A Poem

In his poem Virtue, George Herbert uses the typical for the metaphysical poets of his time arguments. In each of the stanzas he makes a different argument consisting of two parts. In the first part he describes why the object he has chosen is beautiful and in the second why it should die. The rose, the day and the spring are all temporary objects. The fourth stanza is the only different one. He states that the soul cannot die, because it is everlasting. His idea is that soul does not disappear, but only moves from one world into the other. As a whole, the idea of the poem is that virtuous soul need not fear death.