13. 17th C Poetry: Trinity and then Ben Jonson

I thought this class went pretty well: first a discussion of the Trinity based on a really fine letter to the TLS by someone named Neville Martin Gwynne (hello! if you're Googling yourself: that was a great letter!).  Then a brief intro to Jonson and a close reading of Jonson's beautiful epigram/epitaph "On My First Daughter," here:

Here lies, to each her parents’ ruth,

Mary, the daughter of their youth;

Yet all heaven’s gifts being heaven’s due,

It makes the father less to rue.

At six months’ end she parted hence

With safety of her innocence;

Whose soul heaven’s queen, whose name she bears,

In comfort of her mother’s tears,

Hath placed amongst her virgin-train:

Where, while that severed doth remain,

This grave partakes the fleshly birth;

Which cover lightly, gentle earth!