The Bane of Life and Beauty: Time

The Bane of Life and Beauty: Time "For every man, Time is an emptying reservoir; to fret over how much you have left only wastes it." - Lee Connolly. In every person's mind, a clock is running. A pendulum is constantly swinging and ticking into the future, into the unknown. Every person must, at sometime, recognize Time as a measurement of their own life and not something that can be ignored and forgotten about. As long as there have been life there has been death, and Time is simply a tool in which nature uses to remind us of this. Writers of the seventeenth century realized this, and put it into to words extremely well. The seventeenth century was filled with religion, fighting, death, new governments, and it was no surprise that brilliant literature would emerge from such an era. The literature of the time would later be divided into three main categories or "schools." These three schools being the metaphysical school, cavalier school, and the extremely religious Puritan school. Though each of these schools consist of very different styles of writing, they all attempt to warn their readers of Time's passing and its consequences. Whether the poems were read in the seventeenth century, today, or in another hundred years, the message is the same; Time is not something that stops for anyone or anything. It is an intangible reality in any man's life. The metaphysical school,containing authors such as John Donne and Andrew Marvel, seem to express to the reader that time moves quickly, while the Puritan group of writers, such as John Milton, seem to be slightly annoyed by Time's passing but accepts it and puts it in God's hands, and lastly the cavaliers, including Robert Herrick, write more about living life for today and living life like there is no tomorrow. Andrew Marvel, a metaphysical writer, stated,"But at my back I always hear Time's winged chariot hurrying near,"(679). In this quote from "To His Coy Mistress," Marvel expresses Time as a chariot