Metaphysical poets Flecknoe" and Joseph Addison, in quoting him, singled out the poetry of George Herbert as providing a flagrant example. There is no scholarly consensus regarding which English poets or poems fit within the Metaphysical genre. In his initial use of the term, Johnson quoted just three poets: Abraham Cowley, John Donne, and John Cleveland. Colin Burrow, writing for the "Oxford Dictionary of National Biography", singles out John Donne, George Herbert, Henry Vaughan, Andrew Marvell, and Richard Crashaw as 'central figures', while naming many more, all or part of whose work has been identified as sharing its characteristics. Herbert Grierson’s "Metaphysical
Metaphysical poets of Wotton himself that prefaced the collection of Wotton's works in 1651. A life of George Herbert followed them in 1670. The links between Donne’s elegists were thus of a different order from those between Donne and his circle of friends, often no more than professional acquaintanceship. And once the poetic style had been launched, its tone and approach remained available as a model for later writers who might not necessarily commit themselves so wholly to it. Metaphysical poets The term metaphysical poets was coined by the critic Samuel Johnson to describe a loose group of 17th-century English poets whose