Analysis of Sonnet XXXIX. Power Of Faith



I sat me down in earth's benighted vale,
And had no courage and no strength to rise;
Sad to the passing breeze I told my tale,
And bowed my head, and drained my weeping eyes.
But Faith came by, and took me by the hand;
And now the valleys rise, the mountains fall.
Welcome the stormy sea, the dangerous land!
With Faith to aid me, I can conquer all.
Faith lays her hand upon the lion's mane;
Faith fearless walks within the serpent's den;
Faith smiles amid her children round her slain;
When words are burning, cries unmoved, Amen.
Yes, I am up, far upward on the wing;
The withered arm is strong, the broken heart doth sing.


Scheme ABABCDCDEFEFGG
Poetic Form Shakespearean sonnet 
Metre 1111010101 0111001111 1101011111 0111011101 1111011101 0101010101 10010101001 1111111101 1101010101 1101010101 1101010101 1111010101 1111110101 010111010111
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 620
Words 120
Sentences 7
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 14
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 34
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 481
Words per stanza (avg) 118
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

36 sec read
43

Thomas Cogswell Upham

Thomas Upham was an American philosopher, psychologist, pacifist, poet, author, and educator. He was an important figure in the holiness movement. He became influential within psychology literature and served as the Bowdoin College professor of mental and moral philosophy from 1825-1868. His most popular work, Mental Philosophy received 57 editions over a 73-year period. Additionally, he produced a volume of 16 other books and the first treatise on abnormal psychology, as well as several other works on religious themes and figures. Specific teachings included a conception of mental faculties - one of these restoring the will to psychology be developing a tripartite division of mental phenomena into intellectual, sentient, and voluntary. The intellect subsumed sensation and perception, attention, habit, association, and memory as well as reasoning. Sensibilities included natural emotions and desires, such as appetites, propensities, and affections, and also moral emotions, such as a feeling of obligation. Finally, the last division was the will, which allowed for volition as a basic component of human nature. more…

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