The Holdfast
The Vow and the Correction
The speaker resolves to obey God by his own strength, is told it is impossible, and learns that even his trust must be confessed as God's gift.
I vowed to keep my dear God's strict command with all my power and strength. But someone told me it couldn't be done. Still, I might trust in God to be my light.✦12 Then I'll trust in him alone, I said. No—even trusting in him was his as well: we must confess that nothing is our own.✦3 Then I confess that he is my help:4
The Holdfast Revealed
The speaker is troubled by having nothing, but a friend explains that all is more ours by being Christ's, who keeps what Adam lost.
But having nothing is ours—not confessing that we have nothing.5 I stood amazed at this, deeply troubled, until I heard a friend say that everything is more ours by being his. What Adam had, and forfeited for us all, Christ keeps now—he who cannot fail or fall.
Read the original English
Ithreatened to observe the strict decree Of my deare God with all my power and might: But I was told by one, it could not be; Yet I might trust in God to be my light.
Then will I trust, said I, in him alone. Nay, ev'n to trust in him, was also his: We must confesse that nothing is our own. Then I confesse that he my succour is:
But to have nought is ours, not to confesse That we have nought. I stood amaz'd at this, Much troubled, till I heard a friend expresse, That all things were more ours by being his. What Adam had, and forfeited for all, Christ keepeth now, who cannot fail or fall.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Ps.27.1 — Of David. The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life; whom shall I dread?
- ↩1Cor.4.7 — For who makes you different? And what do you have that you did not receive? But if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you had not received it?
Notes
- 1 ↩Source orthography joins the opening as 'Ithreatened'; read as 'I threatened' (missing word-boundary).
- 2 ↩Early modern 'threatened to' here means a firm resolve/undertaking, not menace; rendered as 'vowed to' for contemporary clarity.
- 3 ↩"was also his" means the very act of trusting is God's gift, not a human achievement—the poem's central holdfast paradox.
- 4 ↩succour rendered as help (aid/support/rescue); archaic succor avoided for register without loss of sense.
- 5 ↩Herbert’s contrast: emptiness is our real condition, but even the act of confessing that emptiness is not something we can claim as our own (it too is given).
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