the two kinds of light by introducing the poem by a motto from Burnet (E, 29), which ends by saying, “But meanwhile we must earnestly seek after truth, maintaining measure, that we may distinguish things certain from those uncertain, day from night”(E, 29). In the “Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, the context of the quote seems to be reversed. As the voyage begins, the sun is burning brightly overhead. The crew is in good spirits, but soon hereafter a storm strikes the ship sending it wildly off course. At night, when the moon comes out, the Albatross first shows up ass illustrated in this quote, “In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud, it perched for vespers nine; whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white, glimmered the white moon-shine” (A, I, 75-79). The moon is not the only element of nature that is associated with the albatross, the wind relates with the bird, as well. As shown when the albatross first showed up, “And a good south wind sprung up behind; the albatross did follow …” (A, I, 71, 72). Before long, the mariner shoots the albatross, and the rising of the sun soon follows. Immediately upon the rising of the sun, the mariners accept the murder of the albatross (E, 34). The sun is symbolically the cause of their acceptance of the crime. The crewmembers justify the crime because the bird had brought the fog and mist or, the moon. To say it another way, the crewmembers renounce the fog and mist, which are one and the same with the moon (E, 34). At this point, the sun is first introduced. According to Warren the sun is, “ the light which shows the familiar as familiar, it is the light of practical convenience, it is the light in which pride preens itself, which had risen so promisingly and so gloriously” (E, 34). Part III is split into two scenes, one of the sun, one of the moon, in even balance (E, 35). In part III, there is an elaborate description of the sun. A...
