The Complete Works of Richard Crashaw, Volume ICrashaw, Richard
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The Complete Works of Richard Crashaw, Volume I
Crashaw, Richard
English poetry -- Early modern, 1500-1700
" 224 and onward, in 1648 is printed 'least,' in our text
(1652) 'lest.' Except in line 224 it is plainly = last, and so I
read it in 231st and 237th.
See our Essay for Miltonic parallels with lines in this remarkable
composition. Line 46, 'these mortal clouds,' _i.e._ of infant flesh. Cf.
Sosp. d' Herode, stanza xxiii.
'That He whom the sun serves should faintly peep
Through _clouds of infant flesh_.'
Line 114, 'And urge their sun into Thy cloud,' _i.e._ into becoming Thy
cloud, forcing him to become 'a long deliquium to the light of thee.'
Line 189, our text (1652) misprints 'in self.' Line 190, 'By the oblique
ambush,' &c. The Kings continuing in the spirit of prophecy, and with
words not to be understood till their fulfilment, pass on from the
dimming of the sun at the Crucifixion to a second dimming, but this time
through the splendour of a brighter light, at the conversion of him who
was taken to preach to the Gentiles in the court of the Areopagites. The
speaker, or rather CRASHAW, takes the view which at first sight may seem
to be implied in the gospel narrative, that the light brighter than
midday shone round about SAUL and his companions but not on them, they
being couched in the conscious shade of the daylight. Throughout, there
is a double allusion to this second dimming of the sun as manifesting
Christ to St. Paul and the Gentiles, and to the dimming of the eyes, and
the walking in darkness for a time of him who as a light on Earth was to
manifest the True Light to the world. Throughout, too, there is a kind
of parallelism indicated between the two lesser lights. Both rebellions
were to be dimmed and brought into subjection, and then to shine forth
'right-eyed' in renewed and purified splendour as evidences of the Sun
of Righteousness. Hence at the close, the chorus calls them 'ye
twin-suns,'--and the words, 'Till thus triumphantly tamed' refer equally
to both. The punctuation to make this clear should be '... sun, ...
undone; ...' 'To negotiate you' (both word and metaphor being rather
unhappily chosen) means, to pass you current as the true-stamped image
of the Deity. 'O price of the rich Spirit' (line 197) may be made to
refer to 'thee [O Christ], price of the rich spirit' of Paul, but 'may
be' is almost too strong to apply to such an interpretation. It is far
more consonant to the structure and tenor of the whole passage, to read
it as an epithet applied to St. Paul: 'O prize of the rich Spirit of
grace.' I have also without hesitation changed 'of this strong soul'
into 'of _his_ strong soul.' 'Oblique ambush' may refer to the oblique
rays of the sun now rays of darkness, but the primary reference is to
the indirect manner and 'vigorous guess,' by which St. Paul, mentally
glancing from one to the other light, learned through the dimming of the
sun to believe in the Deity of Him who spake from out the dimming
brightness. The same thought, though with a strained and less successful
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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