An Hymn upon St. Bartholomew's Day
What powerful Spirit lives within!What active Angel doth inhabit here!What heavenly light inspires my skin,Which doth so like a Deity appear!A Living Temple of all ages, IWithin me seeA Temple of Eternity!All Kingdoms I descryIn me.
An inward Omnipresence hereMysteriously like His within me standsWhose knowledge is a Sacred SphereThat in itself at once includes all lands.There is some Angel that within me canBoth talk and move,And walk and fly and see and love,A man on earth, a manAbove.
Dull walls of clay my Spirit leaves,And in a foreign Kingdom doth appear,This great Apostle it receivesAdmires His works and sees them, standing here.Within myself from East to West I moveAs if I wereAt once a Cherubim and Sphere,Or was at once aboveAnd here.
The Soul's a messenger wherebyWithin our inward Temple we may beEven like the very DeityIn all the parts of His Eternity.O live within and leave unwieldy dross!Flesh is but clay!O fly my Soul and haste awayTo Jesus' Throne or Cross--Obey!
Words in this poem
- descry
- , Discovery or view, as of an army seen at a distance.
- mysteriously adv.
- In a mysterious manner.
- cherubim n.
- The Hebrew plural of Cherub.. Cf. Seraphim.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
An Hymn upon St. Bartholomew's Day is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poetical Works of Thomas Traherne, 1636?-1674, from the original manuscripts, Project Gutenberg ebook #61586; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Thomas Traherne, An Hymn upon St. Bartholomew's Day, in The Salutation, and Other Poems (1903), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #61586, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/traherne-poems/an-hymn-upon-st-bartholomew-s-day.html, id L13331.
Form and metre
An Hymn upon St. Bartholomew's Day is 36 lines in 4 stanzas of 9 lines each. 92% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.4 syllables. 3 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 44% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 ABABCD-CD withinA · hereB · skinA · appearB · iC · seeD · eternity · descryC · meD
- 2 ABABCDDCD hereA · standsB · sphereA · landsB · canC · moveD · loveD · manC · aboveD
- 3 ABABC-BCB leavesA · appearB · receivesA · hereB · moveC · were · sphereB · aboveC · hereB
- 4 AA--BCCBC wherebyA · beA · deity · eternity · drossB · clayC · awayC · crossB · obeyC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| What powerful Spirit lives within! | 9 | ·/˘˘/˘··· |
| What active Angel doth inhabit here! | 10 | ·/˘/˘·˘/˘· |
| What heavenly light inspires my skin, | 9 | ·/˘˘·˘/·· |
| Which doth so like a Deity appear! | 10 | ·····/˘˘˘/ |
| A Living Temple of all ages, I | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| Within me see | 4 | ···· |
| A Temple of Eternity! | 8 | ·/˘·˘/˘˘ |
| All Kingdoms I descry | 6 | ·/˘·˘/ |
| In me. | 2 | ·· |
| An inward Omnipresence here | 8 | ·/˘·˘/˘· |
| Mysteriously like His within me stands | 10 | ·/˘˘······ |
| Whose knowledge is a Sacred Sphere | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| That in itself at once includes all lands. | 10 | ··˘/··˘/·· |
| There is some Angel that within me can | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Both talk and move, | 4 | ···· |
| And walk and fly and see and love, | 8 | ········ |
| A man on earth, a man | 6 | ······ |
| Above. | 2 | ·· |
| Dull walls of clay my Spirit leaves, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And in a foreign Kingdom doth appear, | 10 | ···/˘/˘·˘/ |
| This great Apostle it receives | 8 | ··˘/˘·˘/ |
| Admires His works and sees them, standing here. | 10 | ˘/·····/˘· |
| Within myself from East to West I move | 10 | ···/······ |
| As if I were | 4 | ···· |
| At once a Cherubim and Sphere, | 8 | ···/˘˘·· |
| Or was at once above | 6 | ······ |
| And here. | 2 | ·· |
| The Soul's a messenger whereby | 8 | ···/˘˘·· |
| Within our inward Temple we may be | 10 | ··//˘/˘··· |
| Even like the very Deity | 9 | /˘··/˘/˘˘ |
| In all the parts of His Eternity. | 10 | ······˘/˘˘ |
| O live within and leave unwieldy dross! | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| Flesh is but clay! | 4 | ···· |
| O fly my Soul and haste away | 8 | ······˘/ |
| To Jesus' Throne or Cross-- | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Obey! | 2 | ˘/ |
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.