Analysis of If love be holy, if that mystery
John Marston 1576 (Coventry) – 1634 (Hampshire)
If love be holy, if that mystery
O co-united hearts be sacrament;
If the unbounded goodness have infused
A sacred ardour of a mutual love
Into our species; if those amorous joys,
Those sweets of life, those comforts even in death,
Spring from a cause above our reason's reach;
If that clear flame deduce its heat from heaven,
'Tis, like its cause, eternal; always one,
As in th' instiller of divinest love,
Unchanged by time, immortal, maugre death.
But, oh! 'tis grown a figment; love, a jest:
A comic poesy: the soul of man is rotten,
Even to the core, no sound affection.
Our love is hollow, vaulted, stands on props
Of circumstance, profit, or ambitious passes.
Scheme | ABCDEFGHHDFIHHJK |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111011100 1101011100 1001010101 0101101001 011010111001 11111101001 1101011011 11110111110 111101011 10111111 011101011 1111010101 01010111110 1010111010 10111010111 11010101010 |
Closest metre | Iambic hexameter |
Characters | 658 |
Words | 119 |
Sentences | 5 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 16 |
Lines Amount | 16 |
Letters per line (avg) | 32 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 514 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 117 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 36 sec read
- 51 Views
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"If love be holy, if that mystery" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/23755/if-love-be-holy%2C-if-that-mystery>.
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