In his earlier book, Poetry and Morality, Vincent Buckley asked in what sense the greatness of poetry is a moral greatness, and tried to answer it by a critical examination of the works of three great critics: Matthew Arnold, T.S. Eliot, and F.R. Leavis. Poetry and the Sacred may be seen as in part a sequel to that book; for in it he considers the associations which poetry has had, and continues to have, with ideas of the sacred. In some cases the poet acts as agent for an established idea of sacredness, while in others he sets himself to discover the roots of sacred awareness or to create an awareness which may have the power to change men's ideas of sacredness which may have the power to change men's ideas of sacredness and hence of God.