A Poet On Prayer

George Herbert on Prayer

If you have been following my blog, you will know that I am reading 16th C English poet George Herbert’s masterpiece, The Temple, a collection of pious poems on various and sundry topics. I recently came across this beautiful poem on prayer. May it encourage you to be a man or woman of prayer.

Prayer

Prayer the Church's banquet, Angels' age,

God's breath in man returning to his birth,
The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav'n and earth;

Engine against th' Almighty, sinners' tower,
Reverséd thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
The six-days world transposing in an hour,
A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;

Softness, and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,
Exalted Manna, gladness of the best,
Heaven in ordinary, man well dressed,
The Milky way, the bird of Paradise,

Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the soul's blood,
The land of spices; something understood.