HERBERT’S POEMS

Southland Times, Issue 22770, 21 December 1935, Page 13

HERBERT’S POEMS

Friend Or Izaak Walton George Herbert, the Rector of Bemerton, who more than three centuries ago, is known to most people only through the half-dozen of his poems which t av e found their way into the anthologies, and through the three or four hymns which appear in the English Hymnal. No one, except perhaps the unknown writer in the Scottish Psalter, has been so successful in rewriting the twentythird Psalm, and the famous hymn beginning. “Teach me, my God and King In all things Thee to see,” is as full of poetry as of religion. Herbert learnt, in his own phrase, to make the “drudgery” of a country parson’s life a “divine” thing, and no one had a firmer hold of “the famous stone that turneth all to gold.” Of course, his poetry, like that of all his contemporaries, is full of conceits and affectations, but they are so much part of his nature that they are accepted cheerfully. A smile may greet him when he says: "God gave thy soul brave wings: put not those feathers Into a bed to sleep out all ill weathers, but it is a kindly simile, and even in these days people soon learn that effective use can be made of a farfetched image, as for instance in “The Pulley.” And in “The Collar” Herbert after rebelling against all discipline, and clamouring for leave to enjoy life fully and to live carelessly and freely, as a man should live. “But as I rav’d and grew more fierce and wilde At every word, , Methought I heard one calling Childe ; and I reply’d ‘My Lord.’ ” And there is another claim to immortality which George Herbert can put forward, and that is a strong one—his '.friendship with Isaak Walton Not only do some of his verses appear in “The Compleat Angler,’ but its author included his friend’s biography in his inimitable series of Lives. To quote a few sentences from it will give pleasure to all who know that delightful work. A certain Mr Danvers was anxious that “Mr Herbert would marry any of his nine daughters (for he had so many), but rather his daughter Jane than any other, because Jane was his beloved daughter.” He mentioned his desire to both parties.

“and so much commended Mr Herbert to her, that Jane became so much a Platonic as to fall in love with Mr Herbert unseen. This was a fair preparation for a marriage—some friends procured their meeting; at which time a mutual affection entered into both their hearts, as a conqueror enters into a surprised city, and love having got such possession, governed and made there such and

resolutions as neither party was able to resist; insomuch that she changed her name into Herbert the third day after this first interview.” It is enough to say of this happy pair that their “mutual content and love and joy did receive a daily augmentation,” so that the happiness of “these divine souls was only improvable in heaven, where they now enjoy it.”