The Confession
All doubts gave way, all retrospective lore,Whence cooler Reason tortur'd him before;Comparison of times, the Lab'rer's hire,And many a truth Reflection might inspire,Sunk powerless. 'Dame, I am a fool,' he cried;'Alone I might have reason'd till I died.'I caus'd those tears of Jane's:--but as they fell'How much I felt none but ourselves can tell.'While dastard fears withheld me from her sight;'Sighs reign'd by day and hideous dreams by night;''Twas then the Soldier's plume and rolling Drum'Seem'd for a while to strike my sorrows dumb;'To fly from Care then half resolv'd I stood,'And without horror mus'd on fields of blood,'But Hope prevail'd.--Be then the sword resign'd;'And I'll make Shares for those that stay behind,'And you, sweet Girl,'------He would have added more,Had not a glancing shadow at the door
Words in this poem
- cooler n.
- That which cools, or abates heat or excitement.
- dastard n.
- One who meanly shrinks from danger; an arrant coward; a poltroon. [Prob. from Icel. dæstr exhausted. breathless, p. p. of dæsa to groan, lose one's breath; cf. dasask to become exhausted, and E. daze.]
- glancing a.
- Shooting, as light.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Confession is in the public domain. This text is taken from Rural Tales, Ballads, and Songs, Project Gutenberg ebook #9093; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Robert Bloomfield, The Confession, in Rural Tales, Ballads and Songs (1802), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #9093, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/bloomfield-tales/the-confession.html, id L09682.
Form and metre
The Confession is 19 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 84% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%). 99% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.5 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 16% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in heroic couplets, other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AABBCCDDEEFFGGHH-AA loreA · beforeA · hireB · inspireB · criedC · diedC · fellD · tellD · sightE · nightE · drumF · dumbF · stoodG · bloodG · resign'dH · behindH · girl · moreA · doorA
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| All doubts gave way, all retrospective lore, | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| Whence cooler Reason tortur'd him before; | 10 | ·/˘/˘/˘··· |
| Comparison of times, the Lab'rer's hire, | 11 | ˘/˘˘·····/˘ |
| And many a truth Reflection might inspire, | 10 | ·/··˘/˘·˘/ |
| Sunk powerless. 'Dame, I am a fool,' he cried; | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| 'Alone I might have reason'd till I died. | 10 | ˘/···/˘··· |
| 'I caus'd those tears of Jane's:--but as they fell | 10 | ·········· |
| 'How much I felt none but ourselves can tell. | 10 | ······˘/·· |
| 'While dastard fears withheld me from her sight; | 10 | ·/˘·˘/···· |
| 'Sighs reign'd by day and hideous dreams by night; | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| ''Twas then the Soldier's plume and rolling Drum | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| 'Seem'd for a while to strike my sorrows dumb; | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| 'To fly from Care then half resolv'd I stood, | 10 | ······˘/·· |
| 'And without horror mus'd on fields of blood, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| 'But Hope prevail'd.--Be then the sword resign'd; | 10 | ··˘/····˘/ |
| 'And I'll make Shares for those that stay behind, | 10 | ·········· |
| 'And you, sweet Girl,'------ | 4 | ···· |
| He would have added more, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Had not a glancing shadow at the door | 10 | ···/˘/···· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.