A Psalm of Life - Questions & Answers

Answer: The main theme of the poem, as we can see, is to represent an optimistic view of life. According to the poet, this life is precious. We should not waste it. Rather, we should use this life to do something great, so that people remember us for ever. We are here to win the battle of life, not to lose it.

Answer: According to the poet, to make our life sublime we should act and act in the present without trusting any pleasant future and with no regret for our past. We have to keep faith in God and work hard to make this life count. The speaker feels that this life is indeed important and many things can be achieved in this earthly life. Enjoyment or sorrow is not our life’s goal, but to act for a better tomorrow is. Time is short, but we have many things to do. So, we should take inspiration from great men who have achieved success before us and strive towards winning the battle of life. We should learn to labour and to wait for the rewards.

Answer: In the first stanza the poet wants to say that one must not waste his life sitting idle or sleeping but he must be able to enjoy every moment of life, as life is full of dreams to be completed.

We must not take life lightly and pessimistically. He further adds that soul is dead for the inactive people. Though our body dies soul is immortal. It lives forever and hence he encourages his readers not to waste life, as life is too short and more work is to be done. He instructs about how to live and utilize one’s life meaningfully.

Answer: According to the poet, life is not an empty dream because it is real and earnest. The poet holds an optimistic view of life and does not think that grave is the ultimate goal of this life. Though our body dies, the soul remains immortal. Moreover, in this life we can achieve many things and inspire others with our success. A lot of responsibilities have been assigned to us and we must utilize our time in fulfilling those. Wasting time sitting idly and singing sorrowful songs is not the way to go. We should take this life seriously and learn to labour and wait patiently for the rewards. Here, of course, the speaker’s view is understandable and realistic enough. So, we support this view of life.

Answer: 'Mournful' means sad and sorrowful, and 'numbers' means tunes or songs. The speaker here asks others not to sing sad and pessimistic songs about life’s uselessness when he says “Tell me not in mournful numbers, / Life is but an empty dream”. The speaker is an optimistic young man who disapproves of the pessimistic theory of life and believes that this life is real and important.

So, “mournful numbers” here refers to the complains and whines of unsuccessful people who think that nothing can be achieved in this life.

Answer: ‘Solemn’ means serious, stern and gloomy, and ‘main’ is an open ocean. In the above phrase the poet has compared this life to a stern and gloomy ocean. Many people face difficulties in crossing this ocean of life. So they sometimes lose their hope and become pessimistic. The poet has urged us to treat this life seriously and do something great in order to set an example before them and motivate them to cross this ocean of life easily.

Answer: “A Psalm of Life” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is a poem that I think should feature in any list of the most inspiring poems in the language. This is a poem that tells us not to wait for anything to happen, but explore the limitless possibilities we come across in our life and lead an active life that would fetch us pleasure as well as success.

Again, in “A Psalm of Life”, the poet Longfellow does not take this life lightly. This life is not an empty dream to him. Rather it should be full of action towards our goal. This life is not long enough to spend sleeping or sitting idly. “Art is long, and time is fleeting” conveys the length of the works given to us. So the poet wants us to act wisely and wait with patience for the rewards.

Thus, this is one of those poems that deliver a strong wave of inspiration to us. It rejuvenates us to work with fresh energy every time we read the poem.

Answer: As the speaker says in Longfellow’s poem ‘A Psalm of Life’, the lives of great men remind us that we can make this life an inspiring one, leaving behind us footprints for others to follow. This way we can help distressed people cross this ocean of life easily.

Actually, the lives of great men deliver a positive aura around themselves and inspire others who are otherwise sad, distressed, dejected, hit by failures and hurdles of this vast life. Thus those great people sow the seeds of success and positivity in the society.

Answer: Longfellow’s poem ‘A Psalm of Life’ is essentially concerned with the meaning and potential of this life. The speaker slams the pessimists and glorifies this life as ‘real’ in an attempt to challenge the Biblical teaching that says ‘Dust thou art, to dust thou returnest’. In this connection, the poet has compared this world to a vast battlefield and this life to a bivouac (a temporary camp). The troop of soldiers are sent to the camps giving certain duties in a war. Similarly we are sent to this temporary and worldly life with certain duties to perform. Hence the comparison is very apt here.

So this transitory life is a part of a greater arrangement. We have to fulfill the responsibilities that we have been assigned to. We have to win this battle like a hero. This is all about motivating ourselves in performing our duties with a smile.

Answer: The poet uses a simile to compare our heart beat to the beat of the muffled drums on funeral marches. The drums that are beaten are covered with wet cloth so as to minimize the sound and make it suitable for the sad occasion. The poet makes such a comparison because just as with every beat of the drum, the dead body moves towards the grave, with every beat of our heart we move a little closer to our death.

Answer:

In the first stanza of the poem, life is compared to an ’empty dream’ by the pessimists.

Life is but an empty dream!

Though this is not actually a comparison from the speaker’s end, he just hits back to the negative idea of life held by some people who think this life to be unimportant.

Secondly, this life is compared to a ‘funeral march’.

Funeral marches to the grave.

Our life is like a march to the finishing line — the grave. And our hearts beat like a muffled drum in that march. The speaker suggests that we should utilize our limited time span to the fullest instead of wasting it in the thought of death or other such thing.

Then, the young man has compared life to a ‘bivouac’ or temporary camps for soldiers.

In the bivouac of Life,

We have all come to fight and try and win a battle in this world. He urges us not to be like dumb, driven cattle, but to be a hero in the world’s vast battlefield.

Again, this life is compared to a journey on the sands.

And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;

We should strive to leave behind us a mark of our good work in this life. It is like leaving a footprint on the vast desert of time.

Finally, life is compared to a large sea (‘solemn main’).

Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,

We should set examples before others and inspire the wretched and hopeless people to cross this ocean of life with a brave heart.

Answer: Optimism, self-belief, faith in God, hard work and patience are the values as such desired in Longfellow’s poem A Psalm of life. The speaker has disapproved of pessimism, complacency and idleness.

Answer: In the poem The Psalm of Life the speaker guides us towards the way of ideal living and it conveys the author’s viewpoints about life.

According to the speaker in Longfellow’s poem ‘A Psalm of Life’ this life is ‘not an empty dream’. It is rather real. So it’s important to make the most of this short life. We can set examples before others by achieving great height of success. Thus we can inspire downhearted people to follow our footprints and regain the hope. We should not pay any heed to what the pessimists say. We should not even take the Biblical quote “Dust thou art, to dust thou returnest” literally. We should not even be discouraged by the thought of death. We should not waste time in the thought of the past or dreaming of the future. Rather, we should take this life very seriously, work hard in the present and wait for the rewards patiently.

Answer: The speaker in the poem ‘A Psalm of Life’ compares this life to a vast sea. Our ‘forlorn and shipwrecked brother’ refers to the person who finds it difficult to cross this sea of life. Many people are dejected due to their failure in achieving something. They feel like their ship is wrecked in the sea of life. The speaker is talking about those people here. He thinks that they need some inspiration and motivation to get back on their feet and start the journey again. And only the examples set the successful people who have already crossed this sea of life can give them that inspiration.

Answer: In the poem, the poet has presented an image of a broad battlefield and an image of a bivouac, a temporary camp for soldiers.

These images have successfully created a strong effect in our minds. The poet wants us to take this life seriously, to win this battle of life like a hero. He wants us to understand that we have come to this temporary camp called ‘life’ just to win it and we have to go back to our real home, that is heaven. The poet has been successful in delivering his message through these images.

Answer: In the poem ‘A Psalm of Life’ there is a Biblical reference. The Biblical phrase is indeed quoted in the seventh line of the poem: ‘Dust thou are, to dust thou returnest’, meaning ‘you are made of dust and you must return to dust after death’. That indicates that our life has no greater value. This life is mortal and not an important one.

But the speaker in the poet doesn’t agree to that theory. He protests and says that grave is not really the ultimate goal of this life. Though our body is mortal, the soul does live on. Moreover, we can remain alive in people’s heart by our great deeds. So, the poet says those words in protest of the Biblical Teaching mentioned above.

Answer: The poet in the poem ‘A Psalm of Life’ advises us not to trust our future, however pleasant it may appear now. It is because we cannot completely be certain of what future would bring to our life. What looks very good at this point, may change with time. Moreover, we may get complacent if we are obsessed with our bright future and neglecting our duties at hand. So, it is wise to work and continue to work in order to improve the outcomes, to achieve perfection, as quality line has no ending.

Answer: As the speaker (the young man) in Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem ‘A Psalm of Life’ says it, we should not trust our future however pleasant it may look at present. Even if it looks very bright now, situations may change later. In short, we can never be certain of our future and so we should not trust it. Rather we have to work in the present to make our life a success.

Again, past is past. We should not be worried or even happy thinking of our past failures or successes. Past should be forgotten and utmost concentration should be given on our present situation and the works we have in hand. This is how the poet expresses it —

Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act, — act in the living Present!

Answer: The first two stanzas of A Psalm of Life conveys the central idea of the poem. Here the poet expresses his beliefs in contrary to the biblical teachings that this human life is of no value and we are born merely to die and return to dust. The poet believes that this life can do wonders. This life is rather real and the saying “Dust thou art, to dust returnest” was spoken of the body; the soul is indeed immortal.

The theme of the poem that this life is important is justified in the poet’s reasoning that a good example of life can inspire and guide others in the right direction. The poet has also instructed us to work without wasting our valuable time and to crave for becoming a better human being with every passing day. That way we can set examples before others and achieve the status of immortality, making this life a real one. Moreover, the poet opines that the biblical saying is spoken only of body, not soul. That also justifies his theme: realness of life.

Answer: In the poem “A Psalm of Life” the poet expresses his belief that the human soul is immortal. It can never be destroyed. Indeed, the soul remains unchanged even after our death. Though the body becomes dust again and goes back to the earth, the soul is perpetual or eternal. So he says: “Dust thou art, to dust returnest, / Was not spoken of the soul.”