Love (I)

By George Herbert 1593–1633 George Herbert

Immortal Love, author of this great frame,

Sprung from that beauty which can never fade,

How hath man parcel'd out Thy glorious name,

And thrown it on that dust which Thou hast made,

While mortal love doth all the title gain!

Which siding with Invention, they together

Bear all the sway, possessing heart and brain,

(Thy workmanship) and give Thee share in neither.

Wit fancies beauty, beauty raiseth wit;

The world is theirs, they two play out the game,

Thou standing by: and though Thy glorious name

Wrought our deliverance from th' infernal pit,

Who sings Thy praise? Only a scarf or glove

Doth warm our hands, and make them write of love.

Biography

Nestled somewhere within the Age of Shakespeare and the Age of Milton is George Herbert. There is no Age of Herbert: he did not consciously fashion an expansive literary career for himself, and his characteristic gestures, insofar as these can be gleaned from his poems and other writings, tend to be careful self-scrutiny rather than rhetorical pronouncement; local involvement rather than broad social engagement; and complex, . . .

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