Five-minute digest

The Task

William Cowper

Summary

The Task, published in 1785, is a long poem in six books of blank verse that made William Cowper the most popular poet of his generation. Its origin was playful: Cowper's friend Lady Austen urged him to write blank verse and, when he asked for a subject, told him to write about the sofa. The poem therefore opens with a mock-heroic history of the sofa, from the stool to the luxurious couch, but soon wanders, as the title suggests, into a broad and genial meditation on country life, nature, religion and the state of England. Book I, The Sofa, describes walks through the countryside around Olney and contains the famous line that God made the country, and man made the town. Book II, The Timepiece, reads the signs of the times: it condemns slavery, declaring that slaves cannot breathe in England, laments the decline of discipline in church and nation, and affirms England, with all thy faults, I love thee still. Book III, The Garden, contains Cowper's moving self-portrait as a stricken deer that left the herd, wounded and found by one who had himself been hurt by the archers, that is, Christ; it then celebrates the retired life of gardening, including the cucumber frame and the greenhouse. Book IV, The Winter Evening, begins with the post-boy bringing the newspaper and pictures the snug evening by the fire when the cups that cheer but not inebriate wait on each. Book V, The Winter Morning Walk, moves from frost and snow to an attack on tyranny and the Bastille and to a meditation on the true liberty that only grace can give. Book VI, The Winter Walk at Noon, reflects on the love of animals, condemns cruelty, and ends with a vision of the coming kingdom of God when creation will be renewed. Throughout, Cowper's evangelical faith shapes his love of nature, his hatred of cruelty and his social criticism. The Task influenced Wordsworth and Coleridge and anticipated the Romantic conversational poem, while remaining a devout Christian work. This edition also includes John Gilpin and several shorter poems such as To Mary.

Top Lessons

The stricken deer
Cowper describes his own wound of sin and despair and his rescue by Christ.
Related across the library
- Little House in the Big Woods, Lesson: Obedience keeps us safe
  Obedience keeps us safe. Pa's story about the voice in the woods and Charley's false cries for help both show that disobeying or playing tricks can lead to real danger. When Charley truly needs help, no one believes he is in trouble until they see him.
- Uncle Vanya, Full Text
  would make a really splendid subject for a book Imagine it the life of a retired professor as stale as a piece of hardtack tortured by gout headaches and rheumatism his liver bursting with jealousy and envy living on the estate of his first wife although he hates it because he can't afford to live in town He is everlastingly whining about his hard lot though as a matter of fact he is extraordinarily lucky He is the son of a common deacon and has attained the professor's chair become the son-in-law of a senator i...
- The Last Battle, Lesson: The Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs
  The Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs. After being fooled once, the Dwarfs decide to trust no one, and at the end they sit in a bright country believing they are shut in a dark stable. Lewis shows that refusing to be taken in can become its own prison, and that even Aslan's feast cannot reach those who will not receive it.
- Henry VIII, Full Text
  gold like heathen gods Shone down the English and tomorrow they Made Britain India every man that stood Showed like a mine Their dwarfish pages were As cherubins all gilt The madams too Not used to toil did almost sweat to bear The pride upon them that their very labour Was to them as a painting Now this masque Was cried incomparable and th ensuing night Made it a fool and beggar The two kings Equal in lustre were now best now worst As presence did present them him in eye Still him in praise and being present bo...
- Memorial and Remonstrance and Notes of Debates in the Federal Convention, Lesson: Institutions are made by fallible bodies
  Institutions are made by fallible bodies. Madison records fatigue, heat, absence, disagreement, and revision. Political architecture is produced by human limits, not pure reason alone.
Against slavery
Book II is one of the earliest great poems against the slave trade.
Related across the library
- My Side of the Mountain, Lesson: Work makes a home
  Work makes a home. The hemlock is only a tree until Sam burns, scrapes and furnishes it, and the winter is survivable only because he worked all autumn. The book shows that a home is something made with care and labour, season by season.
- The Northwest Ordinance, Lesson: Equal footing
  Equal footing. New states would join as equals, not colonies. The ordinance extended self-government rather than ruling territories as possessions.
- Little House in the Big Woods, Lesson: Work done together makes a home
  Work done together makes a home. Every season in the Big Woods has its work: smoking meat, churning, sugaring, cheese-making and harvest. Even small children help, and the work is shown as part of family love rather than a burden.
- Inaugural Address (Harry S. Truman), Lesson: Deterrence and peace
  Deterrence and peace. The third course of action argues that an armed attack might never occur if it is made clear in advance that such an attack would meet overwhelming force. This is the logic of the North Atlantic Treaty, signed in April 1949. Students should weigh it against the speech's hope for a just and lasting peace "freely arrived at by equals," and against the Christian tradition that distinguishes peace from mere absence of war.
- Christ Legends, Full Text
  inside the grotto they sat outside on the mountain and they flew under the heavens They came marching in great companies and as they passed they paused and cast a glance at the child There were such jubilation and such gladness and songs and play And all this he saw in the dark night whereas before he could not have made out anything He was so happy because his eyes had been opened that he fell upon his knees and thanked God Here grandmother sighed and said What that shepherd saw we might also see for the angels...
The country and the town
Cowper prefers quiet country life to the city's vice and noise.
Related across the library
- The Professor, Lesson: Earning one's bread
  Earning one's bread. William refuses patronage and works for his living.
- Candide: Or Optimism, Introduction
  the gayest books in the world Gaiety has been scattered everywhere up and down its pages by Voltaire's lavish hand by his thin fingers Many propagandist satirical books have been written with Candide in mind but not too many To-day especially when new faiths are changing the structure of the world faiths which are still plastic enough to be deformed by every disciple each disciple for himself and which have not yet received the final deformation known as universal acceptance to-day Candide is an inspiration to e...
- Poems and Songs of Robert Burns, Lesson: Reading a whole poet
  Reading a whole poet. A chronological collection shows a writer growing and changing. Students can watch Burns move from farm verse to national song.
- Areopagitica, Lesson: Judge books after they appear, not before
  Judge books after they appear, not before. Milton does not deny that the state may burn or punish books that prove blasphemous or libellous. His objection is to prior restraint, the requirement that every book pass a licenser before it can be born. His history argues that ancient and early Christian authorities punished after publication and that licensing came later.
- The Early Christian Creeds, Lesson: Empire changes the scale of theology
  Empire changes the scale of theology. Constantine's involvement made Christian dispute visible across the empire and gave councils new force. The result was neither pure politics nor pure spirituality, but an entanglement that shaped Christian institutions for centuries.

Verified Quotes

Frequently cited

“I sing the Sofa.”

— William Cowper, The Task, Book I (Gutenberg #3698: The Task, and Other Poems (Cassell's National Library, 1899)).Quote card

All Quiet on the Western Front, Full Text
ERICH MARIA REMARQUE ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT Translated from the German by A W WHEEN LONDON G P PUTNAM'S SONS IM WESTEN NICHTS NEUES first published in Germany January First published in England March Reprinted April Reprinted April Reprinted April Reprinted April Reprinted April Reprinted April Reprinted April Reprinted April Reprinted May Reprinted May Reprinted May Reprinted June Reprinted June Completing PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN CHISWICK PRESS CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND GRIGGS PRINTERS LTD TOOKS COURT CH...
The Comedy of Errors, Act 4, Scene 4
Give me your hand, and let me feel your pulse. The conjurer begins his examination like a physician before turning to exorcism.
The Nose, Part I
On the 25th March, 18--, a very strange occurrence took place in St Petersburg. The deadpan opening sentence of the story.
Henry IV, Part 1, Act 5, Scene 1
Honour hath no skill in surgery then? No. What is honour? A word Before the battle, Falstaff's catechism argues that honour cannot mend a wound and belongs only to the dead.
Utilitarianism, Chapter II
The creed which accepts as the foundation of morals, Utility, or the Greatest Happiness Principle, holds that actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness Mill's canonical statement of the principle, followed at once by the definition of happiness as pleasure and the absence of pain.

Frequently cited

“God made the country, and man made the town.”

— William Cowper, The Task, Book I (Gutenberg #3698: The Task, and Other Poems (Cassell's National Library, 1899)).Quote card

Pensees, Fragment 358, Section VI
Man is neither angel nor brute, and the unfortunate thing is that he who would act the angel acts the brute A warning against the pretension to purely spiritual or rational virtue (a footnote marker in the source is omitted).
On the Magnet (De Magnete), Book V, Ch. XII
A loadstone is a wonderful thing in very many experiments, and like a living creature. The opening of the chapter arguing that magnetic force is animate or imitates life.
Martyrs Mirror: Selections, Michael Sattler (1527)
and sisters which was granted him Having conferred with them for a little while he began and undauntingly answered thus In regard to the articles relating to me and my brethren and sisters hear this brief answer First That we have acted contrary to the imperial mandate we do not admit for the same says that the Lutheran doctrine and delusion is not to be adhered to but only the Gospel and word of God This we have kept for I am not aware that we have acted contrary to the Gospel and the word of God I appeal to th...
Early Christian Writings: The Apostolic Fathers, The First Epistle Of Clement To The Corinthians
forsaking the vain toil and the strife and the jealousy which leadeth unto death Let us fix our eyes on them that ministered perfectly unto His excellent glory Let us set before us Enoch who being found righteous in obedience was translated and his death was not found Noah being found faithful by his ministration preached regeneration unto the world and through him the Master saved the living creatures that entered into the ark in concord Clem Abraham who was called the friend was found faithful in that he rende...
On the Magnet (De Magnete), Book I, Ch. XVII
we have to establish & present to the view of the learned our New & unheard of doctrine about the earth Gilbert introduces his claim that the globe of the earth is magnetic.

Frequently cited

“I would not have a slave to till my ground,”

— William Cowper, The Task, Book II (Gutenberg #3698: The Task, and Other Poems (Cassell's National Library, 1899)).Quote card

Edward the Second, Final scene
Base Fortune, now I see, that in thy wheel There is a point, to which when men aspire, They tumble headlong down Mortimer reflects on his fall.
The Spirit of the Laws, Book XV, ch. 1
The state of slavery is in its own nature bad. Montesquieu opens his books on servitude by judging slavery useful neither to the slave nor to the master, whom it accustoms to the want of moral virtues.
The Social Contract, Book II, Chapter III
the people is never corrupted, but it is often deceived, and on such occasions only does it seem to will what is bad Distinguishing the infallibility of the general will from the fallibility of actual deliberation.
Passages from the Life of a Philosopher, CHAPTER VII. DIFFERENCE ENGINE NO. II
for others to estimate those services I now however simply ask your Lordship to do me the honour to consider this statement and the offer I make I prefer no claim to the distinctions or the advantages which it is in the power of the Crown or the Government to bestow I desire only to discharge whatever imagined obligation may be supposed to rest upon me in connexion with the original undertaking of the Difference Engine though I cannot but feel that whilst the public has already derived advantage from my labours...
Hamlet, Act 5, Scene 2
There’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ’tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all Hamlet declines Horatio's offer to excuse him from the duel, echoing Matthew 10:29 and accepting whatever comes.

Frequently cited

“England, with all thy faults, I love thee still--”

— William Cowper, The Task, Book II (Gutenberg #3698: The Task, and Other Poems (Cassell's National Library, 1899)).Quote card

The Oxford Book of English Verse, Lesson: Choosing is judging
Choosing is judging. An anthology looks like a neutral container, but every Oxford Book has been an act of judgment by one editor. Comparing Quiller-Couch, Gardner and Ricks shows students how taste, scholarship and convictions shape what a generation calls English poetry. The point is not suspicion of editors but the habit of asking on what grounds a poem is kept.
The Canzoniere (Sonnets and Canzoni), with the Triumphs, To Laura in Death
every blossom with a sigh How oft deep musing on my woes complete Along the dark and silent glens I lie In thought again that dearest form to meet By death possess'd and therefore wish to die How oft I see her rising from the tide Of Sorga like some goddess of the flood Or pensive wander by the river's side Or tread the flowery mazes of the wood Bright as in life while angel pity throws O'er her fair face the impress of my woes MERIVALE SONNET XIV Alma felice che sovente torni HE THANKS HER THAT FROM TIME TO TIM...
Pericles, Prince of Tyre, Full Text
touch the gate You are a fair viol and your sense the strings Who finger d to make man his lawful music Would draw heaven down and all the gods to hearken But being play d upon before your time Hell only danceth at so harsh a chime Good sooth I care not for you ANTIOCHUS Prince Pericles touch not upon thy life For that s an article within our law As dangerous as the rest Your time s expired Either expound now or receive your sentence PERICLES Great king Few love to hear the sins they love to act Twould braid you...
The Chemical History of a Candle, Full Text
chain been forged Some links too quickly and too slightly made have given way and been replaced by better work but now the great phenomena are known the outline is correctly and firmly drawn cunning artists are filling in the rest and the child who masters these Lectures knows more of fire than Aristotle did The candle itself is now made to light up the dark places of nature the blowpipe and the prism are adding to our knowledge of the earth s crust but the torch must come first Among the readers of this book so...
The Nicomachean Ethics, Chap. Ii
and the goods external and fortune that in these points he may not be fettered As for those who say that he who is being tortured on the wheel or falls into great misfortunes is happy provided only he be good they talk nonsense whether they mean to do so or not On the other hand because fortune is needed as an addition some hold good fortune to be identical with Happiness which it is not for even this in excess is a hindrance and perhaps then has no right to be called good fortune since it is good only in so far...

Frequently cited

“Variety's the very spice of life,”

— William Cowper, The Task, Book II (Gutenberg #3698: The Task, and Other Poems (Cassell's National Library, 1899)).Quote card

The Bible, Job 3:3
Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived Job breaks his silence by cursing the day of his birth.
Inaugural Address (Harry S. Truman), Statement of faith
From this faith we will not be moved A one-sentence paragraph that closes the creed and turns the speech toward the contest with communism.
The Sound and the Fury, April Eighth, 1928
I seed de beginnin, en now I sees de endin Walking home from the Easter service in tears, Dilsey sums up her long witness of the Compson family in the light of the sermon.
Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, First Part
this is the faculty of improvement; a faculty which, as circumstances offer, successively unfolds all the other faculties, and resides among us not only in the species, but in the individuals that compose it Rousseau names perfectibility as the quality that, beyond dispute, distinguishes humans from beasts.
The Sickness Unto Death, Lesson: Faith as the opposite of sin
Faith as the opposite of sin. Against moralism, the book claims that the opposite of sin is not virtue but faith: resting transparently in the power that established the self. Sin is located in the will rather than in ignorance. The argument is theological, but it also offers a picture of healing as trust rather than self-improvement.

Frequently cited

“I was a stricken deer that left the herd Long since;”

— William Cowper, The Task, Book III (Gutenberg #3698: The Task, and Other Poems (Cassell's National Library, 1899)).Quote card

On First Principles (De Principiis), Book IV, Chapter I. On the Inspiration of Holy Scripture, and How the Same is to be Read and Underst
in order that the simple man may be edified by the "flesh," as it were, of the Scripture, for so we name the obvious sense Book IV, from the Greek: the threefold sense of Scripture, literal, moral and spiritual.
Olney Hymns, Book I: On Select Texts of Scripture
Amazing grace! (how sweet the sound) That saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found, Was blind, but now I see. Book I, Hymn 41, 'Faith's Review and Expectation', by Newton.
Troilus and Cressida, Act I, Scene III
And appetite, an universal wolf, So doubly seconded with will and power, Must make perforce an universal prey, And last eat up himself The climax of the degree speech: once order collapses, power reduces to will and will to appetite, which consumes itself.
Troilus and Cressida, Act I, Scene III
Take but degree away, untune that string, And hark what discord follows From Ulysses' speech to the Greek council diagnosing the stalled siege as a neglect of rank and order.
Confessions, Book I, opening
let each in his turn expose with equal sincerity the failings, the wanderings of his heart, and, if he dare, aver, I was better than that man Rousseau imagines himself at the Last Judgment challenging the assembled throng of humanity.

Medical Lens

Cowper suffered recurrent severe depression and was confined at Dr Nathaniel Cotton's asylum in St Albans (1763-65). The Task presents gardening, walking and quiet routine as consolations, and its stricken-deer passage is a famous self-portrait of melancholy relieved by faith.

Melancholia Depression Asylum Institution Philosophy AS Therapy

Book III, The Garden
The stricken deer passage describes his wounded withdrawal from society and healing by Christ.
Books III and IV
Gardening and fireside routine as a regimen against melancholy.

The Task

Summary

Top Lessons

The stricken deer

Against slavery

The country and the town

Verified Quotes

Medical Lens