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 The Metaphysical Sonnet: An Examination of the Formal Conventions of John Donne’s Holy Sonnet ​
1 and George Herbert’s “Redemption” By Jack Zapotochny In his 1781 text, ​
Lives of the English Poets​
, Samuel Johnson discusses the work of several poets who wrote in the previous century. He designates one group the “Metaphysical th​
Poets,” an appellation still given to a group of 17​
­century poets whose work explored abstract theological concepts. Dr. Johnson notably criticized the Metaphysical Poets by “instead of writing poetry they only wrote verses, and very often such verses as stood the trial of the finger better than of the ear” (22). Johnson accused the Metaphysical Poets of lacking the spark and inspiration of good poetry, and denounced the sonic appeal of their work, claiming that their verses were technically proficient but not pleasing. Indeed, the work of the Metaphysical Poets displays a strong attachment to the formal conventions of poetry. However, the subjects these poems explore often depart from the conceptual archetypes of their poetic forms. Perhaps th​
Johnson, writing in the 18​
century, objected to archaic poetic forms like the sonnet, believing there to be a greater breadth for poetic expression in his own time. Despite its strict formal qualities, Metaphysical Poetry reinterprets earlier lyrical genres in order to emphasize spiritual concepts. In doing so, these works use traditional poetic conventions to narrate individual processes of religious introspection and catharsis. For example, the Metaphysical Poets often interpreted the sonnet form as an expression of the desire to connect with God, using many of the conventions of earlier sonneteers such as Shakespeare and Petrarch, which traditionally expressed a secular attachment to the poet­speaker’s beloved. John Donne’s ​
Holy Sonnet ​
1 and George Herbert’s “Redemption” both engage the sonnet form to express their poet­speakers’ desire for a closer relationship with God, reimagining the conventional theme of unrequited love in the sonnet form. These poems display an introspective contemplation on their object of desire, spiritual fulfillment. The content of the sonnet often comprises a meditative expression of desire characterized by the poet­speaker’s dynamic process of introspection. Elements of this process is the question addressed to the poem’s listener, the antithesis by which the poet­speaker challenges his earlier ideas, and the volta, a conceptual turn. Both sonnets examined in this paper present their speakers’ desire for a stronger sense of communion with God, expressed in a direct address to God in Donne’s poem, and an allegorical search for God in Herbert’s poem. John Donne’s ​
Holy Sonnet ​
1 uses the form of the Petrarchan sonnet to express its poet­ speaker’s desire for faith and spiritual catharsis. The Petrarchan sonnet is divided into an octave and a sestet. Because the dominant volta of a sonnet often occurs at its ninth line, the volta of a Petrarchan sonnet coincides with the beginning of its second stanza. This leads its structure as a poem to divide into two stanzas conceptually, as well as formally. The first stanza of Donne’s sonnet is characterized by imagery of death and decay, as the speaker focuses on human weakness. At line nine, the poet­speaker turns his attention to God and the tone of the poem changes dramatically. While Donne’s first stanza is concerned with transience and mortality, the following stanza displays hope and fortitude. The poet­speaker laments his state of mortality and the transience of his pleasures by saying “I run to death, and death meets me as fast, / And all my pleasures are like yesterday” (3). This statement strongly evokes a sense of mortality by suggesting the speaker is ​
running​
toward death, illustrating the rapidity of human life, in which death is inevitable. Next, the poem asserts the impermanence of earthly happiness in the simile comparing the speaker’s pleasures to yesterday. This suggests that, like yesterday, the speaker’s pleasures and enjoyments have passed into obscurity, evoking a sense of the ephemerality of earthly happiness. The first stanza of Donne’s poem presents a lamentation of the transience of human life, and goes on to discuss death and infirmity. The octave of Donne’s ​
Holy Sonnet ​
1 evokes a sense that the poet­speaker is in a state of sickness and despondency. He displays a temperament that appears to be fixed in sorrow and despair, saying “I dare not move my dim eyes any way” (5). This reminds us that the speaker is in a state of infirmity because the description of his “dim eyes” suggests that he is ill or close to death. This is a notion that the poet­speaker first presents in his question “Thou hast made me, and shall thy work decay?” (1). This query asks God whether His creation, the speaker, must undergo sickness and death, and leads into the poet­speaker’s examination of his own mortality, in which he presents imagery of death and sorrow. For example, he describes his present state of mind by saying “Despair behind, and death before doth cast / Such terror” (6). In this statement, the speaker not only expresses his fear of death, but also his sense of regret. We can observe this in the description of his past as “[d]espair behind.” Moreover, the poet­speaker identifies the emotion which the near presence of death evokes within him as “terror,” illustrating the natural anxiety of mortality. This stanza presents a detailed portrayal of human weakness. The poet­speaker goes on to acknowledge his infirmity and regret by saying “my feeble flesh doth waste / By sin in it, which it towards hell doth weigh” (7). This statement presents the view that mankind suffers mortality because of its sin and imperfection. The poet­speaker concedes his own human weakness in the description of his “feeble flesh”, and goes on to suggest that his sins incline his soul toward damnation. At the volta of Donne’s poem, the speaker turns his focus away from human weakness and misery, toward the hope and fortitude he desires to attain through faith in God. While the poet­speaker had previously contemplated his own emotional state, asserting “I dare not move my dim eyes” (5), he commences the second stanza by turning his gaze toward God. He addresses God, declaring “Only thou art above, and when towards thee / By thy leave I can look, I rise again” (9). In this description, the speaker indicates that he is able to look toward God and contemplate heavenly things because God’s will sanctions him to do so. We can see this in the statement “By thy leave I can look” (10), which asserts God’s permission as a necessity to the poet­speaker’s spiritual contemplation. The poet­speaker also affirms that his faith in God elevates him above his prior state of infirmity and despair when he says “I rise again” (10). The poem then presents an antithesis challenging this atmosphere of faith and spiritual renewal. The poet­speaker admits “our old subtle foe so tempteth me” (11). This refers to the Devil, and temptation toward vice. This statement asserts that the speaker’s faith and repentance are imperfect and remain subject to sin and temptation. The poem goes on to address this antithesis by suggesting that the speaker alone is powerless to overcome temptation, but can resist it with the help of God. He says “Not one hour myself I can sustain. / Thy grace may wing me to prevent his art” (12). Here, the speaker affirms that, despite his own weaknesses, he trusts God to give him wings to prevent the Devil’s work of sin and temptation. This is a metaphor representing the transcendence of human limitations through faith in God. Therefore, the sestet of Donne’s ​
Holy Sonnet​
1 uses the conventions of the volta and poetic antithesis to illustrate the spiritual catharsis its speaker experiences after pondering his own sickness and despair, and turning his focus toward God. While Donne’s ​
Holy Sonnet ​
1 expresses its speaker’s desire for catharsis through faith in God, “Redemption”, a sonnet by George Herbert, narrates its speaker’s search in an allegorical effort to foster a closer relationship to God and develop a stronger faith. To create this allegory, Herbert’s poet­speaker describes his effort to find his landlord and seek more reasonable accommodation. The landlord represents God, and the lodgings sought by the poet­speaker represent his own relationship to God. In order to narrate this process, Herbert uses the form of a Shakespearean sonnet. Though its rhyme scheme is irregular, “Redemption” resembles the form of a Shakespearean sonnet because it is broken into three quatrains and a couplet. Unlike the Petrarchan sonnet, which shows a strong contrast evoked by the volta beginning its second and final stanza, the Shakespearean sonnet may effectively illustrate several smaller contrasts because it is divided into shorter stanzas. In the first stanza of Herbert’s poem, the speaker identifies himself as impoverished, and describes his subservient station in life. He describes his subjection by saying that he has “been tenant long to a rich lord” (1), to whom he wishes to make a new claim, having “resolved to be bold” (2). He expresses a desire to entreat his landlord for “A new small­rented lease” and to “cancel th’old” (4). In its first stanza, this poem establishes the premise of its allegory as the poet­speaker describes his present situation of economic distress and desire for a more comfortable situation. In a similar way to Donne’s poem, Herbert’s “Redemption” begins with a description of its speaker’s earthly distresses before turning its focus toward religion. The next two stanzas of Herbert’s poem narrate the poet­speaker’s search for his landlord as he fruitlessly looks throughout lofty and opulent settings, illustrating his confusion of the concepts of secular influence and divine authority. The poem creates the sense that its speaker is searching for a rich landowner when the poet­speaker receives this direction, “They told me there that he was lately gone / About some land which he had dearly bought” (6). We can observe, in this description, that the poet­speaker first directs his search toward a landowner, a person of material wealth and influence. This view illustrates the poem’s initial discussion of earthly life and possessions before revealing its overarching conceit of God’s humility and the importance of spirituality over material wealth. The poet­speaker affirms that he searches for a wealthy nobleman by saying that he, “knowing his great birth, / Sought him accordingly in great resorts” (9). This statement begins the third stanza, which illustrates the poet­speaker’s confusion of human authority and divine magnanimity. He is searching for God, whom he sees as a landlord and a nobleman of “great birth” This introduces the concept of nobility, a form of authority based on one’s lineage. Like material wealth, noble birth is a form of human authority not derived from a spiritual origin. At this point, the poet­speaker has yet to recognize that he searches for a being of more intangible influence and authority than the human concepts of wealth and noble birth. The speaker realizes that his search for God in opulent settings is unsuccessful as he next turns his attention toward an unexpected concept, a setting we would generally, consider ignoble. Although Herbert’s poem is broken into four stanzas, it presents an overarching conceptual progression in which the speaker moves from discussing his own impoverishment, to his search for his landlord in opulent settings, to his realization of God’s benevolence and the unimportance of material wealth. One may consider each stage of this contemplative process to be a volta of the poem. The most significant volta of Herbert’s poem occurs at the end of the third stanza when the poet­speaker turns his attention away from examples of wealth and nobility, toward a setting characterized by poverty and supposed immorality. He says “At length I heard a ragged noise and mirth” (12). This creates a stark contrast between the earlier imagery of wealth and “great resorts” (9) and the impoverished and seemingly debauched setting wherein the poet­speaker concludes his search. This setting is characterized by “ragged noise”, a depiction of the tumultuous sound of poverty and urban life. The poet­speaker goes on to reveal the immorality he first observes in this ragged setting by describing his view of the “mirth / Of thieves and murderers” (12). Despite the slovenly appearance of this setting, and the immorality he observes, it is here that the poet­speaker finds the object of his search, whom he first believed to be a wealthy landowner. At last, the poem reveals God, not as a nobleman in a lavish setting, but within this squalid landscape, among thieves and murderers. The poet­speaker concludes by saying “there I him espied, / Who straight, ‘Your suit is granted,’ said, and died” (13). Herbert’s poet­speaker finds that God indeed grants his request, but observes that God does not have authority through material wealth, like a landowner, but fulfills his supplication through His death. This is a reference to the redemption of mankind achieved through the death of Jesus Christ. The poet­speaker’s realization of God’s divine, rather than material, authority concludes his allegorical search presented through the conceptual progression of this poem. In ​
Holy Sonnet ​
1 and “Redemption”, John Donne and George Herbert both use the sonnet form to describe their poet­speakers’ desire for religious understanding and a closer relationship to God. In order to create this atmosphere of spiritual longing and repentance, Donne and Herbert adhere to the formal conventions of the sonnet to illustrate their speakers’ contemplative processes of spiritual examination. The sonnet is a form which allows poets to express a complex sentiment within a succinct formula because its fourteen lines are often broken into brief stanzas displaying different notions within the poet­speaker’s contemplative process. This allows the speaker to present a progression toward a cathartic or altered state, describing the various stages of this process throughout the poem. As a lyrical form, the sonnet has proved very effective in presenting an expression of desire whereby the poet­speaker addresses, or describes, his beloved, or another desired object or emotional state. These poems by Donne and Herbert exemplify the practice by which the Metaphysical Poets used traditional poetic forms, representing them within a distinctly religious paradigm. This may be considered a reinterpretation of existing conventions because, prior to this poetic movement, forms such as the sonnet were usually secular. Samuel Johnson accused the Metaphysical Poets of lacking originality, claiming that their work displayed technical proficiency, but failed to produce a significant affect. In this argument, Johnson did not acknowledge the innovative approaches of poets like Donne and Herbert, who created a distinctive form of religious poetic expression while following traditional poetic conventions. Examining the formal qualities of these examples of Metaphysical poetry will benefit our modern view of poetic conventions. While we have come to see free verse as an opportunity for unhindered expression, it is important to remember that fixed­form poetry is not a restriction on ideas. It is rather an opportunity to express a personal sentiment in a form which contributes to the theme and atmosphere of a poem. Forms such as the sonnet may be appropriate to certain ideas and provoke a contemplative development across stanzas reflecting their formal conventions. Works Cited Donne, John. ​
Holy Sonnet ​
1. ​
The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Volume 1.​
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Ed. Stephen Greenblatt. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2012. 1410. Herbert, George. “Redemption.” ​
The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Volume 1.​
9th​
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Ed. Stephen Greenblatt. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2012. 1708. Johnson, Samuel. “Abraham Cowley.” ​
Lives of the Poets (Cowley to Prior)​
. New York: Dolphin Books, 1963. 22.