Anne Bradstreet's "Upon the Burning of Our House July 10th, 1666"

In The Heath Anthology of American Literature I'm still reading selections from Anne Bradstreet's work.  Last week, I read "Upon the Burning of Our House July 10th, 1666," and I was surprised that the anthology didn't provide footnotes for the Biblical references Bradstreet put in the poem.  While I don't really have anything very literary to write about the poem itself, I thought I could at least catalogue her Biblical references.

Bradstreet's "I blest His name that gave and took" (line 14) echoes Job's "The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD" (Job 1:21).  Despite their losses, both Job and Bradstreet bless God.

"Adieu, Adieu, all's vanity" (line 36) is a quote from Ecclesiastes.  "Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities!  All is vanity" (Ecclesiastes 1:2).  The next verse in Ecclesiastes reflects on the transience of life:  "What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?"  From this, Bradstreet shifts her focus to Heaven, which she calls "an house on high erect, / Framed by that mighty Architect" (lines 43-44).  She asks herself, "And did thy wealth on earth abide? / Didst fix thy hope on mold'ring dust?" (lines 37-38)  Her self-examination seems to be spurred by Matthew 6:19-21:  "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."  Along with the similarity in these views, there's some resemblance between Bradstreet's "mold'ring dust" and the Biblical "moth and rust destroy" (initial M and D, and the -ust of dust and rust).  At the end of the poem, she expresses the same view presented in Matthew: "The world no longer let me love, / My hope and treasure lies above" (lines 53-54).

Anne Bradstreet's "In Reference to Her Children, 23 June 1659"

As part of my Anthology Odyssey project, I've been reading some Anne Bradstreet poems in The Heath Anthology of American Literature.  I recently read and noticed something about "In Reference to Her Children, 23 June 1659."

In the poem, Bradstreet portrays herself as a mother bird worried about her young.  She writes:

If birds could weep, then would my tears
Let others know what are my fears
Lest this my brood some harm should catch,
And be surpris'd for want of watch,
Whilst pecking corn, and void of care
They fall un'wares in fowler's snare (lines 41-46)

This anthology includes a footnote for "fowler," explaining only that "fowler is a term for bird-catcher."  When I saw the superscript number that indicated a footnote, a mere definition of the term was not what I expected to find because I think this specific image in Bradstreet's metaphor is a Biblical allusion.

I've been reading the Bible since July 2014 (and plan to continue to cycle through it, just re-starting when I've finished), and earlier this year, I found this same image of the fowler's snare twice in the Psalms:  "For he [God] will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence.  He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler" (Psalm 91:3-4) and "Blessed be the LORD, who has not given us as prey to their teeth!  We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken, and we have escaped!" (Psalm 124: 6-7).  The bird imagery in Psalm 91's "he will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge" is also echoed in Bradstreet's "Long did I keep you soft and warm, / And with my wings kept off all harm" (lines 57-58).

Some of the other Bradstreet poems in this anthology, like "Contemplations" and "The Flesh and the Spirit" have very obvious Biblical references that evidence Bradstreet's familiarity with the Bible so it seems very likely that she would also have been familiar with the fowler image in the Psalms and used it in "In Reference to Her Children."