Analysis of “Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College” by Thomas Gray

Verses 1 - 2.
Imagery of the college.

Verses 3-4

Henry the VI established Eton college, and here we begin to see the beginning of the metaphor. What College is for, that the college rests in Henry VI's holy shade, and the college is for science.

Verses 5 - 10

Imagery of the college, and the Thames river, showing a peacefulness, separating the college itself, from the academic learning.

Verses 11-12

Here we have the first intonation of a tone, set in the negative. "Belov'd in vain", sets the tone, of a negative experience. The college's education was not as splendid as the college itself, and its beauty.

Verses 13 - 14

The college occupied his childhood, and he was yet a stranger to pain. He was not yet taught the ways of the world, by the college. His innocence wasn't broken yet.

Verses 15 - 20

There is a joy there, of the college, a certain nostalgia. Of the college itself, and not the academic subjects, which get separated in the poem.

Verses 21 - 26

The students play there, and those are his fondest memories. Of the students playing, and frolicking, and being freed from the rigor of the academy. He's free, to marvel at the thames, and the architecture of the college.

Verses 27 - 30

The idle offspring of men and women succeed, to chase the balls, and play catch. I suppose there were balls, then, which the students would play with.

Verses 30 - 34

Here we get the first intonation of the academic side of the college. Not the idle play, and activities, not the beauty of the landscape, but what you're here for. And "Bring constraint/to sweeten liberty" is a negative wording of it, to bring "constraint" and "sweeten liberty" these two are juxtaposed with one another, to make "Liberty" a negative concept.

Verses 35 - 37

Some bold thinkers disdain the limits of their "Little Reigns", the limits of their imagination, what is theirs to grasp. And they venture into unknown subjects, and dare to "Catch sight of them." Their minds aren't proper for it, though.

Verses 38 - 40

They run, though, into these subjects, to "hear the voice in every wind"; they follow the voices of their books, and learning, and their teachers, and "snatch a fearful joy." The things they learn are a fearful joy, because they half understand it, and can only make mischief with it.

Verses 41 - 42

Their "Gay hope" is liberty, and a world of liberty, but it's "Less pleasing when possesst."

Verses 43 - 46

Their movement is short, and forgotten as soon as they shed a tear, and their vitality is healthy, and their witty inventions are new. (Though this isn't true: this is being written around 1742, so the movements of the enlightenment were just beginning, and he's critiquing them a bit. The philosophies are half baked, and not full yet, and won't have their fruition until 1776, and the Colonies are getting rambunctious over this new doctrine. Also, intonating the French Revolution. Just a foreshadow of the events to come about 30 to 70 years later that will change the world.)

Verses 47 - 50

They truly aren't thinking about the concepts, and are lolled to sleep, and have thoughtless days, and easy nights. Their spirits are poor, and they don't truly understand what they're being taught.

Verses 51 - 52

They do not know that these philosophies will spoil them. They play, and are victims to its ideology.

Verses 53 - 56

They have no care beyond the ills of the day, or ills to come, nothing beyond today. Around them, cultured by this ideology, are "The ministers of human fate" "Fate" is a strong word. The tone of the text implies something fiercely negative.

Verses 57 - 60

And misfortune is "Black" and "Baleful". The consequences of their beliefs. And they stand in ambush, to seize their prey, and are a "Murth'rous band!" Why are they murth'rous? They're being radicalized by the university, ready to fight because of half baked ideas. They are innocent, at the one end, not knowing what they are being used for, but also getting radical, and ready to murder for the things they have been taught.

Verses 61 - 64

The fury of their learning, shall be a passion, that tears, and it is a vulture of the mind. It brings disdainful anger, pallid fear, and shame that skulks behind.

Verses 65 - 70

Or they will be occupied with finding love, and not swept up in the movement, and made wan, and their cares will fade, and this pining and jealousy shall make them sorrowful and despaired.

Verses 71 - 74

The ambition of this learning shall tempt them to rise above their station, and whirl the "wretch" from high, and it will be bitter scorn, and like a sacrifice. The victim of their rage: the current status quo.

Verses 75 - 77

Falsehoods shall be tried, and hard unkindness of the learned behaviors an altered eye. It mocks the tear that's forced to flow. As in, their falsehoods shall be purified by academia, and this will make a hard unkindness in their eye, and it will mock the tears that are forced to flow from their ideology, and their learning. As in, they will be sharpened to think differently, and will lose the joy and innocence they once shared, shown in the beginning of the poem.

Verses 78 - 80

And when remorseful for the blood that they defiled, the moody madness shall laugh wild amidst their woes. By acting on their ideas, and the blood they will shed, it will make them mad, and woeful, though confident in their position, because it's what was taught.

Verses 81 - 84

So, the family of "Death" is more hideous than their queen--the ideas of Democracy are more hideous than their "Queen", than the royal order. 

Verses 85 - 87

So this rage created by the enlightenment racks the joints, and puts fire in the veins. It makes every sinew strain, and it sends rage deep into the vitals.

Verses 88 - 90

And because poverty fills the band, and it numbs the soul with icy hands--that is hand quick to shed blood--and also slow consuming age causes this jadedness to occur, too.

Verses 91 - 93 

Here, it's just saying all men suffer, and what we try to do to fix it, only makes things worse. So, be tender for another's pain.

Verses 94 - 96

Why should they know their fate? Why should they know their own poverty? Why should they be made aware of their lack of liberty?

Verses 97 - 100

Because happiness swiftly disappears when you're made aware of the world's engines, and thought destroys your paradise. Too much thought destroys the innocence of the previous stanzas. So, ignorance is bliss, and it is "a folly to be wise." Why? Because it ruins your bliss.

Thoughts:

I think this is the way of a mass movement, and how it starts. It starts in the intellectual spheres, and begins to move and matriculate. And Thomas is saying, "Why are they doing this? Why are they losing their innocence for this thing? Better to play on the fields, and study the beauty of the architecture of the buildings, and swim in the Thames, than get involved in the world's woes."

Gray, Thomas. Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College. Poetry Foundation. Web. 1.23.26 https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44301/ode-on-a-distant-prospect-of-eton-college