His method of meditation fell into three main parts: A) prayer and composition of place; B) the examination of points (analysis); C) the colloquies (the dialogue with God as a climax) (Martz 1962, 27-32).
In 1628, Thomas Taylor wrote a Puritan handbook "Meditation from the Creatures", recommending to include images from the sensible world (metaphorical of God's glory).
Soon Puritan ministers like Edward Taylor began to write meditations in verse, based on lines from the Bible and on sense perceptions, both allegorical of the greater glory of God.
The method of the three main steps (the composition of place, examination of points, colloquies) had survived into the twentieth century in many poems, as had the devotional practice of verse meditation.
Leading modernist poets like T. S. Eliot and Wallace Stevens began to fragmentize the process, blending thoughts and sense perceptions in a sort of spiritual diary (Parini 1993,12).