American Literature 1

EDWARD TAYLOR AND PHYLLIS WHEATLEY COMPAREDEdward Taylor s Our Insufficiency to Praise god Suitably , for His Mercy and Phyllis Wheatley s An sing to Humanity illustrate distinct differences in the poetry of the prudes and the age of Reason . While the former embraces a negative panorama of reality and emphasizes mankind s subordination to matinee idol , the latter shows valet s optimism , celebrates its intellectual abilities , exalts human possibility , and makes an appeal for recognition of blacks abilitiesEdward Taylor (1642 ?-1729 , an English-born prude pastor and physician , conveys typic altogethery puritan attitudes . His metrical composition embraces the prude view of man s inferiority before an all-powerful God whom the Puritans could never satisfy . Using somewhat ungainly legal transfer and belabo pa lisade his metaphor of the infinite voices as atoms and motes Taylor writes that even if an infinite tot together of voices sang God s appraises , Our Musick would the World of Worlds out ring / and be unfit within thine Eares to ting (Puritan Sermons . In other(a) course , even an unimaginably , impossibly large amount of praise would be insufficient making human confinement perpetually lacking and humans forever inferiorThe final twain stanzas have humanity unfit for its own manufacturer , worsened than cast off we tread upon yet the narrator says to god , We beseech / give birth thereof . We see no better establish (Puritan Sermons student Karl Keller comments that [Taylor s] poetry . takes the form of prayers desiring to be appreciated on high school . His is a poetry of humility and hope (Keller , 1975 ,. 7 . For the Puritans all human endeavors existed for the glorification of God , and this is certainly the affair of Puritan literature . Poetry exis ts non for art s saki , nevertheless for ! God s glorification . The poem also presents a rather low opinion of humanity , as a flaw , sinful creature unworthy of its own creator and hence bound to seek salvation by devoting itself to redemption .

overly , nature is considered terrifying , evidence of God s magnitude and authority to punish mankind for its transgressionsWriting a few generations later on , Phyllis Wheatley (1753-1784 , born in Africa and brought to Boston as a slave , conveys the Age of Reason s optimism and positive logic , and her poems reveal a more questioning tone , but without being militant or negative toward America s rac ial situation . In An Hymn to Humanity Wheatley produces a deeply religious poem without terror of God instead , an unnamed prince of heav nly birth (obviously the Nazarene ) arrives on earth to build an empire but , in contrast to the Puritans unworthy planet , he finds bosoms of the great and solid and is commanded by God to act in bounties unconfin d /Enlarge the conclusion contracted mind /And fill it with thy fire (Boss . In entryway , nature is infused with God s potential to do good the innate(p) is not depicted as harmful , but a ascendant of inspirationWheatley s narrator adds that divine forces stoop d to shine /And deign d to get out my lyre (Boss , meaning that both God and nature have given...If you require to get a full essay, order it on our website: OrderCustomPaper.com

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