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ENC 1102
April 23, 2020
How Emily Dickinson Develops the Same Theme in the Poems “Faith” Is Fine Invention”
and “I Never Saw a Moor”?
The poetry of Emily Dickinson is full of straightforward approaches to the major
everyday themes of her time, as she wants to strike a balance between the material and
immaterial worlds to understand human characters amid reasonable manifestations. She
masterly and laconically uses the language in her poems “Faith” Is Fine Invention and I
Never Saw a Moor to introduce the idea of religion and science, human beliefs and
assumptions, and natural and subtle matters surrounding individuals. In other words, she
refuses categorical judgments in her poems in favor of some pragmatic and critical points to
guide a reader through her ideas metaphorically. Therefore, in the two poems by Dickinson,
she focuses on the use of metaphors and sound to discover her broad viewpoint on the
relation between religion and science and tangible and intangible facts and matters.
First, it is important to note that Dickinson uses a single stanza with four lines to
introduce a reasonable balance between religious and scientific things by the time she wrote
the poem. A reader is welcome to feel the difference between seeing and proving with
prudence and how these issues are critical for the contemporary world. The author discovers a
variety of ABCB rhyme, meter, sound, and metaphors (Leiter 98). However, the four lines
given in the poem have a direct relation to the depth of meaning included in the title as a
reflection of the first line:
“Faith” is a fine invention
For Gentlemen who see!
But Microscopes are prudent
In an Emergency (Dickinson)!
Along with the use of sound to keep the reader focused on the ideas of seeing and the
benefits of microscopes, a reader gives a so-called moment of enlightenment, understanding
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there should be no categorical judgments but the harmony between religious and scientific
affiliations among individuals. The tiny lyric included in one single stanza refers to “the
liminality of seeing, hearing, and intelligibility, the dynamic border between the attributes of
sense and sensation, thought and extension” (Noble, Deppman and Stonum 99). The author’s
philosophical perception of the reality is full of direct metaphors of seeing and believing and
proving something empirically. “Gentlemen who see” refer to the masses of people who
strive for getting the wisdom from above with its effects on increasing human happiness,
patience, and hope. This metaphorical approach becomes clear for readers with the help of
sound used in the linear rhymes and meter with the identical first and third and second and
fourth rhymes respectively.
On the other hand, in the poem I Never Saw a Moor, Dickinson tends to describe the
meaning of things a person never saw in his/her life; however, it does not mean these things
do not exist. Once again, a pragmatic viewpoint by the author is evident to juxtapose the
ideas of seeing and believing, as well as agreeing with the unseen things, features, and events.
