable in Her­ bert and then, not finding it, to disparage his artistryi for the tuia poets had under­ taken to transform into art quite different experiences within the religious life, and the structural nature of the poems must dif­ fer accordingly. Neither one could have used the means of the other to achieve his end. The titles of their major books identify the qualities of their poetry. For Herbert it is. The TemplB. the church and its sacraments and symbols* his is the record of a devout church­ man who had had to struggle to attain and hold his piety against the pull of the world. . . . Vaughan's poems, however, are sparks from the flint* they are quick with immediate desire, joy, or grief. In them we are outside the « church, in the bare little room of man's heart.

** ThrBB Metaphysical Poets. Writers and Their Ulork, 134 (Londont Longmans Green & Co., 1961), p. 19, n The Heirs of Donna and Jonson (Nb w York* Oxford University Press,"T97Q), p. 12*1. O On thB Mystical Poetry of HBnrv Vauohan (Cam­ bridge, Mass.i Harvard University Press, 1962), pp. 10-11. 164 There are many doors one could open in order to get into the room that is both Vaughan's heart and its poetic expression) including its expression of mystical experi­ ence. The door most obviously beckoning to me is marked

"silence." In his poetry Vaughan has modified the word "silence" with "Eloquent," "Vocally" "3trange," "old," and "that

[death's],"® In his secular poems and translations uiord3 modified by "silent" include "greene," "Courtship,"

"glaunces," "Queen." "peace," "admiration," "sorrow," "shades," "Orbs," "olide," "house." "Relioues." "Ray," 10 "path," and "Ghosts." In his sacred poems and transla­ tions word3 modified by "silent" include "face," "skve."

"Cell," "paths," "flights," "teare," "tears," "nook,"

"drops," "star," "dew," "nights," "shades,” "secret rooms,"

"tombs," "hour," "flight," "tear," and "stealth,"^ Words

g References are "ThB Charnel-housB," 13* "To his friend— ," 31* "To Etesia parted from him, and looking back." 5* "Disorder and frailty," 11* and "The Agree­ ment," 64. 10 References arB "To my Ingenuous Friend, R,. W.," 43* "To his Friend Being in Love," 6* "A Rhapsodie," 12* "Monsieur Gombauld." 2* "To thB best , . . Couple," 18* "To , , , Mrs, K, Philips." 20* "Ausonil Cuoido. Edvl. 6," 38* "AusoniT Cupido. Edvl. 6," 48* "Boot. Lib. 2. Mstrum 2," 8* p. 152* p. 167* "On Sir Thomas Bodley's Library , , , ,"49* "To Etesia"TjFor Timander,) the first Sioht." 40* "To Etesia ooino beyond Sea," 7* and "V • • Severinus [Boethius] • • . Metrum 12, Lib. 3," 45, 11 References are "Caslmirus. Lib. 4, Ode 13," 12* "The Praise of a Religious life • • , ,"22* "Resurrec­ tion and Immortality," 8* "The Search," 69* "The Call," 165 like "VocaJU" and "Eloquent" invest silence with figura­ tive, aural qualities. Other words link silence with visual imagery.

According to I, A. Richards, "an image may lose al­ most all its sensory nature to the point of becoming scarcely an image at*all, a mere skeleton, and yet repre­ sent a sensation quite as adequately as if it were flar- 12 ing with hallucinatory vividity." If one agrees with

Richards, then silence can be considered an image, albeit an intangible, invisiblo, inaudible one, a rather para­ doxical imageless image, in Vaughan's poetry.

It is an image made more tangible by some image- related words associated with it, Words given co-ordinate status with "silent" are "shady," "unseen," "drie."

"piercing," "attentive," "sad," "One," "dead," "Gads," 1 3 "searching," and "times," ■ Words given co-ordinate

16* "Thou that know'st , , , 49* "Admission," 1* "The Shepheards," 39; "Ascension-day," 52* "White Sunday," 38* "Jesus weeping (_ I I*J," 48* "The Stone," 6* "The StonB," 6* "The Stone," 6* "The Stone," 7* "The Night," 14* "The Night," 31* "The Feast," 72* and "The Water-fall," 1. A O Principles of Literary Criticism (New York; Harcourt, Braca and Company, 1924), p. 120, 13 References are "To my Ingenuous Friend, £. W. 43* "Ausonii Cuoido, Edvl. 6," 38* "Casimlrus, Lib. 4, Ode 13," 12* "To Etesia if or TimandBr.) tha~Tirst Sight." 40* ", , , Severinus ^BoBthius^ • •' . Netrum 12, Lib. 3," 45* p. 167* "White Sunday," 38* "The Night," 14* "The Night," 31 * "The Night," 31* and "The Water-fall," 1, 166 status with "silence” are "stealth of days," "dead sleep,"

"light," "watchfulnes,” "Calm," "Joys," and "thick shades,"^

To a sensitive reader, "silence" evokes all that has been associated with it in its prior contexts. Much like

"quickness," discussed at the end of Chapter Three, "si­ lence" takes on the suggestive power of a symbol. Accord­ ing to R, A, Durr, Vaughan's "images, though precise, are ' 1S fluid in their quality of easy fusion and transition,"

Silence often fuses with images of enclosure and with­ drawal from the world, i,e,, with cells, nooks, houses, rooms, tombs, 3hade, death, and night} with images of illumination and vision, i.e,, with light, rays, glances, and admiration} with images of transcendence, i.e., with stars, orbs, sky, and flights} and with images of sorrow, i.e., with tears,' drops, and, by association, with dew, 1 6 Silence thus comes to symbolize, among other things, enclosure and withdrawal from the world, illumination and vision, transcendence, and sorrow,

*1 A References are "Silence, and stealth of days • , , ,« -jj “Disorder and frailty," 11} "The Constellation," 13} "The Constellation," 13} "Misery," 59} "Misery," 59} and "Psalme 104," 54. 15 Durr, p. 30, 1 6 Others have identified other major symbols in Vaughan's poems, Durr discusses the symbols of growth, quest, and marriage (pp, 29-78), Ruth Preston Lehmann dis­ cusses over thirty different images in "Characteristic Im­ ages in the Poetry of Henry Vaughan," Diss, Univ. of Wis­ consin, 1942, 167

Reading Vaughan's verse involves a process not unlike

that related by Herbert for reading the Biblet

Oh that I knew how all thy lights combinef And the configurations of their gloriel . Seeing not onely how each verse doth shine. But all the constellations of the storie. This verse marks that, and both do make a motion-- Unto a third, that tBn leaves off doth liei ("The H. Scrip­ tures II," 1-6)

Reading Vaughan, one comes upon constellations of imagery*

The opening stanzas of "The Constellation" afford a good

example of the resonating evocativeness of his symbolic

imagery, by means of which words mean more than their im­

mediate context suggests*

fair, order'd lights (whose motion without noise Resembles those true Joys Whose spring is on that hil where you do grow And w b here tast sometimes below,)

With what exact obedience do you move Now beneath, and now above, And in your vast progressions overlook The darkest night, and closest nookl

Some nights I see you in the gladsome Cast, Some others neer the West, And when I cannot see, yet do you shine And beat about your endles line*

17 Cf. "A Priest to the Temple or, The Country Parson," where Herbert urges "a diligent Collation of Scripture with Scripture, for all Truth being consonant to it self, and all being penn'd by one and the self-same Spiri.t, it can­ not be, but that an industrious, and judicious comparing of place with place must be a singular help for the right understanding of the Scriptures, To this may be added the consideration of any text with the coherence thereof, touching what goes before, and what follows after, • • *" Works, ed* Hutchinson, p. 229, 16B

Silence, and light, and watchfulnes uiith you Attend and wind the Clue, No sleep, nor sloth assailes you, but poor man Still either sleeps, or slips his span, (11. 1-16)

At the end of Chapter Two the connection between the joys of "The Constellation" and those described in the opening of "Mount of Olives [ll3" was pointed out. More connec­ tions between important words in the opening lines of "The

Constellation" and words of other poems can bB drawn,

Vaughan linked religion with "Constellation" when he said that religion so multiplied and shined in Isaac that it became the "sacred Constellation" of his mind ("Isaacs

Marriage," 9-10), No fewer than six of Vaughan's poems begin with "Fair"* "Fair, order'd lights" ("The Constel­ lation"), "Fair and yong light" ("Fair and yong lightl .

. ,"), "Fair, solitary path" ("Righteousness"), "Fair, shining Mountains of my pilgrimage" ("Looking back").

"Fair prince of life, lights living well" ("Discipline"), and "Fair Vessell of our daily light" ("The Recovery").

In every instance, something fair is invoked, usually as an example to be followed. Fairness is linked with light in four out of six instances. Order reminds one of the contrasting "Disorder and frailty" that are man's (cf,

"Affliction [l]," 36) and introduces a contrast developed throughout the rest of "The Constellation," Light recurs in Vaughan's works, the most recent instance being in the poem immediately preceding "The Constellation," where 169

Vaughan expresses his faith in God's pouter to "light and lead" him home ("The Mutinie," 34), The phrase "without noise" evokes the "Tears without noise" of "An Epitaph upon the Lady Elizabeth , , ," (1, 13), "Conscience with­ out novsa" of Vaughan's translation of Casimire's "The

Praise of a Religious life" (1, 18), and "griaf • , , without noise" of "Jesus weeping [il]" (H» 46-47),

Vaughan compares the motion of the constellation's lights * not to something else that is visible but to the abstrac­ tion "Joys," which brings to mind the opening of "Mount of

Olives [ll3" and anticipates lines near the end of "I walkt the other day . . ,"i "Lead mB above / Where Light,

Joy, Leisure, and true Comforts move" (11, 58-59),

Obedience, stressed in the second stanza, furthers a theme prominent throughout Silex Sclntillans. In the poem immediately preceding "The Constellation” Vaughan asks God to make him obedient ("The Mutinie," 39), and the virtue of obedience is stressed two more times in

"The Constellation" (11. 29, 55), In the second poem after "The Constellation" Vaughan prayst "Open my rockie heart, and fil / It with obedience to thy wil" ("Misery,"

101-102), Downward and upward motion occurs also in the

"rising winds, / And falling springs" and man's climbing and lying down in "The Morning-watch" (11, 12-13, 23-24), the waters that fall and fly up in "The Tempest" (11, 25-

26), and the descent and rise of water in "The Water-fall" 170

(11. 9-12), to mention only a few examples. References to

night abound in Vaughan's poetry) the only poem in Silex

Scintillans in which "silent" occurs more than once is

titlBd "The Night." Vaughan refers to a "silent nook" in

the poem immediately following "The Constellation" ("The

Shepheards," 39).

The alternating locations of light in the Cast and

in the Ulest recall the West which others see as Cast in "An Clegie on the death of Mr. R. Hall ..." (11, 63-64)

and suggest the companion-piece3, "The Morning-watch" and

"The Cvening-watch." The "endles line" harks back to thB

"endless light" of the opening line3 of "The World [i]."

In the next stanza the contrast between the constel­ lation's watchfulness and man's sleep is echoed in the contrast between Bethlehem's seers who sleep and the shep­ herds who watch in "The Shepheards" (11. 22-28), and the contrast between the creatures which watch and man who sleeps in "And do they so? ..." (11. 31-32), and be­

tween trees and herbs which watch and Jews who sleep in "The Night" (11, 23-24), Other references to sleeping and watching recur throughout Silex Scintillans. The

"Clue" recalls the "CIu b / That guides through erring

hours" in "Son-dayes" (11. 21-22) and anticipates the

"Clue / To guide out others" in "The World [II]" (11,

2-3), Slipping recalls the speaker's confession that 171 he had "slipt / Almost to hell" in "The Relapse" (11, 1-2)

and the reference to others uiho "slipt into a wide Ex-

cesse" in "The World [i]" (l. 40).

The connections of elements in sixteen lines of one

poem with elements of Vaughan's other poems suggest the

network of interrelations operating within Vaughan's poet­

ry. In addition, many symbols by connotation and allusion

Bmbody meanings which ars not tied into any of Vaughan's « particular poems but are part of literate man's conscious­ ness. Itrat-Husain comments on the contributions of sym­ bolism to mystical expressiont "Symbolism has a definite significance in mysticism) it is true that symbolism is a sign for something which could not be expressed in any other way, but the meaning of the mystic always transcends the symbolism he employs to communicate his experience.

He has to contract the majesty of the infinite splendour of his vision in finite words, and the symbols that he uses suggest rather than describe the richness of his mys- 1 0 tical experience."

Some critics have interpreted the operation of

Vaughan's symbols by implication or suggestion as vague­ ness of diction. Vaughan apparently anticipated such criticism when he advised readers in the preface to the

18 The Mystical Element in the Metaphysical Poets of the Seventeenth Century (London* Oliver and Boyd, 19487* p. 214. 172 second edition of SilBX Scintillans that therB are "some passages. whose history or reason may seem something re- motei but were they brought nearer, and plainly exposed to your view, (though that (perhaps) might quiet your curiosity) yet would it not conduce much to your greater 1 0 advantage" (p. 221). Vaughan's purpose for doing this, as was pointed out in Chapter OnB, was to raise his verse above his readers' heads, "encouraging their minds to * stretch, to extend their understanding, to transcend the mundane world," It is easy to see how Vaughan does this through the symbolism of stars, birds, and herbs. These are tangible things which in Vaughan's poetry often point toward that which is intangible. But what about such words as "silence," "light," and "watchfulnes"? One reading superficially or incompletely the poems in Silex Scintil­ lans might consider "silence," "light," and "watchfulnes" vague abstractions, not recognizing that they are words which by their recurrence in Vaughan's poetry take on

19 Cf. a similar statement by Clement of Alexandria! "Dreams and symbols are all rather obscura to men • • . in order that an inquiry, investigating the mysteries, may discover the truth." The Latin translation is as follows! "Somniaque at symbola sunt omnia hominibus obscuriora . , , ut aenigmatum notionem subiens in- quisitio, ad inveniendam recurrat veritatem." Stromaturn. V, 4, Patroloolae Cursus Comoletus. Series Graeca, 9, ed. J. P. Migne (Parisiist Apud Gamier fratres, 1090), p. 43. Cf, Hugo Rahner, "The Christian Mystery and Pagan Mysteries," trans, Ralph Manheim, The Mysteries. Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks, 2 (New Yorki Pantheon Books, 1955), p. 365. 173

symbolic overtones, One can appreciate these so-called

vague or abstract words better when he understands their

function.

Just as Plato urged men to appreciate Beauty by

mounting from contemplation of a beautiful body, to con­

templation of two and then several beautiful bodies, and

thence to beautiful institutions and laws and sciences, and eventually to a vision of the essence of Beauty

(Symposium). so V/aughan, I think, strives to wean men

from mundane concerns by directing their attention first

to herbs, birds, and stars, then to Ibss tangible silence,

watchfulness, and light, and eventually to a contemplation

of eternity itself. Not bogging down his imagery with the

impedimenta of concrete details, he uses unparticularized

objects of the senses to lead men to travel beyond the

senses. For example, in "I walkt the other day , , .**

Vaughan, as an example for all men, prayst

Grant I may so Thy steps track here below, That in these Masques and shadows I may see Thy sacred way, And by those hid ascents climb to that day UJhich breaks from theB Ulho art in all things, though invisibly) Shew me thy peace, Thy mercy, love, and ease, (11, 48-56)

Vaughan sees nature not pantheistically as God but Platon-

ically as the vestigBS or footsteps of God, leading men

to follow the way toward God, Reality lies not so much 174

in the visible vestiges, which are but shadows and masques,

but in the invisible God Who produced the vestiges,

Vaughan's God not only is in nature, inasmuch as a cre­

ator is revealed by what he has created, but also tran­

scends nature, When Vaughan wrote the above lines, he

probably had in mind St, Paul's defense of the efficacy

of natural revelations T o r the invisible things of him

[[God] from the creation of the world are clearly seen,

bBing understood by the things that are made, even his

eternal power and Godhead" (Romans 1t20), According to

Vaughan* it is by climbing from visibles to invisibles, * all of which come from God, that one approaches eterni­

ty, Thus Vaughan hopes to elevate his thoughts by con­

templating the masques and shadows of nature, which lead

to thoughts of God's peace, mercy, love, and ease,

Vaughan states the same thought in different words when he says that "to give up our thoughts to pious Themes and Contemplations (if it be done for piBties sake) is a great step towards perfection! because it will refine, and dispose to devotion and sanctity. And further, it will procure for us (so easily communicable is that lov­ ing spirit) some small prelibation of those heavenly refreshments, which descend but seldom, and then very sparingly, upon men of an ordinary or indifferent holy- ness , , (pp, 220-221), While some critics might see 175

"peace,” "mercy,” "love," and "ease” as vague abstrac­ tions, l/aughan saw them a3 "pious Themes and Contempla­ tions.” which refine men's thoughts, burning away ex­ ternal trappings in order to get to essence. Some things are properly conveyed only by a lack of explicitnessi they are hinted at by suggestion.

As we have seen in Chapter Two, Vaughan proceeds first by means of the positive way, by meditetlng on what he s o b s , but he come3 to understand that ultimately nature, perceived by the senses, cannot fully convey the super­ natural. ThBn he proceeds along the negative way. One who, likB the blind seer Tiresias, can see invisibles no longer needs his carnal eyes. The righteous man, accord­ ing to Vaughan, is one who

seas Invisibles. . . . who walks not by his sighti Ulhose eyes arB both put out, And goes about Guided by faith, not by exterior light. ("Right­ eousness," 1 1 , 21-24)

St. Paul had expressed a similar thought when he said,

"we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not s e e m for the things which are seen are temporalf but the things which are not seen are star- on nal" (II Corinthians 4i18), Prior to man's mystical

^ For a similar statement see Ploto's Phaedoi "CWa] who has got rid, as far as he can, of eyes and ears and, so to speak, of the whole body, these being in his opinion distracting elements which when they infect the soul 176

experiencef thB natural world in whose "weaker glories"

man can spy "SomB shadows of eternity" ("The Retreats,"

13-14) is seen as helpful, but during and after mystical experience* the world is seen as a place which deceives

by painting and lying ("Mount of Olives [il]," 11).

In addition to using symbolism and abstract diction to hBlp convey his mystical experiences to his readers*

Vaughan also reveals the experience of eternity by pre­ senting the world sub specie aeternitatisi

[Christ] Being there [in heaven], this spacious ball Is but his narrow foot3 toole alia And what we thinke Unsearchable* now with one winks Hb doth comprise} ("Mount of Olives [i]," 25-29)

The elevated perspective works here in much the same way that it does at the end of Chaucer's Troilus and Crisevde. 21 compelling the reader to re-evaluate his perceptions.

hinder her from acquiring truth and knowledge«who* if not he, is likely to attain to the knowledge of true being?" The writer of The English Text of the Ancrene Riwle asso­ ciates outward blindness with inward sighti "Ule rede gen­ esis 27 fat fe owtward eghen of ysaak derked. & he my3 t not se. / Also holy toby was blynd tobie 2 But gret gostly. & inward sight. had fey bofe. t’us. be 3a as blynde. to behold thynges owward vnprofetable, / And god wil gif 3 0 W inwa'rde, ligTTt as he gafe hem." Ed. from British Museum MS Royal 8C.1 by A. C. Baugh* Early English Text Society, 232 (Londons Oxford University Press* 1956), p. 14.

V, 11, 1007-1870, The Uiorks of Geoffrey Chaucer, ed, F. N. Robinson, 2nd ed, (Boston1 Houghton Mifflin Company, 1957), p. 497. 177 The perspective is not unlike that resulting from looking

through a telescope from the end of widest diameter*

What one had thought grand comes to be seen as diminished.

Vaughan also achieves the mystic-poet*s difficult

task of relating tha experience of eternity to man by

challenging his reader's assumptions about reality, show­

ing that what the reader may have assumed to be real is

not real. Thus in "I walkt the other day ..." (11. 4B-

56) Vaughan describes external nature, the things man can see, hear, smell, touch,, and taste, as masques and shad­

ows, which are but imitations of or reflections from re­ ality. On the other hand, in "They are all gone ..."

Vaughan says that in man's "brighter dreams" Angels call to the soul, and just as sometimes happens in man's dreams, so sometimes "some strange thoughts transcend our wonted theams, / And into glory peep” (11. 25-26),

What the reader might have thought real, i.e., the things he could SBe or in some way perceive by his senses,

Vaughan says are shadows and masques. And dreams, what the reader might have assumed to be imaginary fantasies,

Vaughan asserts to be means of apprehending reality (cf.

"drBams of Paradise and light" affording foretastes of heaven in "Cock-crowing," 6 ). Significantly, not man's eyes but man's thoughts peep into glory. The senses are 178

transcended, and man experiences more directly by his 22 thoughts the mystical glory of eternity.

Some of Vaughan's poems, especially "Les Amours,"

"Regeneration," "The Lamps," "The Queer," and "The im­ portunate Fortune , . . are allegorical or contain allegorical elements. In "Monsieur Combauld" Vaughan de­ scribes the method of allegory whereby philosophy and

"hidden, disperst truths" are folded in "the dark shades of deep Allegorie" (11. 42-46). Fables and fancy are the means, drawing the reader's attention toward the meaning, i.e., truth and history. Allegory, operating so that events, objects, and participants in a narrative convey at least one parallel interaction of ideas, suggests to the reader that reality consists of other realms than those perceived by the senses.

Vaughan uses the allegorical devices of dreams and mirrors as aids for expressing eternal truths. In "The

Proffer" he refers to a dream about "A calm, bright dayl /

A Land of flowers and spices I" and concludes, "If these be fair. Q, what is Heaven" (11, 45-48), This suggests by a

22 Cf. these thoughts of Meister Eckharti "When the soul is gathered up in God's loving embrace^,] it rises up and stands in perfect beauty and bliss. The senses are mute. ThB knowledge of God becomes immediate and inde­ pendent of visual impressions. When the soul has reached the pure realization of God, it knows him in his Unity of Nature and Trinity of Persons," ffleistBr Eckehart SpBaks. trans. Elizabeth Strakosch (New Yorki Philosophical Li­ brary, 1957), pp. 55-56, 179 combination of analogical and a fortiori reasoning that just as the experience of the dream is more pleasing than everyday experience, so much more pleasing is the experi­ ence of heaven. In "The Stone" Vaughan says that he

Ulas shown one day in a strange glass That busie commerce kept between God and his Creatures, though unseen, (11. 19-21)

The allegorical device of the glass or mirror makes it possible for Vaughan to see and express invisibles.

The process of seeing invisibles is like the eloquence of silence* both are paradoxes, uihich, by challenging man's conceptions, hBlp to express the reality experienced and expressed by a logic-transcending mystic-poet. Just as symbolism weans man's mind from a notion of reality com­ prised only of those things which are perceivable by the senses, so paradox weans man's mind from a notion of reali­ ty understood only by reason's handling of the tools of formal logic. According to Malcolm M, Day, "part of the effect of paradox , , , is to move the mind away from its limited perspective to a level beyond the simple opposi­ tion of contraries. Even if the opposites which the mind confronts are not successfully transcended, their simul­ taneous assertion forces the mind to seek a transcendence.

Confronted with equally valid opposites, the mind must either accept them both as somehow simultaneously true 180

or 'resolve' their opposition by seeing them as coinciding 23 on a higher level of being."

In "The Ass" Vaughan, paradoxically praising the

ft i lowly ass and using it as a means to convey high truths,

expresses his belief in the superiority of faith over reason and his preference for being led by the mysteries of God rather than following his own potentially mis­ leading reasoning!

Let mB thy Ass be onely wise To carry, not search mysteries} Who carries thee, is by thee lead, Who argues, follows his own head, (1 1 , 21-24)

Vaughan's poetry is rich in paradoxes, although most are not original with him. An oxymoron is a paradox com­ pressed into two words} so, strictly speaking, eloquent silence is an oxymoron. The phrase "Eloquent silence" occurs in "The Charnel-house," 13} the concept of elo­ quent silence, as has been shown in Chapters Two and

Three, is one that permeates Vaughan's poetry. Other paradoxes and oxymora in Vaughan's poems include darkness and stars at mid-day, one made rich by having all taken away, a man who is "BBgger'd by wealth," the "ridiculous

23 "•Naked Truth* and the Languaga of Thomas Tra­ herne," SP, 68 (1971), 316-317, 0 A For further discussion of thB paradox of praising the ass, see Kitty W, Scoular, Natural Magici Studies in the Presentation of Nature in English Poetry from Spenser to Marvell' (Oxford! At the Clarendon Press, 1965), pp, 112-117. 1B1

miserle" of the times, the “sad delioht" of having been

absent from the funeral of a friend, gaining lifo by dying

and becoming richer by the loss of worldly fortunes, be­

coming less the more one grows, climbing by lying down,

sickness being wholesome, a man being prisoner to his

liberty, “high humility," dusty death being a jewel, dis­

cordant harmony, sour sweets, mid-night Sun, dazzling

darkness, “darkest nights [outshining]] their brightest

days," poverty-producing riches, peace being war, healing 25 by exaspirating a wound, and being “dead alive." At

the end of "The Shepheards" Vaughan explains how the star, signifying the birth of Christ, paradoxically transformed

the shepherds' night into day and their day into nightt

The first light thBy beheld was bright and gay And turn'd their night to day, But to this later light they saw in him. Their day was dark, and dim, (11. 51-54)

Vaughan also expresses the paradoxes implicit in Christ's

incarnation and passions

To put on Clouds instead of light, And cloath the morning-starre with dust,

25 References arB “A Rhapsodie," 1} "To Amoret Weep­ ing," 42| "The Charnel-house," 42j "To his retired friend * . . ," 78i "An Elegie on the death of Mr. R. W. slain • ■ • 74i "Authoris Cde se) Emblema." 15-T6*~"The Morn- ing-watch," 23-24* "Affliction |_IJ," 17* "Misery," 2* "They arB all gone , , , ," 13* and 17-19* "Joy," 2* "The hidden Treasure," 25* "The Night," 12* and 50* "To Lysi- machus , . , ,"42* "ThB importunate Fortune . . , ,"30 and 109-110* "To Etesia parted from him, and lookino back," 1* and 11-12* and "Etesia absent." 7, 182 Was a translation of such height As, but in thee, was ne*r exprestt

Brave wormes, and Earthl that thus could have A God Enclos'd within your Cell, Your maker pent up in a grave, Life lockt in death, heav'n in a shells ("The In­ carnation and Passion," 5-12)

Covering Himself with clouds and dust, Christ revealed

Himself to man. By descending, Christ achieved a high translations he expressed the inexpressible. The incar­ nation, enclosing God in a cell, paradoxically put eter­ nity in time and the infinite in finitude. Life's giver was taken by death. Han's liberator was pent up in a grave. While Christ's life was apparently locked up or confined in death, the truth of the matter is that man's life was locked or made securB in Christ's death. Christ, by taking on a material body or shell, enabled man to take in heaven.

Before leaving a discussion of Vaughan's paradoxes, we must take up two paradoxical questions about Vaughan's poetryt why does one who values silence write poetry? and how can a poet who values the eloquence of silence write what some critics consider to be wordy poetry? The writings of mystics furnish hBlp for answering the first question. Many mystics, after stating that their experi­ ence was ineffable, nevertheless attempt at least to ap­ proximate it in words, believing that although words do not fully match experience, they are not totally worthless. 163

Thus are mystics able to capture at least some traces of

their experience in words so that later they can better

remember their experience and so that other readers can

gBt a glimpse at what mystical experience is like. This

is also why Vaughan* who valued silence* nevertheless

wrote poetry. Itlords can be used as a means toward the

improved cultivation of silence in others* especially

those whose only contact with Vaughan and his thoughts

is through what he wrote. Valuing silence and writing

poetry are not Mutually exclusive interests. Vaughan

wrote poems not because he especially valued silence per

se but because he valued the eloquence of silence. This

reconciles Vaughan's poetry-writing* but not necessarily

his verbosity* with his valuing silence.

A clue to unravelling that paradox lies within the

oxymoron "eloquent silence." Vaughan's valuing silence

must not be seen es a rejection of all language. He

valued silBnce for its expressiveness* not for its empti­

ness. Just as elements of nature in his poetry were im­

pregnated with symbolism* so the silences were invested

with significance. I think that Vaughan saw words in much the same way as ha viewed nature. Words are helpful

toward expressing eternal troths in much the same way

that nature aids the mystic in apprehending and. expressing

eternal truths.' According to Isaac Penington* one of

Vaughan's contemporaries* "the end of words is to bring 184

men to a knowledge of things bayond what words can 26 utter," The positive way by which both nature and

words work to express the eternal Is seen as inadequate at the point when one is lifted up or enraptured by God*

Then one comes to recognize the frailty of his attempts to apprehend or express mystical experience. Plan's at­ tempts at describing eternity are like his climbing a mountain! at the summit he thinks that he has climbed a long way above the flatlands, But when the dove of the

Holy Spirit picks him up and lifts him much higher than he could ever imagine, he realizes the inferiority of his efforts. After going as far as words can reach, a poet can express what follows only by an eloquent silence, a silence which transcends words, Vaughan's verbosity can be understood as his verbal exertion, worthy insofar aa it can reach to the heights of the mountain of medita­ tion, He saw writing and reading divine poetry and prose aa means of growing close and leading others to God, In his preface to The Plount of Olives, a work of devotional prose, Vaughan encouraged readers on their wayi "Think not that thou art alone uoori this Hill, there is an in­ numerable company both before and behinde theB" (pp. 104-

105).

26 Quoted in PI, Ulhitcomb Hess, "A Quaker Plotinus," The Hlbbert Journal. 24 (1931), 483, 185

Vaughan's verbosity can be seen as his effort to go as far as words will take himt presumably, many words would tako him further than few words. Vaughan is not as repetitious as Traherne is; his words do bring one to new ground. Whether or not the new ground unprofitably sidetracks the reader or furthers his way is open to varying opinions. Vaughan's words generally add new content and bring new meaning to his poems. His verbos­ ity is not like the detailed descriptions which flesh out Joseph Conrad's works nor like the elaboration of symbolic overtones as exemplified by Herman Melville's explication of the whiteness of Moby Dick. Often Vaughan's wordiness is the extension of his poems' usefulness by the addition of didactic application* The added didacticism may striko twentieth-century readers as a form of wordi­ ness because they fail to appreciate seventeenth-century man's appetite for sermons and discourses on ethics. One man's delight may well bo another man's aversion. Unap­ preciative readors might fault Plato, I suppose, for not proceeding forthwith to Socrates' brilliant conclusions.

One subject about which Vaughan has relatively fewer words than has Donne or Herbert is himself. An examination * of first-person singular pronouns in the English poems of

DonnB, Herbert, and Vaughan shows that Donne had an avor- age of thirty-nine first-person singular pronouns per hundred .lines of poetry, Herbert had an average of 186 forty-foul* per hundred, and Vauqhan only twenty-seven per 27 hundred. A comparison of Herbert's "Faith" with Vaughan's

"Faith" indicates a change in emphasis From the self and its experiences to the world (comprising the books of nature and of Scripture) and its teachings. Both poems contain an equal number of lines. In Herbert*s poem "I" occurs eleven times, and in Vaughan's poem "I" occurs only twice. Vaughan begins his poem by invoking faith, meta­ phorically calling it a "Bright, and blest beame" (1, 1).

Herbert begins by addressing God, asking how He could deign to give man all things by faith. He then proceeds in the next three stanzas to narrate three separate oc­ casions when faith brought him something* faith brought him food, medicine, and relief from indebtedness. After invoking faith, Vaughan proceeds to tell that it "Reacheth as well things of dejection / As th' high, and tall!' (11,

3-4). It Is interesting to note that wherBas Vaughan first relates the reaches of faith to things, not man,

Herbert, on the other hand, uses human imagery in stressing the extent of faith's reaches*

• 27 The statistics were gathered by counting the num­ ber of first-person singular pronouns (I, me, my, mine) in the first, middle, and last, lines of each English poem. The to ta l number of such pronoun references found was d i­ vided by the total number of linBS examined to arrive at a percentage, which was converted to a ratio of references per’hundred lines, 107

IF blisce had lion in art or strength, Mono but the wi.3e or strong had gained it: Whore now by Faith all arms aro of a length; One size doth all conditions fit.

A peasant may belenvo as much As a great Clark, and reach the highest stature, (11. 25-30)

When Vaughan does relate faith to men, he uses Biblical imagery (cf, Ephesians 3:6 and Romans 0i17), which gives his statement a more doctrinal ring than Herbert's con­ crete, homely imagery evokes:

A ll may be now Co-heirs; no noise Of Bond, or Free Can Interdict us from those Joys That wait on thee[.] (11, 9-12)

Whereas Herbert relates faith as experienced by individual persons, Vaughan relates it as experienced by peoplB in groups:

How hath my God by raying thee Inlarg'd his spouse, And of a private familio Made open house? (11, 5-0)

Again Vaughan uses B iblical imagery to express his thought, this time referring to. God's spouse, a metaphor not for an individual but for the Church, In lines 13 through 40

Vaughan elaborates on how faith superceded the law and ceremonies when the "Sun of righteousness" (1, 21) ap­ peared, "as in nature, when the day / 8reaks, night ad­ journs" (11, 17-18), In lines 33 through 40 Herbert sim­ ila r ly us bs imagery of lig h t and darkness to express the coming of faith, made possible by Christ, Herbert closes 188

his poem by expressing his faith in an ultimate bodily

resurrection. In the final lines of Vaughan's poem ap­

pear its only "I"s«

Faith brings us hornet So that I need no more, but say JL £& believe. And my most loving Lord atraitMay Doth answer, Live. (11. 40-44)

Whereas, for the most part, Herbert's poem moves from

the specifics of his personal experience to generaliza­

tions about faith, Vaughan's poem moves from generaliza­

tions about faith to a personal application of what he

has learned and expressed. Rather anachronistically, Her­

bert operates more inductively, drawing conclusions from

his experience, but Vaughan operates more deductively,

drawing his conclusions mainly from the authority of Bib­

lical doctrine.

Vaughan is a conservative. Claiming that moat

"modern books are blots" on God and combinations of "self­

worship and self-ends" ("The Agreement," 25, 30), he values

established doctrine more than individual opinion. He in­

terprets the world more by the light of tradition.than by

experimentation. His universe is more like that described

by the Hermetic alchemists than that described by the Ba­

conian and later the Newtonian scientistsi it is more or­

ganic than mechanistic.

The highly allusive character of Vaughan's verse and his heavy borrowing from the Bible and George Herbert . 1 6 9

further establish his convnrvativD traditionalism. Vaughan

valued imitation more than self-expression, Ho would have

agreed with St. Augustine, who prayed: "whatsoever I have

said in these books that comes of thy QCod’s] prompting,

may thy people acknowledge i t : ' for what I have said that

comes only of myself, I ask of thee and of thy people par- 93 don," Before the Romantics began to stress originality

as a criterion for poetic expression, imitation was not re-

* garded as a sign of a poet’s insincerity. By quoting and

alluding to Bible vorses, Vaughan aligns his sacred poems

with Christian tradition; his poems thus achieve an author­

ity they otherwise would not have had. By borrowing heavi­

ly , from Herbert, Vaughan hoped to match the excellencies of

Herbert’s "holy, ever-living lines / [which} Have done much

good" ("The Match," 1 -2 ), Vaughan's borrowing is not so much plagiarism, arrogating for oneself credit for the words wrought by others, as i t is a way of w riting a poetry of self-donial.

Many of Vaughan's poems are not about his own experi­

ences but rather about what he reads from tho book of nat­ ural revelation and the Book of divine revelation. Vaughan meditates on man's fall, Abel’s blood, Isaac's marriage,

Jacob's•pillow and pillar, Mary, Christ's incarnation and

n a tiv ity , the shepherds who went,to Bethlehem, the daughter

28 • The Trinity. 15, Auoustine: Later Works, trans, John Burnaby, Library of Christian Classics Series, 8 (Philadelphia: The Westminster Pres3, 1955), p. 181. 1 90 of Herodias, Mary Magdalene, Jesus* weeping, Nicodemu3* visit, the ass that carried Chri3t, Palm Sunday, Christ's passion, Caster, Christ's ascension, White Sunday, and the day of judgement, .The process of meditation demands a si­ lencing of the self, a turning away from the noisy distrac-

» tions of human a ffa irs to a quiet concentration on an as­ pect of nature or on something related in the Bible, Many of Vaughan's meditative poems are structured in the manner og described by Louis L. Marts,*" The poet fir s t uses his memory to evoke and compose a place, time, or event, pro­ ceeds to use his understanding to analyze the subject com­ posed, and concludes by using his w ill and affections in colloquy to petition God or exhort a human audience.

Vaughan's "The Men of War" follows such a meditative structure. It opens with a reference to Luke 23:11, which * mentions Christ's being mockingly abused by Herod and his men of war. Vaughan counters this reference with a verse paraphrase of Revelation 13:9-10, which indicates the fu­ t i l i t y of actions undertaken by men of war. In the next section, lines 9 through 36, Vaughan moves from the past and timeless to the timely present. He applies the

29 The Poetry of Meditationt £ Study in English Religious Literature of the Seventeenth Century ( New Haven: Yale University Press, 1954? rpt’, 196*2), chaps, 1 and 2. According to Earl Minor, The Metaphysical Mode from Donne to Cowley (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1969), p, 110, Vaughan "is the most given to meditation of a ll the major Metaphysical poets," 191 cantont of the firs t ninn linos to his own situation and considers what h'is l if e would havo been i f ho had not boon enlightened by God’s Word; ho would have lived lik e a man of war. In lines 13 through 15 ho elaborates on how medi­ tation on God’s Word has guided him, and in lines 17 through 28 he contrasts saints with conquerors and heav­ en’s armies with earth’s sufferers, Vaughan closes the second section by drawing sim ila ritie s between Christ's sufferings and the sufferings of Christ's seventeenth- century servants, and between Christ's response to su ffer­ ing and theirs. This section of analysis is developed more by analogy and by associative expansion than by lo g i­ cal progression. He begins the last section, the collo­ quy, by addressing Jesus, asking Him for His virtues. The final six lines look toward the future, Vaughan prays that when the day of judgement comas, when the earthly conquer­ ors are overcome, he w ill be preserved

Amongst that chosen company, Who by no blood (here) overcame But the blood of tho blessed Lamb, (11. 50-52)

Only by the blood of One temporarily overcome by men of war can one permanently overcome tho men of war. The poet in meditation so manipulates time—enclosing past, present, and future in one poem—and space— moving from events hav­ ing taken place in Jerusalem, to those taking place in sev­ enteenth-century Britain, to those to happen in heaven— that in the span of a poBm he transcends time and space. 1 92

"Thn Constellation" is a good example of Vaughan's

meditation on a subject from the book of natural revela­

tion, I t opens with a composition of place, fifte en lines (previously quoted in this chapter) describing the

constellation. In lines 15 through 40 Vaughan develops

the section of analysis by contrasting the constellation with man*

Silence, and light, and watchfulnes with you [con­ stellation] Attend and wind thB Clue, No slesp, nor sloth assailes you, but poor man 15 S till either sleeps, or slips his span.

He grops beneath here, and with restless Care First makes, then hugs a snare, Adores dead dust, sets heart on Corns and grass But seldom doth make heav'n his glass, 20

Musick and mirth ( i f there be musick here) Take up, and tune his year, These things are Kin to him, and must be had, Who kneels, or sighs a l i f e is mad.

Perhaps some nights heo'l watch with you, and pqep 25 When i t were best to sleep, Dares know Effects, and Judge them long before, Whan th' herb he treads knows much, much more,.

But seeks he your Obndienne. Order. L.1 qht, Your calm and wel-train'd flight, 30 Where, thouqh the glory d iffe r in each star, Yet is thare peacB s t i l l , and no war?

Since plac'd by him who calls you by your names And fixt there all your flames, Without Command you never acted ought 35 And then you in your Courses fought.

But here Commission'd by a black s e lf-w il The sons the father kil, ThB Children Chase the mother, and would heal The wounds they give, by crying, zeale, 40 193

Then Cast her bloud, and tears upon thy book Where they for fashion lookf And like that Lamb which had the Dragons voice Seem mild, but are known by their noise,

Thus by our lusts disorder'd into wars 45 Our guides prove wandring stars, Which for these mists, and black days were reserv'd, What time mb from our first love swerv'd.

This lengthy quotation not only displays a meditational analysis structured by contrast but also illustrates

Vaughan's use of Biblical allusions and allegory aa a subtle means of social criticism and summarizes some of the high paints of his thought. In these stanzas from

"The Constellation" a aet of contrasts emerges, cluster­ ing around the constellation and around man. The one la silent! the other is characterized by music and noise.

Light characterizes the constellation! man gropes around in darkness, directed by his "black self-wil," The con­ stellation is watchful, neither sleepy nor slothful, but man "sleeps, or slips his span," The constellation,

"there," is obedient, never acting without Cod's com­ mand, and is orderly! man, "here," is restless, willful, fickle, and disordered. The constellation is characterized by calm and (except for one example of commanded excep­ tion, cf, 1, 36) peacei man, by cares and wars. The con­ stellation is part of the eternal heavens! man is part of the transient, mortal earth.

In lines 37 through 48 Vaughan allegorically de­ scribes the condition of man in seventeenth-century 194

Britain* Those who are "Commission9!) by a black self.- wil" and motivated by zeal represent those who prefer to follow their mutable consciences rather than the es­ tablished law and their emotions rather than their rea­ son* The sons who kill their father represent the Puri­ tans who had King Charles I beheaded* and the children who chase the mother are those Puritans who persecuted members of the Anglican Church* The Puritans justify their actions by misguided interpretations of the Bible*

They are deceptive* "like that Lamb which had the Drag­ ons voice” (cf* Revelation 13i11)* Plen have turned from

Cod* their "first love" (of* Revelation 2>4)* and* led by their lusts* have waged wars (cf* James 4t1-2)«

After claiming that human guides are but "wandring stars*" Vaugan in lines 49 through 60 pleads in colloquy to Christi

Yet 0 for his sake who sits now by thee All crown9d with victory* 50 So guide us through this Oarknes* that we may Be more and more in love with dayi

Settle* and fix our hearts* that we may move In order* peace, and love* And taught obedience by thy whole Creation* 55 Become an humble* holy nation*

Give to thy spouse her perfect* and pure dress* Beauty and holiness* And so repair these Rents* that man may see And say, Where God is. all agree* 60

Vaughan pleads for the guidance* more dependable than that of "wandring stars*" which God-assisted meditation 195 on the constellation con provide. Thus can men Innrn to live in "order, peace, and love" and bccomo "an humble, holy nation," Vaughan prays For the end of. divisive con­ flic ts , the end of contrasts batujeen man and constellation, the beginning of agreeable union, a holy wholeness in the presence of God,

Many of Vaughan's poems are developed and structured by contrasts: between disobedient man and obedient nature

(e .g ., "Distraction," "And do they so , , , "The Tem­ pest," "The Constellation," and "Man"), between action and contemplation (B,g,, "The Night" and "Misery"), bBtweBn the re lative ly good past and the decadent present (e .g ., "Reli­ gion" and "Corruption"), and between the imperfect present and the perfected future (e .g ., the concluding lines of

"The Men of War"), Vaughan concludes some of his poems by moving from the disjunctive clashing of contrasts to a quiet communion. At the end of "Death A Dialogue" the soul reassures the body of future reunion:

• Then shall wee meet to mixe. again, and mBt, 'Tis last good-night, our Sunne shall never set, (11. 31-32)

At the end of "Love-sick" Vaughan expresses his assurance of Christ's reconciling atonement:

for thou didst seal Mine with thy blood, thy blood which makes thee mine, Mine ever, Bvert And me ever thine. (11. 20-22)

The pronouns, working in chiasmic scheme, are mutually inclusive. The final lines echo both the final line3 of 196

Herbert’s "Clasping of hands"—"0 be mine s till! s till make

me thine! / Or rather make no Thine and Mine!" (11, 19-

20)—and Christ's prayer that His Followers "all may be

one* as thou Father art in me, and I in thee, that they

also may be one in us" (John 17*21), In such mutually in­

clusive oneness there is no need for words, for everything

is perfectly understood in silence.

Vaughan describes heaven as a place where desires need

no longer be voiced:

we shall there no more Watch stars, or pora Through melancholly clouds, and say Would i t uiera Day! ("Resurrection and Immortali­ ty," 65-68)

He does not describe thB experience of heaven in terms of sounding music but rather envisions heaven as an end of selfhood and mutability and as the final ordering of crea­

tion in undifferentiated unity. He pleads to Christ:

shine and spread Thy own bright s e lf over each head,30

30 In those linns Christ is described metaphorically as the Sun, n puri on Christ as the Son of God, The pun suqgoots in onn word more than one meaning and somotimnn ■implies a sense of analogy. Other puns in Vaughan's poems include man finding no peace in a piece of fleece ("Con­ te n t," 1-4), man finding no shade but "Yewgh"-you ("The Re­ lapse," 18;, "gracious art" ("The Tempest," 22;, those takun up-by, business rather than plav casting themselves "gravely" away ("Childe-hood," 27.-30;, works as volumes and as deeds ("Tho Book," 29), men being "bound" to the book- collector Bodley far th e ir fane ("On S ir Thomas -Bodloy's Library , , . ," 37-38), and the Sun-*5on pun in "Faith," 21V "To . . , JE5VS CHRIST , , , ," 19j "Ascension-day," 30, 36; "The Night," 12j and "The Agreement," 35, 197

And through thy creatures pierce and pass T ill all becomes thy cloudless glass,31 Transparent as the purest day And without blemish or decay, Fixt by thy s p ir it to a stato For evermore immaculate, ("L'Envoy," 9-16)

In an earlier part of this chapter it was shown how the cumulative effect of Vaughan's symbols, providing a network of in terrelatio n s, unifies his poetry. What re­ mains to be seen is how Vaughan's secular and sacred poems are a lik e , and how they d iffe r , and whether Vaughan's po­ etry shows any kinds of development. For the sake of c la r­ ification, I am calling every poem except poems comprising

S ile x ' S cin tillan s and the "Pious Thoughts and Ejaculations" section of Thalia Reriiviva secular. Although 01 or Iscanus

4 was published as late as 1651, later than the first edition

Silex S cin tillan s in 1650, I am assuming from Vaughan's prefatory dedication of Olor Iscanus to Lord Kildare Digby, signed and dated 17 December 1647, that a ll the poems in

Dior Iscanus antedate those in Silex S cin tillan s by several years. We cannot be sutb about the dates of poems pub­ lished in Thalia Rediviva because it is a compilation of poems w ritten throughout Vaughan's poetic caroer.

31 Cf, a similar state, the vitrification of nature, described by S ir Thomas Browne, Reliqio Medici , I, 50, od. Jean-Jacques Denonain (Cambridge* At the University Press, 1955), pp. 66-67; and by Andrew Marvell in "Upon Appleton House, to my Lord Fairfax," 11, 651-68B, The Poems and Letters nf Andrew Marvell. od, H, M. Margoliouth, 3rd dd. (Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1971), I,.p p . 83-84, 198

As indicnt.od espRci.ally in Chapters Tujo and Three,

Vauqhan writes about silence, quiet, dumbness, in e ffa b ili- ty, and related subjects in both hi9 secular and sacred poetry. Both his secular and sacrod poems reveal Vaughan's antipathy toward the Civil War, his desire for retire­ ment, and his fondness for nature. Sometimes he uses the vocabulary of religion in his secular poems, but, for. ex­ ample, the speaker's sins are believing a "Womans easie faith" and placing "True joyes in a changing face," and the lover sacrifices himself to heaven because of his * mistress's scornful eyes ("Les Amours," 1-6)j the lover'3 saint is his mistres.s, and his incense is his tears ("To his Friend Being in Love," 4-8). In Vaughan's secular poems religious imagery is usually forced to serve the language of human love. Both his secular and sacrod poems contain borrowings from others. But his secular poems show the influence of Classical poets, such a3

Juvenal, Horace, and V irg il, and of Ben Jonson and the

Sons of Ben; his sacred poems show the influence of the

Scriptures and of George Herbert.

Generally, Vaughan's secular poetry is public poetry, often addressed to a particular person; his sacred poetry is private, addressed to God or to meditating man in gen­ eral, His secular poetry, sometimes satirical, deals with man's external affairs with society; his sacred poetry, sometimes ly ric a l, deals with man's internal affairs 199 between the soul and God. As we have seen in Chapter Two,

uthen Vaughan refers to aspects of nature* such as silent stars* in his secular poems his purpose is often to estab- lieh an earthly setting or to furnish similes to embellish an amorous relationship! in his sacred poems nature is more often used symbolically to express divine* eternal truths*

Often his secular poetry is about a particular occasion! his sacred poetry is about that which is timeless*

The contrast between the end of "To my worthy friend

Master T. Lewes" and the end of "Resurrection and Immor- tality" epitomizes some of the main differences between

Vaughan's secular and sacred poems*

Why any more cast wee an Eye On what may come, not what is nloh? Why vex our selves with fBare. or hooe And cares beyond our Horoscope? Who into future times would peers Looks oft beyond his terme set here* And cannot goe into those grounds But through a Church-vard which thBm bounds! Sorrows and signes and searches spend And draw our bottoms to an and* But discreet Joyea lengthen the lease Without which life were a disease* And who this age a Mourner goes* Doth with his tears but feed his foBS* (11* 11-24)

So shalt thou then with me (Both wing'd* and free*) Rove in that mighty* and eternall light Where no rude shade* or night Shall dare approach us! we shall there no more Watch stars* or pore Through melancholly clouds* and say Would it were D a y ! One everlasting Saboth there shall runs Without Succession, and without a Sunne. T T T T 6 1 - 7 0 ) 200

.Vaughan's secular poetry is myopic; it concerns it3 elf mainly with present affairs, denying itself tho per­ spective of history and the vision of a future. His sacred poetry, on the other hand, gives hope to the present by faith in the future, Vaughan in his secular poetry can encourage his friend only to season his sor­ rows, sighs, and searches with "discreet Joyes," to keep a stiff upper lip amidst adversity. The governing phi­ losophies are Aristotelian moderation and Stoic imper­ turbability, In his sacred poetry, specifically in "Res­ urrection and Immortality," the conversation is inter­ nalized; the soul in colloquy addresses the body, en­ couraging it to have hope for the future. The guiding philosophy is Christian faith. Significantly, the lines of the secular poem are rigidly controlled; the octo­ syllabic couplets are all end-stopped. But the lines of thB sacred poBm, the concluding lines of the epode por­ tion of a Pindaric Ode, express liberation. The couplets % are not end-stopped but freely continue the movement of expression, and the first stop is softened by enjambment.

The first eight linBS alternate between what can tenta­ tively be called iambic tetrameter and iambic dimeter; the rather freewheeling meter is not nearly as regular as that of the secular poem. George N, Shuster points out .that the poems of "Silex Scintillans are as wayward prosodically as the most impetuous mystic could desire, , 201 • . As a rule, however, Vaughan's poems repeat the ini­ tial stanza with relative fidelity,"®2 The final couplet of Iambic pentameter is more regular, however, completing the poem with assured finality. In reading through Vaughan's poetry, one notices a development from the amatory poBtry dominating his Poems (1646), to occasional poetry dominating Olor Iscanus (1651), Vaughan's translations in Olor Iscanus. espe­ cially those of Boethius, whose Consolation of Philoso­ phy successfully combines Classical and Christian thought, furnish a transition to his later, more serious, sacred poetry, published in two editions of Silex Scintillans (1650, 1655), Thalia Redlvlva (1678) collects poems, both secular and sacred, not previously published. In contrast to both Herbert and Traherne, poets with whom Vaughan is most often compared, Vaughan favors the couplet as an ordering prosodic form and moves from a rather controlled use of couplets in his secular verse to a freer use of them in hiB sacred poetry. According to Antony frank Bellette, "it seems likely that in Vaughan the couplet serves the same purpose as Herbert's more tightly organized [and varied]] stanza patterns— to provide

IIM The Enollah Ode from Wilton to Keats (Gloucester, Wass,i Peter 5mith, 1964), p, 85, 202 a 8 olid Formal basis for subtle nuance and spontaneity of feelings,"33 Before closing the door on Vaughan's poetic expres­ sion » perhaps I might comment briefly on uhat is conspic­ uous by its absence from this consideration of Vaughan's style. Little has been said about his alliteration and assonance, metrics* rhyme patterns* and stanzaic schemes* Surely* all these are present to some degree* but usually they do not call attention to themselves* In his sacred poems especially* Vaughan avoids calling attention to aspects of his verse which would detain or completely stop readers at surface considerations of sound and struc- ture* Vaughan repeatedly expresses his preference for con­ sidering the inwardness of things* their essence rather than their externals. As early as his translation of Juvenal's "tenth Satyre*" published in 1646* Vaughan states that what makes life happy is not what fortunes the world bestows on a man from the outside but the virtue man has 34 within him* In "Thou that know'st • • •" Vaughan muses

33 "form and Vision in four metaphysical Poets," Dies* University of British Columbia, 1968, p* 169* 3d The Latin original followsi monstro quod ipse tlbi possis dare) semita carte tranquillae per virtutem patet unica vitae* nullum numon habes* si sit prudential noa to, nos facimus* fortuna* deam caeloque locamus* 203

on the ways of Cod with tnant

Thus hast thou plac'd in nans outside Death to the Common Eye, That heaven within him might abide, And close eternitiet (11. 29-32)

Similarly, Vaughan must have believed that for a reader to dwell solely an the manner of hie poems, the externals of sound and structure, mould be deadly, distracting him from the lively meaning within.

Why then these curl'd puff'd points. Or a laced story? Death sets all out of Joint And scornes their gloryi Some Love a Rose In hand, some in the skim But crosae to those, I would have mine within,' ("Content,** 17-24)

Vaughan understood well Herbert's pun on a rose-arose

("The Rose," esp, 1, 32) as in the above lines he states his preference for contents which are both essential and uplifting.

He wanted his poems to appeal not so much to the reader's eye or ear as to his heart and soul. Although he often imitated Herbert, Vaughan nBver arranged his lines to resemble an altar, a pair of wings, or any other visible thing. And Vaughan's lines are considerably less musical, Herbert's "Whitsunday" begins«

"Satire X« The Vanity of Human Wishes," 11. 363-366, Juvenal and Persiua. with English trans, by G, G. Ramsay (New Yorltei- G, P, Putnam's Sons, 191B| rpt, 1930), pp, 220-221. Listen sweet Dove unto my song* And spread thy golden wings in mey Hatching my tender heart so long* Till it get wing, and flie away with thee, (11. 1-4)

Vaughanv8 "White Sunday" beginsi

Wellcome white dayl a thousand Suns Though seen at once, were black to theey For after their light, darkness comBS, But thine shines to eternity, (11, 1-4)

Herbert addresses a sweet dove with golden wings, the Holy

Spirit described by visible and tangible and perhaps even gustatory imagery, Vaughan addresses a white day, a rather conceptual and certainly intangible imagB, if it can be considered an image at. all, Herbert refers to himself and calls special attention to the fact that his poem is a song, Vaughan makes no reference to himself nor to song,

Herbert's perfect rhymes, "song" and "long," "me" and

"thee," befit a song, Vaughan's imperfect rhymes, "Sun*" and "comes," "were black to thee" and "eternity," certainly do not befit a song, Herbert's lines are best read aloudi

Vaughan's, best read silently.

Vaughan played down the musical and visual aspects of his poetry not only to emphasize spiritual things over physical or material things but also to de-emphasize his artistry. According to Helen C, White, "for the mystic the creation of the work of art must ever seem • • • of less consequence than the expression of the experience, ,

, , the end of the mystical poet is silence, the silence of contemplation before which beauty is even a little 205 35 thing*" Just as after Vaughan's conversion his per­

sonal goal was to live "invisible and dim" in God ("The

Night," 54), so also, I believe, his poBtic goal uias to

de-emphasize his ingenuity and poetic craftsmanship.

Vaughan did not strive, like Herbert, to imitate God's

unlimited creative ability by making a temple of poems,

embodying a wide variety of stanzaic forms. He saw the

poetic act not so much an imitation of God as an in­

spiration by God. Consequently, he endeavored to make

himself as invisible or translucent as possible so that

God's uorda could be transmitted through hia poems un­ sullied.

He pleaded, 4 36 touch with one Coal My frozen hearts and with thy secret key Open my desolate roomst my gloomie Brest With thy clear fire refine, burning to dust These dark Confusions, that within me nest. And soyl thy Temple with a sinful rust. ("Dress­ ing," 3-8)

Uhen the confusions of his self-expression were silenced, he could speak most eloquently for Godi

35 White, pp. 31, 35. 36 Cf. the purging of Isaiah's lips by a live coal (Isaiah 6 i6-7). f i n Cf, the statements of Ben Jonsoni "[We] must take the care that our words and sense bee cleare. . . . For Order helpss much to Perspicuity, as Confusion hurts." Tlmben or. Discoveries, in Literary Criticism of Seven­ teenth-Century EnolandI~ed. Edward it). Yayler (New York* Alfred A. Knopf, 1967;, p. 122, 206

If the Sun rise on rocks* i s H right* To call It their inherent light? No* nor can I say* this is mine* for* deareot Jesu3* H i s all thine. ("To . . • JESVS CHRIST . . . 19-22) Conclusion

For the last twenty-nine years of his life, Vaughan mas virtually silent. The last extant poem that can bo dated with assurance is "Daphnla," an elegiac eclogue, which, according to F. E, Hutchinson, commemorated the 4 death of Henry's twin brother Thomas in 1666, Henry

Vaughan died in 1695, Although Vaughan's last volume of poems, Thalia Redlvlva;. was published as late as 1676, the volume was a compilation of poems written over a span of many years and may have been published without Vaughan's full consent. Neither the dedication nor the preface to the reader is signed by Henry Vaughan.

A number of scholars have speculated about the rea­ sons for Vaughan's late silence, Hutchinson conjectured that Vaughan may have abandoned authorship because "the reception of his books may have offered him little en­ couragement, and, besides, there were the pressing claims 2 of his professional life" as a physician, Edmund Blunden

1 Henrv Vauohant ife and Interpretation (Oxfordi At the Clarendon Press, 2 „ Hutchinson, Henrv Vauohan. p, 212,

**■ ■ 207 208 suggested that, like Herman Melville after writing Mobv

Dick. "Vaughan had found himself on such sudden heights of vision that afterwards he knew his day had come and 3 gone.'" . frank Kermode speculated that, after the ex­ panded second edition of Silex Scintillans in 1655,

Vaughan’s inspiration left him almost as inexplicably as it had come to him.*

E. C, Pettet comments that the mid-seventeenth cen­ tury religious and political conflicts were not conducive c to poetry-writing, but the years of the Civil War, the

1640's and 1650's, were Vaughan's moBt prolific years.

Some passages in Vaughan's poems indicate that Vaughan found conflict a stimulus for writing. In "Oq Sir Thomas

Bodley's Library , , he says that "Afflictions turn our Blood to Ink" (1, 21), and in "To the Editor s i x * matchless Orinda" he comments that "wit, as well as piety /

Doth thrive best in adversity" (11, 15-16). E. L. Marilla claims that the "final overthrow of the monarchy and the execution of the king supplied the impulse in 1650 to

3 "On the PoemB of Henry Vaughan," The London Mercury. 15 (1926), 72,

* "The Private Imagery of Henry Vaughan," RES. N, S., 1 (1950), 225. e Of Paradise and Llqhti A Study of Vaughan's SU bx Scintillans (Cambridgei At the University Press, 1960), p, 210, Cf, Abraham Cowley, Poems (Chiswicki From the Press of C. Whittingham, n. d.J, I, p. 70, 209

bring forth the sacred verse as appropriate testimony to

the efficacy of Christian faith during thB current triumph

of evil. " 6

Perhaps, uiith the Restoration of 1660 and with the

confidence of his religious faith strengthened by all that

he had written, his external and internal conflicts being

thus considerably diminished, Vaughan saw no reason to con­

tinue writing. Itrat-Husain speculated even beyond this

in suggesting that, like St. John of the Cross, Vaughan

"had realized that the higher stages of mystical life re­

late 'to mattsrs so interior and spiritual as to baffle

the powers of languags,* and so remained silent. R. A.

Durr compared Vaughan's late silence with that of St.

Thomas Aquinas, who, having been granted mystical know­

ledge, "considered all he had donB before as so much straw

and stubble, and wrote no more." "Recalling the Silurist's

supplications for the full vision and union," Durr con­

tinues, "one wishes that his silence were the consequence g of just such an experience, the fulfilment of his desires,"

6 "The Religious Conversion of Henry Vaughan," RES. 21 (1945), 22. 7 The Mystical Element in the Metaphysical Poets of the Seventeenth Century (Londoni Oliver and Boyd, 1940), p. 236, The words of St. John of thB Cross came from The Living flame of Love, trans. David Lewis (London* Thomas Baker, 19347* p, 1, g On the Mystical Poetry of Henrv Vaughan. Cam- ' bridge, Mass.i Harvard University Press, 1962), pp. 143n-144n. 210

But Vaughan's poems give evidence that after the mystical

experience described in "Mount of Olives ar|d after

having seen "Eternity the other night" ("The World Cl],"

1), Vaughan went on to record thosB experiences and to write other poems. If Vaughan's late silence is not the result of poemsi manuscripts, or published volumes having been lost or destroyed, I think that Vaughan's silence was less like that of St, Thomas Aquinas and mare like t that described by St, John of the Cross, St, Thomas

Aquinas, having laid aside the Summa Theolooica. on which he had been working, after a period of silence, said,

"All I have written ssemB nothing but straw • • • com­ pared to what I have seen and what has been revealed to g me," St. John of the Cross gave another reason for his silencel

Clt] seemed to me that enough has been said already to affect all that is needful, and that what is wanting (if indeed anything be wanting) is not writing or speaking— whereof ordinarily there is more than enough— but silence and work, for whereas speaking dis­ tracts, silence and work collect our thoughts and strengthen the spirit. As aoon there­ fore as a person understands what has been said to him for his good, there is no further need to hear or to discussi but to set him­ self in earnest to practice what he has learnt with silence and attention, in humility, char­ ity and contempt of self,'*0

g JoBef Pieper, The Silence of St. Thomas, trans, John Murray and Daniel O'Connor (New York* Pantheon, 1957), p. 39. 10 Quoted in Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy 211 The step from underplaying poetic craftsmanship and diminishing self-expression to giving up all poetic ex­ pression is a short one* I think that Vaughan's late silence indicates the fuller attention given to his medi­ cal practice* After years of the contemplative life of writing poems* he was prepared to enter more completely the active life of a country doctor* Uthen he prayed*

"0 God , . . / give my spirit leave / T o act as well as to conceive" ("Anguish*" 16-18)* he was ready to trans­ late words to deeds*

Vaughan* after his conversion* renounced the "fol­ lies" of his secular verse (p* 219)* but,.so far as we know* he did not, after he had stopped writing poems* belittle the sacrBd poems that he had written* Unlike

Herbert, he did not suggest that his sacred poems be burned if they did not "turn to the advantage of anv 11 delected poor Soul." He viewed the sacred poems ho had written as the fruits of his faith and offered them

(New Yorki Harper Brothers* 1944), p* 216* Cf* the fol­ lowing "Spiritual Maxims" of St* John of the Crossi "For growth in virtue* the important thing is to be silent and to worki conversation distracts* silence and work bring recollection*" "The moment a parson understands what is told him for his good* there is no necessity for him to ask for further direction* nor to speak about it* but to act upon it sincerely in silence* carefully* in humility* charity* and contempt of self*" The Living Flame of Love, p. 236* 11 Quoted in Izaak Walton, The Lives of John Donna. Sir Henrv Wotton. Georoe Herbert & Robert Sanderson (1670) (New Yorki Oxford University Press* 1927), p* 314* 212 up in thanksgiving to God not by burning thorn as a burnt

sacrifice but by publishing them abroad, asking God,a

blessing upon his gift to "make it as useful now'in the

publick. as it hath bean to me in private" (p, 2 2 1 ),

We cannot be as sure about the reasons for Vaughan's

late silence as we can be about hie desire to cultivate

eloquent silence both in his life and in his poetry. An

examination of Vaughan's poetry reveals, as ure have seen,

his strong preoccupation with silence amidst the noises

of mid-seventeenth-century British religious and political

polemics and Civil W a n « Abominable face of things! here's noise Of bang'd Mortars, blew Aprons,''2 and Boyes, Pigs, Dogs, and Drums, with the hoarse hellish notes Of politickly-deafe Usurers throats, ("To his retirad friend . * * ," 15-18)

"The world," he said, "Is full of voices| Man is call'd,

and hurl'd / By each, he answers all" ("Distraction," Il­ ls). Vaughan answered not with loud oratory but with some

volumes of poetry. During the course of his poetic career

his motives for writing verse changedi after his conver­

sion, he no longer wrote so much to bring fame to others

and to himself and to delight a select group of ingenious

12 According to L, C. Martin, ed., The Works of Henrv Vaughan, 2nd ed. (Oxfordi At thB Clarendon Press, 1957), p. 706, "blew Aprons" are the marks of tradesmen. 213 readers as to toach and move a wide audience of readers.

His source of inspiration changed from witty sack and gold to God. The content of his poems progressed from the expression of his diversions from the noisy world to his criticism of the world and, finally, to his con­ version from the ways of the world.

He answered the noises of his times by contemplat­ ing nature's eloquent silences*as means of God's revela­ tion and by turning his attention away from the face of things to a "Countrie / Far beyond the stars," where

"above noise, and danger / Sweet peace sits crown'd with smiles" ("Peace," 1-6), He counselled a retirement from the world of human affairs, urging man, like a seed growing secretly, to

bless thy secret growth, nor catch At noise, but thrive unseen and dumb; Keep clean, bear fruit, earn life and watch Till the white winged Reapers cornel ("The 5eed , , . ," 45-46)

Vaughan considered himself dumb in writing his sacred poems because what he wrote was not self-ex­ pression so much as a reflection outward to other men and back to God of what God had communicated to him.

He did not enter the fray of political and religious pamphleteers. Instead of arguing, using words to wage war, he turned man's attention to the eternal verities, which silently smile upon man's feeble efforts to change men's minds and to transform the world. He paid attention not 214 so much to what hs could learn from the voices of other men ae to uihat he could learn from God's speaking through

Scripture and through nature.

In a time of disunity Vaughan sought wholeness in union with God by meditation upon and poetic expression of

divine truths. He was not much concerned with the artistry of his verse because the criteria for artistry change ac­ cording to the fashions of the times and because artistry draws attention more to the cleverness of the poet than to the meaning of the poem, Eloquence for Vaughan consisted not so much in the form of the verse as in the truth of the matter and the perfection of life. List of UJorks Cited

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