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 hymn to Humanity illustrate distinct differences in the poetry of the prudes and the ripen of Reason . While the former embraces a negative aspect of reality and emphasizes mankind s subordination to perfection , the latter shows almsgiving 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 anyy prude attitudes . His metrical composition embraces the puritan view of man s inferiority before an all-powerful God whom the Puritans could never satisfy . Using somewhat ungainly manner of speaking and belabo smo ther his metaphor of the infinite voices as atoms and motes Taylor writes that even if an infinite hit together of voices sang God s praises , Our Musick would the World of Worlds out ring / and be unfit within thine Eares to ting (Puritan Sermons . In other(a) haggle , even an unimaginably , impossibly large amount of praise would be insufficient making human confinement evermore lacking and humans forever inferiorThe final twain stanzas go for humanity unfit for its own manufacturer , worsened than spurt we tread upon yet the narrator says to god , We beseech / cause 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 elevated . 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 exists non for art s saki , just now for God s glorification .! The poem also presents a rather low opinion of humanity , as a blemish , sinful creature unworthy of its own creator and frankincense bound to seek salvation by devoting itself to redemption .

to a fault , nature is considered terrifying , evidence of God s magnitude and emf to punish mankind for its transgressionsWriting a few generations later on , Phyllis Wheatley (1753-1784 , born in Africa and brought to Boston as a hard worker , conveys the Age of Reason s optimism and positive logic , and her poems reveal a more questioning tone , but without being war-ridden or negative toward America s racial sit uation . 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 good and is commanded by God to act in bounties unconfin d /Enlarge the finis contracted mind /And fill it with thy fire (Boss . In gateway , nature is infused with God s potential to do good the innate(p) is not depicted as harmful , but a line of inspirationWheatley s narrator adds that divine forces stoop d to shine /And deign d to delineate my lyre (Boss , meaning that both God and nature have given...If you motive to get a full essay, order it on our website: OrderCustomPaper.com

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