John Davies (poet) trying to understand the relationship between the natural order and human activity. In political terms, Davies was significant in his work on constitutional law and in framing the terms of the Plantation of Ulster, a model that served the English crown as it extended its colonial reach in North America and elsewhere. In literary terms, he was a fine poet who lay quite neglected from the mid-17th century, until his cause was championed by T. S. Eliot. Davies's poem "I know my soul hath power to know all things" was set to music by the composer Hubert Parry in his
T. S. Eliot of personal difficulty for Eliot—his marriage was failing, and both he and Vivienne were suffering from nervous disorders. The poem is often read as a representation of the disillusionment of the post-war generation. Before the poem's publication as a book in December 1922, Eliot distanced himself from its vision of despair. On 15 November 1922, he wrote to Richard Aldington, saying, "As for "The Waste Land", that is a thing of the past so far as I am concerned and I am now feeling toward a new form and style." The poem is known for its obscure nature—its slippage between