394. Upon Man
Man is compos'd here of a twofold part:The first of nature, and the next of art:Art presupposes nature; nature shePrepares the way for man's docility.
Words in this poem
- docility n.
- teachableness; aptness for being taught; docibleness. [L. docilitas, fr. docilis: cf. F. docilité.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
394. Upon Man is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #22421; 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 Herrick, 394. Upon Man, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/394-upon-man.html, id L05401.
Form and metre
394. Upon Man is 4 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 50% of the lines. The lines average 10.0 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
See other poems in rhyming couplets.
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 AA-- partA · artA · she · docility
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Man is compos'd here of a twofold part: | 10 | ··˘/···//· |
| The first of nature, and the next of art: | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Art presupposes nature; nature she | 10 | ··˘/˘/˘/˘· |
| Prepares the way for man's docility. | 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.