The Seafarer Group

Question:

ashleeee
ashleeee
Student
High School - 12th Grade

According to the speaker in the poem "The Seafarer", what qualities might earn a person a place in heaven?

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Posted by ashleeee on Tuesday October 14, 2008 at 1:53 PM and tagged with heaven, speaker, the seafarer, themes.

Answers:


  1. dymatsuoka

    eNotes Editor

    The speaker catalogues the qualities that might earn a person a place in heaven at the end of the poem, in lines 108-116.  He highlights the virtues of humility, courage, faith, chastity and love, saying,

    "He who lives humbly has angels from Heaven

    To carry him courage and strength and belief".

    He emphasizes the importance of self-moderation and control, especially as it pertains to the element of pride, admonishing,

    "A man must conquer pride, not kill it,

    Be firm with his fellows, chaste for himself".

    Finally, he offers a treatise on the "Golden Rule", outlining how one who wishes to attain heaven must treat others, and stressing that one must never do harm, no matter what the circumstances.  He says,

    "Treat all the world as the world deserves,

    With love or with hate but never with harm,

    Thought an enemy seek to scorch him in hell,

    Or set the flames of a funeral pyre

    Under his lord".

    Sources:
    http://www.enotes.com/seafarer/
    http://www.enotes.com/seafarer/summary
    http://www.enotes.com/seafarer/text-poem

    Rate answer:

    Posted by dymatsuoka on Tuesday October 14, 2008 at 5:19 PM