3 April: Boreham on George Herbert

Court and Countryside
The villagers of Bemerton in Wiltshire never forget to commemorate on the third of April, the birth, in 1593, of George Herbert, whom Coleridge regarded as the purest religious poet of all time. Izaak Walton always felt that the writing of Herbert's biography represented the crowning glory of his own literary career. From the very outset, George Herbert had everything in his favour. Delicately nurtured and liberally educated, he early became a favourite at Court and gained the personal intimacy of the King. James never looked upon the dignified and graceful bearing of the handsome youth, or listened to his deep, rich musical voice, without wishing to have him constantly attached to his royal person. In view of Herbert's mastery of European languages, he made him Public Orator, an office that involved him in the task of drafting His Majesty's personal correspondence with foreign princes and potentates. Hoping that this might lead to his appointment as Secretary of State, George eagerly accepted the post. But, in 1625, King James died and the outlook changed.

For some time before this crisis broke upon him, George had felt less and less satisfied with the kind of life in which his position at Court involved him. His mother, having entreated him to enter the ministry, he retired to a pretty little hamlet in Kent to review the perplexing issues. The longer he pondered the matter, the less inclined he felt to return to the palace. But, before he could make any announcement of his decision, three important developments complicated matters. His mother died; he discovered that he was doomed to a consumptive's grave and with lightning suddenness, he fell in love.

Love At First Sight—And Before
It came about in this way. Eager to fortify his physical frame, he went, in 1629 to spend a long holiday with a relative, the Earl of Danby. Not so far from Lord Danby's house dwelt Mr. Charles Danvers. Meeting George Herbert, Mr. Danvers capitulated unconditionally to his spell. Moreover, he had nine daughters, and he declared that he would be the happiest man living if one these daughters—Jane, his favourite, for preference—could win the heart of Mr. Herbert. The good man sang his new friend's praises in Jane's ears so persistently and persuasively and successfully that, as Izaak Walton says, she fell in love with him without even seeing him. Within three days of their introduction, they were man and wife. The union proved an ideally happy one. No pages of Izaak Walton's biography are more affecting than his narrative of the perfect sympathy and understanding subsisting between these two.

Married in 1629, Herbert died in 1632. Three months after his marriage, the king and the bishops decided to exercise some pressure in securing his talents for the ministry. He was offered the parish of Bemerton, near Salisbury; Dr. Laud, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, told him that it would be a mortal sin to decline; and the matter was soon settled. The story of Herbert's ministry at Bemerton reads like a tender but triumphant idyll. Izaak Walton hesitated before embarking on this section of his narrative, wondering whether it was possible to convey, in black and white, any adequate impression of the facts that he had to recount. Yet, in spite of all his apprehensions, he did it, and did it so skilfully that the Encyclopedia Britannica declares that George Herbert's life at Bemerton, as told by Walton, is one of the most exquisite delineations in biography.

An Idyll Of Peace And Poesy
One of his best known poems is entitled "The Odour," a set of rapturous verses glorifying the perfume exhaled by a gracious and unselfish life. Everybody in Bemerton was conscious of the subtle and indefinable fragrance of the young vicar's influence. The cottagers and farm workers worshipped the very ground he trod. Twice every day he conducted services in the little church, ringing the bell with his own hands to call to the sanctuary such of his parishioners as could come. Very few, of course, could attend any one of these numerous services; but it is recorded that "when they heard the bell calling them to pray, they let the ploughs rest for a moment in the furrow whilst they bowed their heads and mingled their devotions with his." Rich and poor, young and old, felt that in Mr. Herbert, the erstwhile courtier, they had a man who was equally a master of the visible and invisible worlds, and they treasured his counsel like wisdom distilled from some celestial oracle.

Born when the primroses were beginning to peep through the grass of the hedgerows in 1593, and married when the buds first appeared on the hawthorn in 1629, he died breathing the fragrance of the daffodils and the early violets. His whole life seemed attuned to the beauty and the sweetness of the English Spring. On his last Sunday, he astonished the household by rising and dressing as though he had suddenly returned to health. Seizing his beloved violin, he sang with shining face some of his own choicest stanzas. He handed to Mr. Nicholas Farrer a roll of manuscript. This proved to be the collection of poems, entitled "The Temple," by which he will always be best remembered. Twenty thousand copies were sold almost immediately. His memorial is to be found in one of the most chaste and charming recesses of Westminster Abbey. Not far from the Unknown Warrior's Tomb is a lovely little chapel commonly known as Little Poets' Corner. It contains a statue of Wordsworth, together with busts of Kingsley, Keble, and the Arnolds—Thomas and Matthew. The dainty chapel is adorned by a noble window dedicated to the memory of George Herbert and William Cowper, two singers who had much in common. In that hallowed spot, and in that congenial company, George Herbert seems very much at home; and it is pleasant, in that atmosphere, to take our leave of him.

F W Boreham

Image: George Herbert