During the seventeenth century, a poet named Henry Vaughan influences another poet named William Wordsworth because of his metaphysical poem “Retreat” which has multiple conceits. This classification in poetry discusses the seriousness in the afterlife and God. In Bartleby’s artice, a poem named “The Ode on the Imitations of Immense” is the poem that Vaughan influences Wordsworth to write and he states, “From God, who is our home:/ Heaven lies about us in our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close/ Upon the growing Boy” (William Wordsworth). This quote expresses Wordsworth’s idea of living a cruddy life, but still being able to stay hopeful for the afterlife. Wordsworth enables Henry Vaughan’s …show more content…
Henry Vaughan claims, “That shady city of palm trees” (line 26) to express the amazing Heavenly City by using a paradox to compare it to a shady place. Shady in modern slang can mean corrupt; however, he precisely uses the word ‘shady’ because of its different meaning of providing protection from the sun. In this case, the Heavenly City is actually hidden under protection from people that do not follow Christ, and can only be unveiled by death. The speaker also exposes his inner relationship with God and how he is different from other men by Vaughan stating, “Some men a forward motion love’ / But I by backward steps would move” (lines 29-30). This paradox expresses the speaker’s thoughts of his true love, God. It sounds weird during the first read, but the speaker is saying the he would rather go back to his childhood because he is able to see God and be in his presence; rather than, progress forward into a place that we only lead to malice. Vaughan urges people to understand the great and endless possibilities after the hardships when God is by their …show more content…
Henry Vaughan states, “Before I understood this place/ Appointed for my second race” (line 3-4) to allude back to the preexistence of man. The speaker understands that this is going to be a second life-time for him to go through and how in the beginning he does not know sin, yet. God’s plan is that although people have the free will to sin, He wants them to come repent, believe, and trust in him during sadden times. The speaker vents about he wants to be over with the pain and troubles he is going through so that he can be with his first love. The speaker awaits death which is when Vaughan states, “And when this dust falls to the urn, / In that state I came, return” (lines 32-33). He alludes back to the book of Genesis in the Holy Bible by explaining he will die the same way he came back to Earth, by dust. The last word is return which means that the speaker will be with God once