Poetry Explication: “On My First Son”

Ben Jonson composed this elegy after the death in 1603 of his eldest child, Benjamin, elderly seven. The bard locations the young man, tendering him farewell, and then hunts for some significance for his loss. Jonson blames himself, rhetorically not less than, contending that he wanted too much for his child, who was only on lend to him. Now that the seven years are up, the young man has had to be returned.

Jonson endeavours to contend that this is only equitable and his presumptuous designs for the boy's future were the origin of his present sense of loss. He then inquiries his own grief: why lament the enviable state of death when the progeny has got away pain and the misery of aging? He will not response this inquiry, easily saying "Rest in supple peace" and inquiring that the progeny, or possibly the serious, record that his child was Jonson's "best part of poetry," the creation of which he was most proud. He concludes by vowing that from now on he will be more very careful with those he loves; he will be wary of admiration and so requiring them too much.

In the verse "On my first son" Ben Jonson values mighty diction and dialect to express his strong sentiments of wrath and despair. These strong sentiments which he feels as a Father over the decrease of his child makes him inquiry his belief in his maker.

In the first stanza Jonson expresses his sense of decrease by utilising its diction and language. The phrases "farewell" of his "joy" in the first judgment display us the deep emotional agony he dropped by mislaying the "child of [his] right hand". Jonson has recounted his child with blameless and, literally, joyous words. The use of "loved" and "joy" shows ...