John+Keble

John Keble was an Anglican priest, theologian, and poet. He was born in April 25, 1792 and died March 29, 1866. Keble was educated at Christi College, Oxford and later became a teacher at the highly esteemed Oxford University from 1831 to 1841 where he taught poetry. During his pedagogical stint at Oxford, Keble was part of the Oxford Movement, which “was generally considered to have been initiated by his sermon ‘National Apostasy’” (britannica.com). In 1827, before teaching at Oxford, Keble wrote //The Christian Year// which was highly accepted, and “[w]idely circulated, the book did more than any other to promulgate the ideas of the High Church movement in Anglicanism” (britannica.com). After Keble’s death, Keble College was opened in his honor in 1870.

Keble grew up in the countryside with his close Anglican family. Keble’s father was a vicar of Coln St. Aldwyn. He was the second child out of five children and the eldest son. According to the Oxford Dictionary of Biography Database, all Keble children were educated at home by aunts and mainly their father (oxforddnb.com). On 10 October 1835, Keble had married Charlotte Clarke (who was the sister of his brother’s wife). The Keble family and Clarke family were close family friends and despite the opinions of others the marriage was happy.

At the age of fourteen Keble and his brother (Thomas Keble) became priests. Then when he reached the age of eighteen "he gained double first-class honours, a distinction achieved only once before, two years earlier, by the twenty-year-old Robert Peel. Almost a year later, with Richard Whately, he was elected to an open fellowship at Oriel College, then the intellectually pre-eminent college in the university" (oxforddnb.com). He had continued scholarly success and he became a tutor at Oriel in 1812.

The Oxford Movement, also referred to as he Tractarian Movement, was a cause rallied against the government attempting to cut church funding. The movement later on became more centered around the learnings of older Church Fathers. During the movement, the group published their thoughts in articles called //Tracts for Times// (1833-1841), where Keble wrote 9 out of the 90 articles. Despite some of the members, including one of the leaders John Henry Newman, Keble stayed true to his strict Anglican beliefs and continued to spread his effect (britannica.com).

John Keble’s best known lyrical work, //The Christian Year//, was considered to be the most popular and best-selling book of poetry during the nineteenth century. The book was “[p]ublished anonymously in July 1827, when Keble was in his thirty-fifth year, a first edition of 500 was soon followed by a second edition in November. Six additional poems were added to the third edition in 1828. By 1837 there had been sixteen editions and by Keble's death there were ninety-five” (oxforddnb.com). Perry Butler notes, in his biography of John Keble on the Oxford Dictionary of Biography Database, that by bringing the dangers of Romanticism under the discipline of religious self-control Keble contributed to what one historian has aptly described as ‘the Victorian Churching of Romanticism’. With the massive popularity of //The Christian Year// Keble had designated the profits for the renovations of Hursley Church (where Keble would serve as vicar for thirty years).

Due to the uncontested success of //The Christian Year//, Keble was hired on as the professor of poetry at Oxford University. During his tenure at Oxford University Keble continued with his own poetry, “ [i]n 1846 he published (again anonymously and to raise money for restoration) another volume of poetry, //Lyra innocentium: Thoughts in Verse on Christian Children, their Ways and their Privileges// ” (oxforddnb.com).

John Keble's "Morning" from //The Christian Year//:

MORNING

His compassions fail not. They are new every morning. Lament. iii. 22, 23. Hues of the rich unfolding morn, That, ere the glorious sun be born, By some soft touch invisible Around his path are taught to swell; — Thou rustling breeze so fresh and gay, That dancest forth at opening day, And brushing by with joyous wing, Wakenest each little leaf to sing; — Ye fragrant clouds of dewy steam, By which deep grove and tangled stream Pay, for soft rains in season given, Their tribute to the genial heaven; — Why waste your treasures of delight Upon our thankless, joyless sight; Who day by day to sin awake, Seldom of Heaven and you partake? Oh! timely happy, timely wise, Hearts that with rising morn arise! Eyes that the beam celestial view, Which evermore makes all things new! New every morning is the love Our wakening and uprising prove; Through sleep and darkness safely brought, Restored to life, and power, and thought. 1 Revelation xxi. 5.

Works Cited

Butler, Perry. ‘Keble, John (1792–1866)//.’ Oxford Dictionary of National Biography//. Oxford University Press, 2004. Web. 28 January 2015.

Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica, The. //Encyclopedia Britannica//. Encyclopedia Britannica Inc., n.d. Web. 28 January 2015.

Keble, John. //The Christian Year.// Grand Rapids: Christian Classics Ethereal Library, 2005. Print.