Editing The Hound of Heaven (section)

==Form and theme==
The poem is an [[ode]], and its subject is the pursuit of the human soul by God's love - a theme also found in the devotional poetry of [[George Herbert]] and [[Henry Vaughan]]. [[William Vaughn Moody|Moody]] and [[Robert Morss Lovett|Lovett]] point out that Thompson's use of free and varied line lengths and irregular rhythms reflect the panicked retreat of the soul, while the structured, often recurring refrain suggests the inexorable pursuit as it comes ever closer.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Moody |first1=William Vaughn |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LVwLAAAAYAAJ |title=A History of English Literature |last2=Lovett |first2=Robert Morss |publisher=Charles Scribner's Sons |year=1918 |language=en}}[https://books.google.com/books?id=LVwLAAAAYAAJ&dq=Hound+of+Heaven+themes&pg=PA439 W V Moody, R M Lovett. ''A History of English Literature'' (1918), p. 439]</ref>

The Jesuit J.F.X. O'Conor remarks of the Christian themes of the poem that,
<blockquote>"The name is strange. It startles one at first. It is so bold, so new, so fearless. It does not attract, rather the reverse. But when one reads the poem this strangeness disappears. The meaning is understood. As the hound follows the hare, never ceasing in its running, ever drawing nearer in the chase, with unhurrying and unperturbed pace, so does God follow the fleeing soul by His Divine grace. And though in sin or in human love, away from God it seeks to hide itself, Divine grace follows after, unwearyingly follows ever after, till the soul feels its pressure forcing it to turn to Him alone in that never ending pursuit."<ref>{{cite book |last=O'Conor |first=John Francis Xavier |title=A Study of Francis Thompson's Hound of Heaven |year=1912 |publisher=John Lane Company |page=[https://archive.org/details/studyoffrancisth00oconrich/page/7 7]|url=https://archive.org/details/studyoffrancisth00oconrich}}</ref></blockquote>