The Prophet
Speak, Prophet of the Lord! We may not startTo find thee with us in thine ancient dress,Haggard and pale from some bleak wilderness,Empty of all save God and thy loud heart,Nor with like rugged message quick to dartInto the hideous fiction mean and base;But yet, O prophet man, we need not lessBut more of earnest, though it is thy partTo deal in other words, if thou wouldst smiteThe living Mammon, seated, not as thenIn bestial quiescence grimly dight,But robed as priest, and honoured of good menYet thrice as much an idol-god as whenHe stared at his own feet from morn to night.
Words in this poem
- haggard a.
- Wild or intractable; disposed to break away from duty; untamed; as, a haggard or refractory hawk. Shak [F. hagard; of German origin, and prop. meaning, of the hegde or woods, wild, untamed. See Hedge, 1st Haw, and -ard.]
- mammon n.
- Riches; wealth; the god of riches; riches, personified. [L. mammona, Gr. mam; cf. Heb. matm a hiding place, subterranean storehouse, treasury, fr. taman to hide.]
- bestial a.
- Belonging to a beast, or to the class of beasts. [F. bestial, L. bestialis, fr. bestia beast. See Beast.]
- quiescence n.
- The state or quality of being quiescent. [L. quiescentia, fr. quiescens, p. pr.; cf. F. quiestence. See Quiesce.]
- grimly a.
- Grim; hideous; stern.
- dight v. t.
- To prepare; to put in order; hence, to dress, or put on; to array; to adorn. [OF. dihten, AS. dihtan to dictate, command, dispose, arrange, fr. L. dictare to say often, dictate, order; cf. G. dichten to write poetry, fr. L. dictare. See D]
- idol n.
- An image or representation of anything. [OE. idole, F. idole, L. idolum, fr. Gr. Wit, and cf. Eidolon.]
- morn n.
- The first part of the day; the morning; -- used chiefly in poetry. [OE. morwen, morgen, AS. morgen; akin to D. morgen, OS. morgan, G. morgen, Icel. morginn, morgunn, Sw. morgon, Dan. morgen, Goth. maúrgins. Cf. Morrow, Morning.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Prophet is in the public domain. This text is taken from The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes — Volume 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #9984; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: George MacDonald, The Prophet, in A Microcosm in Terza Rima, and Other Poems (1893), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #9984, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/macdonald-poems/the-prophet.html, id L22450.
Form and metre
The Prophet is 14 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 57% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
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 ABBAABBACDCDDC startA · dressB · wildernessB · heartA · dartA · baseB · lessB · partA · smiteC · thenD · dightC · menD · whenD · nightC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Speak, Prophet of the Lord! We may not start | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| To find thee with us in thine ancient dress, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Haggard and pale from some bleak wilderness, | 10 | /˘·····/˘˘ |
| Empty of all save God and thy loud heart, | 10 | /˘········ |
| Nor with like rugged message quick to dart | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Into the hideous fiction mean and base; | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| But yet, O prophet man, we need not less | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| But more of earnest, though it is thy part | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| To deal in other words, if thou wouldst smite | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| The living Mammon, seated, not as then | 10 | ·/˘/˘/˘··· |
| In bestial quiescence grimly dight, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| But robed as priest, and honoured of good men | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Yet thrice as much an idol-god as when | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| He stared at his own feet from morn to night. | 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.