Analysis of Yet If His Majesty Our Sovereign Lord



Yet if his majesty our sovereign lord
   Should of his own accord
   Friendly himself invite,
   And say "I'll be your guest to-morrow night."
   How should we stir ourselves, call and command
   All hands to work! "Let no man idle stand.
   Set me fine Spanish tables in the hall,
   See they be fitted all;
   Let there be room to eat,
  And order taken that there want no meat.
  See every sconce and candlestick made bright,
  That without tapers they may give a light.
  Look to the presence: are the carpets spread,
  The dazie o'er the head,
  The cushions in the chairs,
  And all the candles lighted on the stairs?
  Perfume the chambers, and in any case
  Let each man give attendance in his place."
  Thus if the king were coming would we do,
  And 'twere good reason too;
  For 'tis a duteous thing
  To show all honour to an earthly king,
  And after all our travail and our cost,
  So he be pleas'd, to think no labour lost.
  But at the coming of the King of Heaven
  All's set at six and seven:
  We wallow in our sin,
  Christ cannot find a chamber in the inn.
  We entertain him always like a stranger,
  And as at first still lodge him in the manger.


Scheme AABBCCDDEEBBFFGGHHIIJJKLMMNNOO
Poetic Form
Metre 11110010101 111101 100101 0111111101 11110011001 1111111101 1111010001 111101 111111 0101011111 1100101011 1011011101 1101010101 011001 010001 0101010101 0101000101 1111010011 1101010111 011101 11011 111111101 010110010101 111111111 11010101110 1111010 1100101 1101010001 101111010 01111110010
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 1,148
Words 216
Sentences 11
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 30
Lines Amount 30
Letters per line (avg) 28
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 852
Words per stanza (avg) 212
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:05 min read
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