17세기 서경 명상시 연구: 「펜써스트 저택」과 「쿠퍼 언덕」을 중심으로

Abstract

In the literature of the English civil war period the desire for reconciliation and peace is expected to be one of the recurring themes. Sick of slaughter and destruction, many writers, whether they are royalists or parliamentarians, frequently want to seek in their works a middle course between political and religious extremes before, during, and after the vortex of the civil war. This may explain why one of Ben Jonson's best known images of the good society, "To Penshurst", begins with, and circles back to, one controlling idea—the modesty of Penshurst and the virtues of its host. In the tight little world of Penshurst man is inseparably connected to nature and the relation between the ruler and the local farmers is based on a reciprocal human kindness. Jonson sees his ideal society in terms of an unforced love rather than governing and submission. The whole range of values which he felt necessary for the good society is suggested in the part of his children's education: "The mysteries of manners, armes, and arts"(98). Summarized in that line is Jonson's sense of the fusion of cultural, moral, and religious life in society. Another poet, John Denham, sympathetic to the crown, treats this idea in a long poem, "Cooper's Hill", which manages to be well balanced by reproving directly or indirectly both the excesses of Parliamentarian reform and the abuses of the royal prerogative. Though ultimately royalist in spirit, "Cooper's Hill" is thought to be a call for moderation on both sides. The greater part of the poem is devoted to answering the question "Is there no temperate Region. . . ?" (139), that is, to showing various examples in both society and nature in which a happy medium or "concordia discors" can be embodied. He finds these examples in the marriage of Charles I with Henrietta Maria which manifests the political trinity of England, Scotland, and France and in the great river Thames which is deep yet clear, strong without rage, and without overflowing full. Though the general eulogies upon "To Penshurst" and "Cooper's Hill" in the following centuries has been based on their depictions of topography and successes as landscape poems, their controlling theme is far more ethical, philosophical, and topical than topographical. The former presents a perfect emblem of the ideal society the basis of which is modesty and generosity, and the latter puts an emphasis on seeking a middle course among seemingly incompatible elements in nature and society.