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 senesce of Reason . While the former embraces a negative vista of reality and emphasizes mankind s subordination to God , the latter shows humanity 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 typically Puritan attitudes . His poem embraces the Puritan view of man s inferiority before an all-powerful God whom the Puritans could never satisfy . Using somewhat ungainly delivery and belaboring his metaphor of the infinite voices as atoms and motes Taylor writes that even if an infinite add 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) words , even an unimaginably , impossibly large amount of praise would be insufficient making human confinement eternally lacking and humans forever inferiorThe final twain stanzas deem humanity unfit for its own manufacturer , worsened than mould we tread upon yet the narrator says to god , We beseech /Accept thereof . We see no better establish (Puritan Sermons Scholar Karl Keller comments that [Taylor s] poetry . takes the form of prayers desiring to be appreciated on high . 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 not for art s saki , but for God s glorification . The poem also presents a rather low opinion of humanity , as a flawed , sinful creature unworthy of its own creator and thus bound to seek salvation by devoting itself to redemption .

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

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