The Jailed Soldier-Poet With the Unfettered Soul

A detail of "The Soul’s Prison House," 1880–1888, by Evelyn De Morgan. Public Domain

“Stone walls do not a prison make / Nor iron bars a cage.” These famous words from 17th-century poet Richard Lovelace thrill us like a surge of adrenaline, reminding us that a truly free human soul can break all fetters. Neither war, prison, nor the loss of his beloved could suppress the exultant spirit of Richard Lovelace. His gallantry and undying love of king, country, and duty shine through his poems like a blaze of sunlight upon an uplifted sword, especially in one poem called “To Althea, From Prison,” which Lovelace did, in fact, write while he was imprisoned in the Gatehouse in London. This physical constraint did not restrain his unbounded soul, and the notion of spiritual freedom juxtaposed with physical restriction becomes a major theme of the poem.

An illustrated plate of Richard Lovelace writing “To Althea From Prison” from “A Book of Old English Love Songs,” 1897, by Hamilton Wright Mabie with illustrations by George Wharton Edwards. Internet Archive. Public Domain

But how did Lovelace end up confined to the Gatehouse, scribbling his sublime words of freedom in the gloom? To understand that, we must place the poet-knight within the historical context of his time.

Lovelace’s War-Torn England

"Charles I (1600–1649) With M. de St. Antoine," 1633, by Anthony van Dyck. Oil on canvas. Royal Collection at Windsor Castle, Berkshire, England. Public Domain

In the early 1600s, the British Isles were divided over questions of religion, power, and economics. King Charles I’s marriage to a Catholic rankled English Protestants, who feared that he would begin to reintroduce Catholic influences into the kingdom. In 1629, Charles dissolved Parliament and ruled by decree for 11 years, during which time he instituted taxes to help restore the navy (“ship money”). Since Parliament was not involved in levying the tax, this was seen as an overstep on the part of the king. Charles’s attempted reforms of the church further alarmed many in England. The match to light this powder keg came, perhaps unsurprisingly, from Ireland. When rebellion broke out there, Charles and his (now reconvened) Parliament argued over who would command the forces necessary to put down the uprising. In the end, Charles raised the force and took command of it on his own, without Parliament’s approval. The gauntlet had been thrown down, and the situation quickly flared up into a series of three English Civil Wars, taking place between 1642 and 1651. The conflicts occurred between the Cavaliers, who supported the king, and the Roundheads, who supported Parliament.

"A Roundhead inquisitor asks a son of a Cavalier 'And when did you last see your father?'," 1878, by William Frederick Yeames. Oil on canvas. Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, England. Public Domain

Lovelace was a Cavalier in more than one sense. He was a royalist, which made him a Cavalier politically, and it was in fighting for the king that landed him in jail—twice. But, he also seems to have sported the bold, gallant, and witty attitude that we associate today with the word “cavalier.” The word “cavalier” is etymologically related to the word “chivalry,” and both derive from the Latin word for horse. Lovelace had that, too: a love of honor, and a code of knighthood and duty that he felt bound to adhere to. Lastly, he was part of a group of gentleman poets known as the “Cavalier poets,” courtiers of the king who considered the writing of polished poems an important part of their character as educated, cultivated, and courageous gentlemen. In the words of English professor William Harmon in his book “The Classic Hundred Poems,” “Lovelace may sound quaint, but his name still gleams with honor.” Whatever one thinks of Lovelace’s politics, his courage and noble-mindedness are beyond question. His short, passionate, lyrical piece “To Althea, From Prison” stands as a testament to the power of the human spirit in dire situations. True freedom, Lovelace shows, lies within the soul, and endures in spite of any physical constraint placed on us. A heart that runs over with love can never truly be imprisoned.

A portrait of Richard Lovelace, circa 1645, by William Dobson. Oil on canvas. Dulwich Picture Gallery, London. Public Domain

Lovelace wrote:

When Love with unconfinéd wings Hovers within my gates, And my divine Althea brings To whisper at the grates; When I lie tangled in her hair And fettered to her eye, The birds that wanton in the air Know no such liberty.

The speaker of the poem here describes the soaring sensations of a soul in love. In the fanciful scene, the captive looks through the prison bars into the eyes of his beloved (“Althea,” meaning “healer”) and experiences a greater freedom than birds who dart and swoop through the air—his chains and bolts notwithstanding. The word “Gates” in line 2 may be a play on “Gatehouse,” the name of the prison in which Lovelace wrote the poem. It’s almost as if he says to his captors, “You may imprison in me in the Gatehouse, but within my own gates I carry something far more valuable: ‘Love,’ and its ‘unconfined wings.’” In the second stanza, love’s form evolves from romantic to patriotic, love of country and comrades. The poet imagines brothers-in-arms drinking toasts to their cause. Most of us have experienced the exhilaration of joining with trusted friends in celebrating a common goal. The joy is unrestrained. Stanza four grows even more patriotic. The poet sings “The sweetness, Mercy, Majesty, / And glories of my King.” This stanza—like all the stanzas—ends by stating that the soul’s exaltation exceeds that of some immense natural or supernatural force: in the first stanza, birds of the air; in the second stanza, fish in the sea; in the third stanza, massive ocean winds; in the fifth stanza, equaling angels themselves. Each stanza closes with the words “Know no such Liberty,” so that the “Liberty” becomes a repeated refrain like the tolling of a bell.

"The Soul’s Prison House," 1880–1888, by Evelyn De Morgan. Oil in glycerin on canvas. De Morgan Collection, Barnsley, England. Public Domain

The poem’s climax contains its most famous lines, frothed with exuberance and tinged with defiance: “Stone Walls do not a prison make, / Nor Iron bars a Cage.” After these bold words, the poet’s train of thought takes a surprisingly calm and religious turn. “Minds innocent and quiet take / That [walls or bars] for an Hermitage,” that is, a place of prayer, solitude, quiet, contemplation, and interior freedom. The final lines of the poem soar heavenward with the speaker’s ecstatic reveries:

If I have freedom in my Love, And in my soul am free, Angels alone that soar above, Enjoy such Liberty.

As we read these words, our minds may go to all those unjustly imprisoned and restrained throughout history—the POW laboring under foreign skies, the faithful believer kneeling in a mirky dungeon, the truth-teller confined behind razor wire like a criminal—whose voices join with Lovelace’s: We may have had our bodies injured and cast into darkness and forgotten, but our hearts are pure, and so we have more true freedom than our captors can ever know or experience.

Lovelace’s Lovelorn Future

According to Harmon, Lovelace lost everything by the end of the wars, which concluded with the defeat and execution of the king. Even Lovelace’s fiancée, Lucy Sacheverell, for whom he wrote his other famous poem, “To Lucasta, Going to the Wars,” was lost to him because she married another after she received a false report of Lovelace’s death. Lovelace was eventually released from prison. One can’t help but wonder what thoughts ran through his head as he stood, newly released, blinking at the brightness of the sun and the golden world about him, his life in ruins because of his devotion to a lost cause. Did he feel that freedom inside, even then? To his fiancée, he had once written, “I could not love thee, Dear, so much, / Lov’d I not Honor more.” His fidelity to that higher love had cost him dearly. But, then, isn’t that what love is all about?

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