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영어

No other poets in the history of English poetry are more religious than Gorge Herbert. He makes the Bible the source of his inspiration and writings. His poems are the means by which he shows his conviction and hope for the Christianity. They reflect the poet’s attitude toward God, the religious issues and tendencies which affected the minds of the people of the times. As a well-known metaphysical poet of the seventeenth century, Herbert found many contradictory contents in the Christian doctrines, concerning the meanings of sin and salvation. His religious lyrics tell us lots of spiritual conflicts that have passed between God and his soul. However Herbert conquers the religious doubts, anxieties and conflicts after realizing God’s providence, cosmos and completeness. Herbert’s religious poems in The Temple eventually reveal how the poet explores the spiritual development of the human soul which moves from the state of despair to the state of hope, from the fallen man’s uselessness to the spiritual restoration through humility, repentance and God’s grace. (Kyonggi University)