Herberts Instruction For Christian Youth Theology Religion Essay

[Theologian]

Expressing their conviction for the religious instruction of children, both George Herbert and Jean Calvin asserted that the pedagogical nourishment of the Christian youth must 'multiply and build up [their] knowledge', since its 'principall and chiefest end [must be for] the childe … [to] know God'. [2] Using, as a foothold, evidence that parts of George Herbert's poetry was assimilated into children's educational literature, such as Thomas White's A Little Book for Children (1671) and Joseph Downing's The Young Christian's Library (1710), this first chapter will present and analyse the examples of basic Christian instruction and principles that are contained in 'JESU' and 'H. Baptisme '. [3] By firstly considering 'JESU', I will propose a new physical, as opposed to interlocutory, model of catechism within the poem as an alternative to the existing analysis of this religious literary style offered by Stanley Fish. [4] I will suggest that Herbert upholds a physical manner of catechism as the most beneficial to the reader for achieving religious edification in the basic Christian precept of Christ's nourishing habitation within the individual. This will be demonstrated through an initial analysis of Herbert's destabilization of the speaker's existing knowledge of Christ and the establishment of the 'little frame' [5] as the vehicle for his poem's catechism, before moving to examine how Herbert rebuilds and extends their knowledge at the moment of pedagogical nourishment. Moving secondly to an examination of the oft-neglected 'H. Baptisme ' and its echoing of central paedobaptismal doctrines contained within The Book of Common Prayer, I shall focus on how Herbert addresses and nourishes the child within his adult reader, who has pre-existing knowledge of such arguments, in order to bring them to a reaffirmation of these values. This will be demonstrated through an initial examination of how Herbert's use of the pedagogical tool of a commonplace horticultural allegory allows the speaker to arrive at articulating and remembering Christ as the origin of baptism's salvific power. I shall then move to analysing the two components of Herbert's aquatic metaphor involving baptismal water's 'blessed streams!' [6] and consider the pedagogical nourishment provided in this consideration of the vehicle for baptism. Finally, my consideration of the speaker's confident tone in the poem's final five lines will reveal how Herbert convincingly conveys to the reader the benefit of remembering the salvific power of their paedobaptism throughout life. Ultimately, a consideration of these examples of Herbert's pedagogical nourishment will reveal how his methods of instruction facilitate the acquisition of, and respect for, what Christina Malcolmson terms 'deep spiritual devotion and ethical behaviour' in both the young Christian reader and the child within the adult reader. [7]
Beginning this chapter with a re-examination of 'JESU's' catechistical style, what is paradoxically most notable about its opening, as confirmed by Stanley Fish and Helen Vendler, is that the poem's speaker appears to have no need for this poetic instruction; he has purportedly already attained a definitive sense of pedagogical nourishment by stating that 'JESU is in my heart' (1) in the first line. [8] However, as the experienced reader of Herbert has come to expect, this statement only signifies a premature and incomplete knowledge of Christ's nourishing capabilities since it is immediately destabilized through the caesura and volta of 'but' (2) as the 'little frame' (3) is broken 'all to pieces' (4), like a jigsaw. It is from this point of fracture that Herbert's catechizing of the poem's speaker and reader can commence as he begins his pedagogical purpose of 'multiply[ing] and build[ing] up [the youth's] knowledge' of Christ. [9] Stanley Fish's analysis of the poem's catechistical style moves immediately from this destabilizing moment to assessing the edifying effects of rebuilding the four 'pieces' (4) of Christ's name at the conclusion, and thus neglects to note the individual significance of the 'little frame' (3) as the main vehicle for the poem's physical, as opposed to interlocutory, manner of catechistical instruction. [10] In fact, I contend that Herbert uses the broken 'little frame' (3) as the physical object for enacting the active catechizing of the poem's persona and the youthful Christian reader as they acquire new knowledge about Christ's nourishing essence; thereby confirming the suggestion of Janis Lull that Herbert's 'ideal … reader [i]s an active agent'. [11] Hence, in a move that is unequivocally akin to John Bunyan's belief in the importance of domestic objects in the child's catechism, and his associated pledge that 'by their play-things, I would … entice [them]' to religious learning, Herbert begins his active method of catechistical instruction by using the object of the fractured 'little frame' (3) to imperatively drive the speaker and reader to 'seek' (4) its four pieces that form the 'parcel[…]' (7) of Christ's 'sacred name' (1) and nourishing whole. [12] Thus, by destabilizing the speaker's and reader's existing knowledge of Christ's 'sacred name' (1) and by invoking a physical method of rebuilding and developing it through the use of a familiar domestic object, Herbert begins the first stage of his pedagogical catechizing of the Christian youth by 'making that [which] he knows serve him in what he knows not', as he fittingly suggested in The Country Parson. [13]
Continuing the ingenious use of what Patricia Demers terms the catechism's 'adaptability of form', which Herbert stated was the most 'admirable way of teaching' the young Christian whereby they can 'delight [themselves] by way of [an] exercise upon [themselves]', the speaker approaches their moment of pedagogical nourishment by piecing together the four components of the 'frame' (3): firstly finding the foundational corner of 'J' (5), then 'E S and … U' , before confidently '[sitting] down to spell them' . [14] It is thus at this second physical moment of 'spell[ing]' , as opposed to 'seek[ing]' (4), that, through these separate 'parcels' (7) of his name, the pedagogy of Herbert's active mode of catechism brings the juvenile speaker and youthful Christian reader to two new understandings of Christ's nourishing essence. In a characteristic moment of Herbertian inventiveness, the speaker firstly collates what Martin Elsky suggests are these separate 'lexical units' of 'JESU' (1) into the phonetic and syntactic unit, 'I ease you' (9); crucially pronouncing the 'J' as an 'I' in accordance with the lack of differentiation between the two in the seventeenth century. [15] Hence, in the first result of Herbert's catechistical pedagogy, by phonetically spelling the name of Christ from the components of the 'little frame' (3), the speaker and reader arrive at an understanding of the palpable nourishment that Christ provides for their 'broken heart' (9). Furthermore, in the second and final revelation of their new knowledge of Christ's healing power, at the conclusion of the poem's catechism the speaker can articulate the complete centrality of Christ to his individual being by now recognising that he does not dwell merely 'in my heart' (1), as was the case in the opening line, but nourishes and ensures the well-being of their 'whole' (10). Herbert's adoption of this active and physical method of catechism, through the vehicle of the 'little frame' (3), has therefore revealed to the young reader the pedagogical benefit of embracing a destabilization of religious knowledge in order to reconstruct and develop it in a way that allows them to 'pierce into the sense' of the basic Christian principle of the centrality of Christ's 'sacred name' (1) to religious well-being. [16]
Progressing now to examining the presence of what Fish confirms was Herbert's belief in establishing his reader's knowledge of Christ's habitation within them as a nourishing and healing force, I will examine how, within 'H. Baptisme ', Herbert reworks this idea by addressing the child within his adult reader and causing them to reaffirm their knowledge of paedobaptismal arguments. [17] Herbert evidently had a key interest in the lasting instructional benefits of infant baptism that can be revisited in adulthood by not only defending its practice in his Latin poem 'De S. Baptismi Ritu', [18] but also explicitly stating in The Country Parson that adults should 'call to minde their Baptism often' in order to counteract sin's pollutant effects. [19] Such an interest is unequivocally present in the pedagogical tool of 'H. Baptisme 's' opening sestet and its horticultural allegory which allows the speaker to arrive at reaffirming their knowledge of Christ as a salvific force. By electing to include a reference to an allegorical 'dark and shadie grove' (1), Herbert enters into the Renaissance literary tradition of instructional religious imagery inherited from Spenser and Dante. He therefore establishes the figurative 'grove' (1) [20] as an image that his astute reader can decode as representing what Mark Taylor confirms to be the sinister trappings of sin, 'error or deception'. [21] Herbert then continues this allegory into the second line by suggesting that his reader may transcend the density of this sinful 'shadie grove' (1) by remembering to 'look beyond' (2) it to the vertical height and allegorical religious space of the 'skie' (2). However, for the reader that has not yet made a confident enthymematic leap by supplying the baptismal subtext of this allegory, the emphatic trochee of 'so' (3) in the third line indicates that its significance will now be laid out for the reader as Herbert rejects what Ramie Targoff terms an 'aesthetic imperative' of form in favour of one that is 'mnemonically accessible'. [22] Through the use of the stanza's parallel syntactical structure, Herbert supplies the child within his adult reader with what I suggest are invisible lexical arrows which allow them to link the components of his allegory to this exposition on the origin of infant baptism's salvific power. Thus, these lexical arrows substitute the allegorical 'grove' (1) for 'sinnes' (3), and the transcendent 'skie' (2) becomes the salvific baptismal 'water … / Which is above the heav'ns' (4-5); a simple but highly effective use of syntax which won the praise of Herbert's nineteenth-century admirers including Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who admired the 'pure … and unaffected' structure of his stanzas. [23] This undeniably helpful connection therefore allows the speaker and reader to progress and reach a moment of pedagogical nourishment as they 'move backward' (4) to considering their infant baptism and confidently reaffirm their knowledge that the original 'spring' (5) of this salvific baptismal 'water' (4) comes from 'my deare Redeemers pierced side' . This reinforces a prayer from the order of the Infant Public Baptism where they were told that 'for the forgiveness of our sins, [Christ] did shed out of his … side both water and blood'. [24] Hence, by entering into a 'mnemonically accessible' tradition of allegorical imagery inherited from his Renaissance predecessors, Herbert illustrates the methodology of surpassing the dense trappings of sin's 'grove' (1) by casting the mind back to the basic, yet transcendental, paedobaptismal argument of Christ's soteriology and salvific power; therein reaffirming his reader's knowledge of one central, nourishing tenet of their baptism that, as The Country Parson confirms, should be 'meditated on … often' in adulthood. [25]
Following from triggering the reader's remembrance of the reverse transubstantiation that occurred when Christ's 'pierced side' provided the salvific baptismal 'water' (4), Herbert's speaker now recalls the power of this vehicle for infant baptism and its medicating power through two components of an aquatic metaphor. [26] In the first instance, the metaphor re-invokes the earlier references to the 'dark … grove' (1) of sin as the speaker confirms that the salvific power of the 'streams' (7) from infant baptism act as what Lull terms a 'spiritual herbicide' by preventing their sins from 'growing thick and wide' . [27] It is here that, in his pedagogical purpose of addressing the child within his adult reader to reaffirm their existing knowledge of baptismal argument, Herbert conflates personal and liturgical voices by alluding to the order of Infant Public Baptism from The Book of Common Prayer. [28] In the service's second prayer, this recognition of baptismal water's pesticidal power is upheld in the statement that 'by … th[e] well-beloved Son Jesus Christ … all … [baptismal] waters … wash[…] away sin' and the baptized individual is 'delivered from [God's] wrath' at their transgression into the 'grove' (1) of sin. [29] However, Herbert's reader is not pedagogically nourished through this allusion to the baptismal water's 'blessed streams' (7) alone. In the second constituent of this aquatic metaphor, introduced by the connective 'or' (9), Herbert revisits the power of his reader's penitential 'tears' (9) through which, in another allusion to the Infant Baptism's liturgy, they should 'not be ashamed to confess' their sins and repent in this manner. [30] By allusively revisiting this second component of paedobaptismal argument, the speaker reaffirms in Herbert's reader the efficacy of penitential tears that, charged with the power of their baptism, possess the capability to 'drown' (9) sins 'as they grow' (9): thereby preventing them from reaching the 'thick' and dense 'grove' (1) contained in the allegorical caveat of the first two lines. Thus, by employing two constituents of an aquatic metaphor within another instance of his simple, accessible syntax, Herbert reinvigorates his adult reader's pre-existing understanding of these paedobaptismal arguments concerning both the water's medicinal power of 'stop[ping] … sinnes from growing thick and wide' , and the use of 'drown[ing]' (9) penitential 'tears' (9) that help to prevent the pollutant growth of sin. Contrary to Lull's conclusion that Herbert '[did] not … associate genuine religious [knowledge] with images of … horticultur[e]', the use of this aquatic metaphor in fact demonstrates that it is this genus of imagery which allows Herbert to fulfil his pedagogical purpose. [31] He is able to address the child within his adult reader and nourish them in the importance of consistently reaffirming what he termed the 'principles' of the vehicle for their baptism in order to maintain its strength as what the liturgy terms a 'banner against sin'. [32]
In relation to what Curtis Whitaker confirms was Herbert's evident belief in infant baptism's redemptive force, which he has just conveyed through the preceding allegories and metaphors, I shall now finally consider the pedagogical nourishment provided for the reader in the tone of soteriological confidence that emerges from the speaker in the final five lines. [33] Janis Lull has argued that at the poem's conclusion the 'speaker … places too much faith in his personal future'. [34] However, by identifying the concluding tone as one of arrogance, Lull incorrectly elides the poem's allusion to The Book of Common Prayer's pedagogic baptismal principle of 'regenerat[ion]', and that the speaker's remembrance of paedobaptismal arguments should in fact cause them to possess confidence in being '[one] of [Christ's] faithful and elect children'. [35] Hence, Herbert has his speaker express this religious confidence to the reader by correctly stating that, since their name has been included in 'the book of life' (12) or baptismal register, following their repentance through penitential 'tears' (9) that 'drown' (9) the sin, Christ will ensure that his figurative nourishing 'plaister' (11) will be 'spread … equall' (11) to their transgression. [36] Subsequent to this instructive exposition on what Richard Strier has termed the regenerating and 'permanent efficacy of baptism', [37] Herbert concludes his poem with a couplet that is certainly an example of the simple and accessible mnemonic nature of many of his closing lines. [38] The final pedagogical nourishment illustrated for the Christian reader within 'H. Baptisme ' is therefore the speaker's concise summary of the development of their knowledge across the poem as they now understand their 'first acquaintance' (14) with infant baptism as a doctrine of powerful redemptive force that, if they actively remember its principles, can 'discredit' (14) the individual's 'sinnes' . Through Herbert's address to the child within his adult reader and their knowledge of paedobaptismal arguments, by the conclusion of the poem, they have arrived at what Herbert referred to as a necessary 'competent knowledge of salvation' through an understanding of their infant baptism as an event to be revisited and 'view[ed]' (3) in the interests of continued religious health and edification. [39]
In conclusion, this chapter has demonstrated that, within 'JESU' and 'H. Baptisme ', there are to be found excellent illustrations of Herbert's pedagogical nourishment that can be, and at times were, related specifically to the instruction of both the young Christian reader and the child within the adult reader through what Ryan Stark identifies as the 'interactive, warm and cooperative' nature of Herbert's devotional poetry. [40] The examination of these two poems in this first chapter has revealed not only the pedagogical purpose of Herbert's poetry to nourish his literal and implied young Christian readers, but also its intention to 'inflame … knowledge, and to encourage them to begin 'driv[ing] [this knowledge] to practice' by allowing them to 'pierce into the sense' of basic Christian principles. [41] By proposing a new physical, rather than interlocutory, model of catechism, my analysis of 'JESU' demonstrated that Herbert destabilizes his speaker's and reader's pre-existing knowledge of Christ's 'sacred name' (1) before using the catechistical vehicle of the 'little frame' (3) to bring them to a pedagogical conclusion that provides two new dimensions of knowledge about Christ's nourishing essence. The analysis of Herbert's use of the Renaissance's literary tradition of the horticultural allegory and his ingenious use of connective lexical arrows in 'H. Baptisme ' revealed his determination to re-convey to his reader the importance of recognising sin as a 'dark and shadie grove' (1) and to transcend it by remembering the soteriology of Christ as the origin of the baptismal 'water['s]' (4) salvific power. The examination of Herbert's use of two components of an aquatic metaphor demonstrated to the reader the medicinal power against sin that is gained through their remembrance of the paedobaptismal argument of the reverse transubstantiation of Christ's crucifixion which created baptismal water's 'blessed streams' (7), and also through a willingness to embrace their own penitential 'tears' (9). Finally, the tone of the concluding five lines revealed that Herbert permits the poem's persona to display an appropriate confidence as he reaffirms his 'regenerat[ion]' which was attained through his 'first acquaintance' (14) with infant baptism and by remembering its nourishing 'plaister' (11) provided by Christ's self-sacrifice. [42] Having succeeded in 'inflam[ing]' the knowledge of his literal and implied young Christian readers, it is Herbert's intention to 'drive [this knowledge] to practice [and] turn[…] it to reformation of life' that will become of more relevance now as my focus shifts, in the second chapter, to Herbert's instructive negotiation of the Christian adult's sin; an inevitable event that he has already foregrounded by proleptically nuancing the 'future sinnes' (13) of the speaker in 'H. Baptisme '. [43]
Chapter 2 - 'Doctrines for Knowledge': The Pedagogical Negotiation of the Adult Christian's Sin

As the preceding chapter has revealed, Herbert possesses a fundamental interest in 'inflam[ing] the knowledge' of his 'Flock' of readers. [44] In this second chapter, I will examine how this pedagogical interest is combined with Herbert's stalwart intent to accurately negotiate his adult Christian reader's experience of sin for their continued pedagogical nourishment. [45] This will be demonstrated by analysing Herbert's polyphonic poetic sequence of 'Sinne ', 'Repentance' and 'Faith' [46] in which the notion of 'turning' their new knowledge to a 'reformation of life' is pivotally important to this poetic trajectory which negotiates sin. [47] My examination of 'Sinne ' will begin by assessing the efficacy of Herbert's choice of a plural, collective voice as a device which reassures the reader that sin, and the subsequent 'turn' [48] away from God, is a common experience in the diurnal life of all adult Christians. [49] I shall then analyse the poem's unconventional sonnet structure and illustrate how Herbert's technical virtuosity allows him to demonstrate that sin is often a sudden and unexpected occurrence. Moving to an examination of 'Repentance' as the second stage of Herbert's negotiation of sin, a consideration of the perfunctory nature of the speaker's two initial confessions will demonstrate that they are still 'turn[ed]' away from God and are incorrectly concerned with a self-pitying fear of punishment rather than recognising the cause of their current anguish and ague. [50] Subsequently, I shall examine the poem's final two stanzas and illustrate how, by recognising that repentance is 'an act of the mind' and making the connection between their ague and their sin, Herbert's speaker completes their repentance and 'turn[s]' back to God with renewed faith and the willingness to receive knowledge that can lead to a 'reformation of life'. [51] Thus, the final analysis of 'Faith' will firstly show how Herbert's allusion to the doctrine of imputation conveys to his reader that their faith is a form of protection. A consideration of the last two stanzas will finally demonstrate that Herbert also brings his penitent adult reader to a knowledge and vision of faith's salvific power. By so candidly recording this dichotomy of the adult Christian's sin, Herbert accepts its presence in their diurnal life and negotiates it within this poetic sequence, as Helen Wilcox suggests, in a manner from which 'others might gain instruction'. [52] Ultimately, this second chapter will therefore present Herbert's eagerness to demonstrate that the adult Christian's soul must learn lessons if is to 'turn [itself] to reformation of life'. [53]
Beginning by considering the efficacy of the voice in 'Sinne ' which Herbert selects to commence his pedagogical negotiation of sinful transgression, what has been most noted by John Savoie is Herbert's 'permutation … of person'. [54] A useful way of analysing Herbert's bifurcation and selection of a plural voice, with its associated pronouns of 'us' [55] and 'our' (10), is to recognise the poem's voice as an example of Herbert's use of the collective expressions within the metrical Psalms: a component of this tradition that is most suited to Herbert's initial stage of poetically educating his reader in the unavoidable presence of sin within each Christian, since it enables him to create an atmosphere of shared experience. [56] This notion can be traced to the fourth-century theologian St Athanasius and his treatise on the Psalms that was often reprinted in the seventeenth century. [57] Athanasius stated that the Psalms's collective voices allow each reader, within the resulting inclusive atmosphere, to 'see … the motions … of his own heart and soul, both to see whereto [he] is inclined, [and also] where he is strained and pinched', so that he may eventually 'amend himself'. [58] A notable example of the efficacy of this collective personation in 'Sinne ' occurs in stanza one where, to borrow a phrase from Whitaker, Herbert employs 'plural statements that reflect the spiritual state of both [him as] speaker and [his]' readership. [59] Herbert therefore begins by outlining the religious security of both himself and his adult Christian reader - that to which they are '[already] inclined' - which has been provided by the 'begirt[ing]' (1) protective pale of the religious 'rules' (4) which were taught during their previous religious education. [60] Hence, through his repeated use of the plural pronoun 'us' (1, 2, 3) in these statements, Herbert immerses himself in shared religious experiences with his reader wherein they are both objects of God's 'care' (1) who were 'season[ed]' (2) by 'parents' (2), instructed in moral 'laws' (3) by 'schoolmasters' (2) and 'bound / To rules of reason' (3-4) by attending 'pulpits and sundayes' (5). Thus, Herbert successfully creates an atmosphere of inclusion with his adult reader which reassures them that they are not alone in committing sin which 'strain[s] and pinch[es]' all adult Christians. [61] It is this explicit willingness, in Elizabeth Clarke's words, to record the inevitable experience of 'the most rebellious [event]' in every Christian's life that will now be analysed in relation to Herbert's unconventional sonnet structure. [62]
In examining the methodology through which Herbert's collective voice exposes the sudden occurrence of sin to his adult Christian reader, and their consequential 'turn' [63] away from God, Herbert's use of an innovative syntactic pattern within this sonnet is notable. [64] John Ottenhoff's examination of the poem has indicated that, in terms of their content, the poem's lines can be divided into the pattern 1-11-2. [65] By choosing to divide his sonnet in this way, Herbert allows his central eleven lines to cut across the gradual, measured progression of a sonnet's quatrains or sestets and to place maximum emphasis upon his lengthy catalogue of the Christian's existing religious defences which include 'Bibles laid open' , 'blessings, … types of gratefulness' (9) and guardian 'angels' (12). However, in accordance with Vendler's identification of Herbert's poems which often 'suffer abrupt changes of direction', the syntactic patterning in his sonnet's structure now allows the sudden arrival of the poem's couplet and volta to achieve its maximum surprise as the occurrence of sin suddenly bursts forth, in spite of these religious defences, and reveals the presence of what Herbert termed the Christian's 'temporal afflictions'. [66] This sudden movement from the catalogue of the preceding eleven lines to the terseness of sin's obliteration of 'these fences and their whole array' (13) in the couplet therefore concludes the poem in a destabilizing, rather than resolutory, way, and opens the sonnet, its speaker and its reader to spiritual vulnerability. [67] In terms of the thematic implications of Herbert's innovative syntactic form, the crisp shock of this couplet evidently acts as a caveat for his reader's awareness of the unexpected and intrusive nature of sin by revealing the fact that 'one … bosome sinne' (14) undermines their antecedence of religious teaching in 'laws … / … [And] reason' (3-4), and causes their sinful 'turn' [68] away from God. [69] By conflating this inventive sonnet structure with his thematic intention, collective voice and inclusive atmosphere, 'Sinne ' allows Herbert to illustrate to his adult Christian reader the sudden surprise of sin as an experience which happens to all of 'us' (2) as Christians and allows the reader, as the Puritan divine Richard Bernard declared in his treatise on the Psalms, to believe it 'almost to have been composed upon his own occasion'. [70]
Continuing this notion of the individual relevance of Herbert's pedagogical negotiation of sin for his adult reader, I progress now to a consideration of 'Repentance' as the sequence's second poem, and the stage in which Herbert's singular voice [71] presents the individual's recovery and 'turn' from sin back to God and 'reformation of life'. [72] However, I begin by demonstrating that Herbert's speaker is initially still 'turn[ed]' away from God since they reveal their preoccupation with what Bloch refers to as a 'self-pity[ing] fear of punishment' [73] at being 'cut … off for my most foul transgression'. [74] This misdirection of the speaker's attention, which Herbert is later keen to disparage in the interests of educating his adult reader in the correct manner of repentance, is betrayed through two perfunctory confessions. Beginning with the admittance that 'I confesse my sinne is great; / Great is my sinne' (1-2), Herbert's use of antimetabole and anadiplosis creates a self-enclosed, and thus self-centred, syntactic unit in which his speaker makes the error of not providing a penitent understanding of why their sin 'is great' (1), but simply states that it is so. This tone of self-pity and petulance is re-iterated as the speaker later states that 'I do confesse / My foolishnesse; / My God, accept … my confession' (16-8), as they now place an imperative emphasis upon God's granting of forgiveness without in fact recognizing or articulating the nature of their 'foolishnesse' (17). These two confessions therefore add unequivocal credence to the prevalent religious argument upheld by both Herbert and Calvin that repentance is 'not [constituted through] the Body['s] verbal admittance', as is attempted here, but through 'an act of the mind'. [75] Thus, in accordance with this argument, by the conclusion of this fourth stanza Herbert's speaker has gained no progress towards 'turn[ing]' back to God through repentance since their mind has not connected the 'wormwood' (21) of their current spiritual anguish with their 'sinne' (1), but is preoccupied with a fear of being 'cut … off' (15). [76] Herbert is therefore able to pedagogically nourish his reader by demonstrating that such perfunctory confessions will not allow them to 'turn' knowledge of their misdemeanour into a 'reformation of life'. [77] By presenting these two confessions in a manner which reveals their inadequacy, Herbert can now use the remainder of the poem to illustrate the necessary connection that the speaker and reader must make between their spiritual ague and their sin in order to fully repent and so 'turn' back to God and renewed faith. [78]
With reference to this shift in focus within the final two stanzas, it is here that Herbert pedagogically nourishes his adult Christian reader in the most efficacious manner of repentance by demonstrating that progression to renewed devotional 'joy' (32) can only occur by remembering that 'repentance is an act of the mind'. [79] In a statement that would not be out of place in Herbert's Outlandish Proverbs, his speaker articulates to the reader the inextricable link between their spiritual ague and their sin by recognising that 'when [God] for sinne rebukest man, / Forthwith he waxeth wo and wan: / Bitternesse fills our bowels' (25-7). This stunning example of Herbert's profound brevity depicts a micro-chronology of sin and its consequences as the speaker's mind reveals their knowledge of progressing from 'sinne' (25) to God's 'rebuke[…]' (25) and punishment, and finally to their consequential ague of 'wo and … / Bitternesse' (26-7). Thus, the speaker evidently recognises that the sickness in their 'bowels' (27) [80] is a punishing consequence of their 'sinne' (25) since, as Sarah Skwire confirms, the role of this ague has been to highlight to the sinful Christian that the sick 'body reflect[s] the [sinful] state of the soul'. [81] Subsequent to making this fundamental connection, Herbert's speaker and reader are now able to 'turn' once again towards God from this moment of discovering the correct manner of repentance and progress to the further discovery that God 'wilt sinne and grief destroy' (31) since, in the words of Calvin, the 'frute and effect which followeth … repentance is a Christian life [in God]'. [82] In what Clarke and Harman confirm is this emerging tone of religious assurance due to recognising the salvific power of God, it is evident that Herbert's speaker has reached the conclusion of his repentance by surpassing his earlier self-pitying confessions and making the connection between his physical ague of 'bitternesse' (27) and his spiritual misdemeanour. [83] Through this humbled perspective the speaker has, as Strier indicates, 'learned the intended lesson' when it comes to repentance and is able to secure their 'turn to reformation of life' by expressing their renewed faith in the final poem of Herbert's pedagogical sequence. [84]
Moving now to the chapter's final section and my analysis of 'Faith', as this poetic sequence's 'well-set song, / Full of his praises' (33-4), Herbert can finally pedagogically nourish his reader in the importance of faith as a means of providing both protection and a vision of its salvific power. Beginning by considering how Herbert presents faith as a theology of protection which absorbs 'our flesh, and frailtie, death and danger' [85] and 'sets [us] higher in [Christ's] glorie' (20) despite the Christian's sinful inclinations, I will firstly focus on stanza nine and its concise exposition on the apostolic doctrine of imputation as part of what Targoff terms the speaker's final 'recuperation from spiritual despair'. [86] Within Herbert's poetic exposition on this theology his speaker states that, as God's 'creatures' (33), they 'have no reall light / Inherent in them' (33-4). In doing so, they encapsulate the fundamental problem of the repentant sinner who, through faithful actions, must try to commend himself to God and seek acceptance despite having 'no … light' (33) of their own with which to do so. [87] However, in the remainder of the stanza, Herbert's speaker recognises that man does not need to strenuously try to commend himself to God through his faith, since it is God who commends himself to man as, through the doctrine of imputation or justification, 'He didst make the sunne / Impute a lustre' (34-5) and illumination to the faithful. This 'lustre' (35) nourishes and protects the Christian by 'allow[ing]' (35) them to be 'bright' (35) in the reflection of 'the sunne['s]' (34) own 'light' (33) - provided by 'what Christ hath done' (36) in dying for the forgiveness of their sins - as they emerge from the 'darkned … / … groves' (37-8) of sin into this protective faith in God and Christ. [88] This part of Herbert's 'well-set song' (33) therefore demonstrates the speaker's and reader's arrival at an understanding of what Calvin termed 'a sure and firme knowledg of the grace of God' that passes onto them his 'bright' (35) commendation which has been 'purchased … by the merites of Christ's death' and their renewed faith. [89] Thus, by negotiating the conclusion of his tumultuous trajectory of sinful experience with an initial comprehension of the devotional benefits within the doctrine of imputation, Herbert allows his adult Christian reader to see his afflictions positively since they have allowed him to comprehend the nourishing protection afforded by God's 'impute[d] … lustre' (35) and assuredly 'turn' their faith to a 'reformation of life'. [90]
Progressing finally to an examination of the pedagogy of the last two stanzas, this enlightenment gained by the speaker's understanding of faith in the doctrine of imputation now allows them to be 'prick[ed]' (38) and to perceive a 'change[d] … scene' (39) and vision of faith's salvific power over mortality. This recognition of the clarifying and 'clean[ing]' (37) power of faith thus prompts the speaker's final consideration of this vision of its salvific power since, as Calvin indicates, from this 'ariseth and proceedeth the assured hope of everlasting life … which we shall have with … Christ in his kingdome'. [91] Confidently referring to the physical decay of their 'bodie [which] runne[s] to dust' (41), Herbert's speaker articulates his knowledge that faith will become an almost tangible presence at the moment of death by 'cleav[ing] unto' (42) the faithful body's 'dust' (41) and 'counting ev'ry grain / … exact[ly]' (42-3) in order to 'reserv[e] all for flesh again' (44) at the Last Judgement. In this exposition on faith's preserving effect upon the Christian's body, Herbert therefore displays what Vendler identifies as his 'materialist view' of faith, as opposed to one that is complexly metaphysical. [92] This allows him to complete his purpose of pedagogically nourishing his adult reader in the vision of faith's salvific power that is to be found by renewing their faith and 'trust' (43) in God as they return to him from their transgression into the bosom of sin. Hence, by concluding his sequence of poems with an examination of faith's imputed 'lustre' (35) and power to 'count[…]' (42) out and provide eternal life, Herbert has demonstrated to his reader that, if these two components of pedagogical nourishment are a consequence of completing the trajectory of sinful experience and 'turn[ing]' to a 'reformation of life', then, as John Donne's Meditations suggest, devotional afflictions should in fact be considered 'a treasure, and scarce any Man can have enough of it.' [93]
In conclusion, this chapter has demonstrated that, in this series of three poems and their discrete perspectives and 'turn[s]', Herbert accurately and truthfully records the dichotomous existence of his adult Christian readers by negotiating the trajectory of their sinful experience, repentance and return to faith for their pedagogical nourishment. [94] My initial analysis of 'Sinne ' demonstrated that Herbert constructs a warm inclusiveness through which he reassures his reader that the uncomfortable event of sinful transgression is shared by all Christians in their diurnal life. The subsequent examination of Herbert's syntactic patterning within the sonnet's form revealed how his technical ability allows him to most effectively depict sin's surprising occurrence and presence. The analysis of 'Repentance' as the second stage of Herbert's pedagogical negotiation of sin, in which the speaker and reader 'turn' from sin back to God, firstly demonstrated that the speaker's two perfunctory and self-pitying confessions are not conducive to attaining the necessary manner of repentance in order to complete this 'turn'. [95] By then analysing the moment at which the speaker's mind makes the appropriate connection between their physical ague and their sin by recognising that repentance is 'an act of the mind', it was shown that they are able to complete their return to renewed faith and 'reformation of life'. [96] Finally considering the illustrations of protection and salvific vision depicted in 'Faith', it was firstly shown that the speaker and reader are able to obtain knowledge of God's protective 'lustre' (35) that is provided by the doctrine of imputation. It was then demonstrated that Herbert's final concern with addressing the material decay of the Christian's 'bodie … to dust' (41) allows him to depict a vision of faith's tangible salvific power at the moment of death as it 'reserv[es] all for flesh again' (44). Ultimately, Herbert's pedagogical poetic depictions and negotiations of sin's surprise, the correct manner of repentance and the benefits to be obtained by 'turning' back to God result, as Chana Bloch confirms, in a 'lifting of the eyes: [their] motion initiates a mood of certainty' in which this polyphonic sequence of three poems eventually come to rest. [97] It is this notion of arriving at devotional certainty and assurance that will become this dissertation's final focus as its concluding chapter considers Herbert's dispelling of mortal fear for the pedagogical nourishment and comfort of his aged Christian reader.
Chapter 3: 'Promises for Comfort': The Dispelling of Mortal Fear for the Aged Christian

In accordance with what Herbert deemed to be the necessity of 'particularizing … speech' within religious instruction, this final chapter can now move from the earlier examination of Herbert's pedagogical nourishment of the younger sinful sort, to presenting the comforting religious education that he provides for the elder sort of reader when it comes to their salvation. [98] This intent to convey knowledge of salvation is one that Louis Martz and Robert Shaw confirm was a key interest of Herbert's, and he consistently reinforced it in his letters where he expresses his conviction for the aged to 'comfort yoursel[ves] in the God of all Comfort'. [99] Focusing on 'Death' and 'Heaven' as two of Herbert's eschatological verses, this final chapter will examine the methods through which Herbert pedagogically nourishes his aged Christian reader in a comforting knowledge of, and confidence in, their eternal life as he draws out these ultimate 'deep and dark points of religion' in his work's entelechy. [100] Firstly examining 'Death', my analysis will concentrate on the opening two stanzas and show how they foreground Herbert's optimistic transfiguration of death. It will show how this is initially achieved through his meliorative use of an inherited Renaissance personification of death. I shall then examine how Herbert's allusion to the totemic word of 'dust' [101] allows him to comfort his aged reader by showing that it was only prior to Christ's crucifixion that death was a cyclical event, since in this period the individual returned to the 'dust' from which he was created, and did not ascend to heaven. [102] By then considering the final three stanzas, I will demonstrate that Herbert succeeds in transforming death into a transcendent occurrence by invoking Christ's crucifixion as a salvific event which allows the figure of death to be reassuringly 'clad' with 'beautie' (20), before analysing the comfort within the poem's concluding soteriological kernel. Moving then to a consideration of 'Heaven', I will firstly analyse how Herbert develops his use of the catechistical form already seen in Chapter One's analysis of 'JESU' as he allows his reader to self-catechize and confirm their existing knowledge of salvation through hearing an echo of their own voice. Finally, I will illustrate how the poem's final four questions allow Herbert's aged reader to reach a climactic moment of pedagogical and salvific comfort. Ultimately, these two eschatological poems that form part of The Temple's consideration of the Last Things [103] convey themselves as two that are fittingly positioned at the conclusion to Herbert's pedagogical nourishment of his reader, and whose 'promises for comfort' are, as Wilcox confirms, instructive and reassuring in 'their expression as well as their doctrinal promise'. [104]
Continuing this notion of Herbert's eschatological poems being comforting in their '[manner of] expression as well as … doctrinal promise' in relation to 'Death', Herbert's subtle manner of beginning his optimistic transfiguration of death in the opening stanza is particularly interesting. [105] Whilst the use of the past participle in the first line's apostrophe to 'Death' (1) declares that 'thou wast once an uncouth hideous thing' (1), and creates an enthymematic moment in which it is suggested that death is something quite different in Herbert's seventeenth-century age, my key interest in this opening stanza is his pedagogical use of personification. Here, Herbert shows to his reader his ameliorated version of an inherited Renaissance image of death as a skeletal figure that contemporary discourses, such as Death's Universall Summons (1650), confirm is 'sent to strike the stroke'. [106] In accordance with his optimistic transfiguration of this figure in order to comfort his reader, this earlier personification of death as a terrifying event from the meditatio mortis and memento mori traditions of Renaissance visual art [107] is stripped of any threatening quality and rendered bathetic as, like his close compatriot Francis Bacon, Herbert begins his demonstration that 'death is no such terrible enemy'. [108] Hence, Herbert depicts this pre-Christ representation of death as what Strier terms 'nothing but' (2) a harmless and bathetic 'bumpkin of bones' whose 'mouth was open' (4) in a kind of morbid grin, and who was devoid of speech and 'couldst not sing' (4). [109] Thus, by consciously augmenting the meditatio mortis tradition, Herbert's brief use of personification succeeds in foregrounding his poem's challenge to this inherited image of death by deflating its fear-inducing components, prior to his later poetic exposition on Christ's conquering of the event.
Far from merely employing figurative devices such as what Rebecca Diman terms this 'personified abstraction of death' to foreground his challenge to this antecedence of fear-inducing images of mortality, Herbert also places a Biblical allusion to 'flesh being turn'd to dust' within this section of the poem that refers to what 'once' (1) applied to the event of death. [110] In doing so Herbert reveals that, prior to Christ's crucifixion and resurrection, death was a cyclical rather than transcendental event that, as Bacon indicates, induced fear in aged 'men … as children fear to go into the dark'. [111] Herbert states that, subsequent to 'losse of life' (7), human 'flesh [was] turn'd to dust, and bones to sticks' , where this end-stopped line reinforces death's earlier finality. Chana Bloch has confirmed that Herbert's use of this totemic word is unequivocally Biblical, and I suggest that this reference to 'dust' alludes specifically to the sentiments within the Book of Genesis. [112] Here, it is said that 'God formed man of the dust of the ground' and that, as a consequence of original sin and prior to Christ's self-sacrifice, they will be reminded that 'dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return'. [113] Thus, the comforting effect of Herbert positioning such explicit Biblical allusion to 'dry dust' (12) within the past tense of his poem's opening two stanzas, alongside his pedagogical and meliorative use of inherited personification, serves to demonstrate to his reader the comforting notion that death only existed as such a cyclical event and fear-inducing figure prior to Christ's facilitation of soteriology. By then moving in stanza four to the present tense and so to the transfiguration of death that occurs subsequent to 'our Saviours death' (13), Herbert will show his aged reader, as indicated in 'Easter', that though 'his death calcined the[m] to dust, / His life may make the[m] gold'. [114]
Progressing now to a consideration of this transfiguration of death into 'a good' (16), Herbert's shift to focusing upon death's position in his era as a transcendental event to be anticipated by the aged Christian becomes explicitly apparent in the poem's volta that precedes the final three stanzas. Stating 'but since [Christ's] death' (13), Herbert immediately reveals his poem's progression into its second epoch of Biblical history regarding death as it moves into the period of anno domini. Continuing his earlier use of the personification of death to challenge previous artistic and religious representations of the event, Herbert begins, as Arnold Stein confirms, to 'draw[…] [this] leading thought through [progressions] which refine' his comforting intention of the device. [115] Alluding to the salvific blood which flowed from Christ's pierced side at the crucifixion, Herbert's re-invocation of personification reminds his aged reader that Christ's self-sacrifice has put 'bloud' (13) into death's 'face' (14), and as a result both the figure and event of death are transfigured into being 'fair and full of grace' (15); a notably comforting progression from the barren 'bones' (2) of stanza one. [116] Furthermore, not only is Herbert's personified figure now animate, but an allusion to the Order for the Burial of the Dead in The Book of Common Prayer finally, and most emphatically, transforms death from a skeletal figure to one which is reassuringly clothed. Early in this liturgy, the priest repeats a central tenet of Christian doctrine whereby the individual must believe that, because of the 'saviours death' (13), they 'shall rise out of the earth in the last day, and shall be covered again with … skin'. [117] Such sentiments are unequivocally present in Herbert's reassuring statement that, because of Christ's soteriology, the Christian's 'soul[…] shall wear th[is] new array, / And all [death's] bones … shall be clad' (19-20). Thus, as a result of his progressive use of personification in relation to the chronology of Biblical history and a consideration of the results of Christ's self-sacrifice, Herbert succeeds in his intention of transforming death from the terrifying figure of the meditatio mortis tradition, to a blood-filled and clothed figure of 'beautie' (20) who can now be 'much sought for' (16) by the aged Christian 'as a good' (16).
In relation to Herbert's successful transfiguration of death, before moving to an analysis of 'Heaven', I will now consider the comfort contained within 'Death's' final two stanzas and their soteriological promise. Far from eliding an acknowledgement of death's presence at his poem's conclusion, Herbert reinforces his comforting pedagogical intention by entreating his reader to note that there can be a harmonious reconciliation between accepting their physical decline to 'dust' , and their knowledge of the 'soul['s]' (19) resurrection at 'dooms-day' (18). In doing so, Herbert demonstrates that these two components of the Christian's death are not mutually exclusive, but are intertwined in a way that, as confirmed by other contemporary dialogues, allows the speaker to simultaneously 'behold' (17) their ability to 'go live forever, yet forever die', as they now rightly state that they perceive death as 'gay and glad' (17).