On
Virtue
- Phillis
Wheatley
O thou bright jewel in my aim I strive
To comprehend thee. Thine own words
declare
Wisdom is higher than a fool can reach.
I cease to wonder, and no more attempt
Thine height t’explore, or fathom thy profound.
But, O my soul, sink not into despair,
Virtue is near thee,
and with gentle hand
Would now embrace thee, hovers o’er
thine head.
Fain would the heaven-born soul with
her converse,
Then seek, then court her for her
promised bliss.
Auspicious queen, thine heavenly
pinions spread,
And lead celestial Chastity along;
Lo! now her sacred retinue descends,
Arrayed in glory from the orbs above.
Attend me, Virtue, thro’ my
youthful years!
O leave me not to the false joys of
time!
But guide my steps to endless life and
bliss.
Greatness, or Goodness,
say what I shall call thee,
To give an higher appellation still,
Teach me a better strain, a nobler lay,
O Thou, enthroned with Cherubs in the
realms of day!
**
Phillis
Wheatley (1753–1784)
Phillis Wheatley Peters was one of the
best-known poets in pre-19th century America. She was enslaved and educated in
the household of a prominent Boston commercialist John Wheatley. We could say
that she was an early proof that the blacks could be both artistic and
intellectual. Her name became a household word among literate colonists and her
achievements served as catalyst for the antislavery movement.
When she was about seven years old “a slender, frail female child ... she was seized from Senegal/Gambia, West
Africa and was transported to the Boston docks with a shipment of “refugee”
slaves. In the month of August 1761, Susanna Wheatley, wife of a prominent
Boston tailor John Wheatley, “in want of a domestic,” purchased the the girl
for a trifle. Though she was enslaved by purchase, the Wheatleys, including their son Nathaniel and their daughter Mary, taught her to
read and write. She read widely.
Her first poem “To the University of
Cambridge in New England” was revealing her spirit that yearned for the
intellectual challenge of a more academic atmosphere. Her later work, the ‘Whitefield
elegy’ brought her national renown. By the time she was 18, Wheatley had
gathered a collection of 28 poems .
She and Nathaniel left for London on May
8, 1771. The now-celebrated poetess was welcomed by several abolitionist dignitaries,
philanthropists including John Thorton, and Benjamin Franklin. The first
edition of her Poems
on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, (1773) was perhaps
the first volume of poetry by an African American published in modern times. In
her poems, in addition to classical and neoclassical techniques, Wheatley
applied biblical symbolism to evangelize and to comment on slavery.
On 1st April 1778, she married John
Peters and her married life was not so prosperous. Wheatley was suffering from
a chronic asthma condition for long and she died, uncared for and alone, on
December 5, 1784,.
In the past decade, Wheatley scholars have uncovered her poems, letters, and
more facts about her life and her association with 18th-century Black
abolitionists. They have also charted her notable use of classicism and have
explicated the sociological intent of her biblical allusions. The research and
interpretation of her works have proved Wheatley Peter’s disdain for the
institution of slavery and her use of art to undermine its practice.
(Adopted and modified from: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/phillis-wheatley—Original
by Sondra A. O’Neale, Emory University.)
