diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old/48772-0.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/48772-0.txt | 21072 |
1 files changed, 21072 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/old/48772-0.txt b/old/48772-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f853f6b --- /dev/null +++ b/old/48772-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,21072 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Poems of John Donne, Volume II (of 2), +by John Donne, Edited by Sir Herbert John Clifford Grierson + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most +other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + + + + +Title: The Poems of John Donne, Volume II (of 2) + Edited from the Old Editions and Numerous Manuscripts + + +Author: John Donne + +Editor: Sir Herbert John Clifford Grierson + +Release Date: April 24, 2015 [eBook #48772] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE POEMS OF JOHN DONNE, VOLUME +II (OF 2)*** + + +E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram, Lesley Halamek, Stephen Rowland, and +the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the sheet music illustrations + as well as audio music files. + See 48772-h.htm or 48772-h.zip: + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48772/48772-h/48772-h.htm) + or + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48772/48772-h.zip) + + +Transcriber's note: + + Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). + + Text enclosed by equal signs is in bold face (=bold=). + + Text enclosed by plus signs is in Old English script + (+Old English script+). + + A carat character is used to denote superscription. A + character or characters following the carat is/are + superscripted (examples: S^t, Pe^tr). In some instances + the superscripted characters are enclosed by curly + brackets (examples: S^{r}, w^{th}). + + Some characters might not display in this UTF-8 text + version or in the html version. If so, the reader should + consult the iso-8859-1 (Latin-1) text file 48772-8.txt + or 48772.zip: + http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48772/48772-8.txt + or + http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48772/48772-8.zip + + + + + +THE POEMS OF JOHN DONNE + +Edited from the Old Editions and Numerous Manuscripts +with Introductions & Commentary + +by + +HERBERT J. C. GRIERSON M.A. + +Chalmers Professor of English Literature +in the University Of Aberdeen + +VOL. II + +Introduction and Commentary + + + + + + + +Oxford +At the Clarendon Press +1912 + +Henry Frowde, M.A. +Publisher to the University of Oxford +London, Edinburgh, New York +Toronto and Melbourne + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PAGE + INTRODUCTION v + + I. THE POETRY OF DONNE v + + II. THE TEXT AND CANON OF DONNE'S POEMS lvi + + COMMENTARY 1 + + INDEX OF FIRST LINES 276 + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +I + +THE POETRY OF DONNE + + +Donne's position among English poets, regarded from the historical and +what we like to call scientific point of view, has been defined +with learning and discrimination by Mr. Courthope in his _History of +English Poetry_. As a phenomenon of curious interest for the student +of the history of thought and literary fashions, there it is. Mr. +Courthope is far too well-informed and judicious a critic to explain +Donne's subtle thought and erudite conceits by a reference to 'Marini +and his followers'. Gongora and Du Bartas are alike passed over in +silence. What we are shown is the connexion of 'metaphysical wit' with +the complex and far-reaching changes in men's conception of Nature +which make the seventeenth century perhaps the greatest epoch in human +thought since human thinking began. + +The only thing that such a criticism leaves unexplained and undefined +is the interest which Donne's poetry still has for us, not as an +historical phenomenon, but as poetry. Literary history has for the +historian a quite distinct interest from that which it possesses for +the student and lover of literature. For the historian it is a +matter of positive interest to connect Donne's wit with the general +disintegration of mediaeval thought, to recognize the influence on +the Elizabethan drama of the doctrines of Machiavelli, or to find in +Pope's achievement in poetry a counterpart to Walpole's in politics. +For the lover of literature none of these facts has any positive +interest whatsoever. Donne's wit attracts or repels him equally +whatever be its source; Tamburlaine and Iago lose none of their +interest for us though we know nothing of Machiavelli; Pope's poetry +is not a whit more or less poetical by being a strange by-product of +the Whig spirit in English life. For the lover of literature, literary +history has an indirect value. He studies history that he may discount +it. What he relishes in a poet of the past is exactly the same +essential qualities as he enjoys in a poet of his own day--life and +passion and art. But between us and every poet or thinker of the past +hangs a thinner or thicker veil of outworn fashions and conventions. +The same life has clothed itself in different garbs; the same passions +have spoken in different images; the same art has adapted itself to +different circumstances. To the historian these old clothes are in +themselves a subject of interest. His enjoyment of Shakespeare is +heightened by finding the explanation of Falstaff's hose, Pistol's +hyperboles, and the poet's neglect of the Unities. To the lover of +literature they are, until by understanding he can discount them, +a disadvantage because they invest the work of the poet with an +irrelevant air of strangeness. He studies them that he may grow +familiar with them and forget them, that he may clear and intensify +his sense of what alone has permanent value, the poet's individuality +and the art in which it is expressed. + +Donne's conceits, of which so much has been made and on whose +historical significance Mr. Courthope has probably said the last word, +are just like other examples of these old clothes. The question for +literature is not whence they came, but how he used them. Is he a +poet in virtue or in spite of them, or both? Are they fit only to be +gathered into a museum of antiquated fashions such as Johnson prefixed +to his study of the last poet who wore them in quite the old way +(for Dryden, who pilfered more freely from Donne than from any of his +predecessors, cut them to a new fashion), or are they the individual +and still expressive dress of a true and great poet, commanding +admiration in their own manner and degree as freshly and enduringly as +the stiff and brocaded magnificence of Milton's no less individual, no +less artificial style? + +Donne's reputation as a poet has passed through many vicissitudes in +the course of the last three centuries. With regard to his 'wit', +its range and character, erudition and ingenuity, all generations of +critics have been at one. It is as to the relation of this 'wit' to, +and its effect on, his poetry that they have been at variance. To his +contemporaries the 'wit' was identical with the poetry. Donne's 'wit' +gave him the same supremacy among poets that learning and humour and +art gave to Jonson among dramatists. To certain of his Dutch admirers +the wit of _The Flea_ seemed superhuman, and the epitaph with which +Carew closes his _Elegy_ expresses the almost universal English +opinion of the seventeenth century: + + Here lies a king that ruled as he thought fit + The universal monarchy of wit; + Here lies two flamens, and both those the best, + Apollo's first, at last the true God's priest. + +It may be doubted if Milton shared this opinion. He never mentions +Donne, but it was probably of him or his imitators he was thinking +when in his verses at Cambridge he spoke of + + those new-fangled toys and trimmings slight + Which take our late fantastics with delight. + +Certainly the growing taste for 'correctness' led after the +Restoration to a discrimination between Donne's wit and his poetry. +'The greatest wit,' Dryden calls him, 'though not the greatest poet of +our nation.' What he wanted as a poet were just the two essentials +of 'classical' poetry--smoothness of verse and dignity of expression. +This point of view is stated with clearness and piquancy in the +sentences of outrageous flattery which Dryden addressed to the Earl of +Dorset in the opening paragraphs of his delightful _Essay on Satire_: + + 'There is more of salt in all your verses, than I have seen in + any of the moderns, or even of the ancients; but you have + been sparing of the gall, by which means you have pleased + all readers, and offended none. Donne alone, of all our + countrymen, had your talent; but was not happy enough to + arrive at your versification; and were he translated into + numbers, and English, he would yet be wanting in the dignity + of expression. That which is the prime virtue, and chief + ornament, of Virgil, which distinguishes him from the rest + of writers, is so conspicuous in your verses, that it casts a + shadow on all your contemporaries; we cannot be seen, or + but obscurely, while you are present. You equal Donne in the + variety, multiplicity, and choice of thoughts; you excel him + in the manner and the words. I read you both with the same + admiration, but not with the same delight. + + He affects the metaphysics, not only in his satires, but + in his amorous verses, where nature only should reign; and + perplexes the minds of the fair sex with nice speculations of + philosophy, when he should engage their hearts, and entertain + them with the softnesses of love. In this (if I may be + pardoned for so bold a truth) Mr. Cowley has copied him to + a fault; so great a one, in my opinion, that it throws + his Mistress infinitely below his Pindarics and his latter + compositions, which are undoubtedly the best of his poems and + the most correct.' + +Dryden's estimate of Donne, as well as his application to his poetry +of the epithet 'metaphysical', was transmitted through the eighteenth +century. Johnson's famous paragraphs in the _Life of Cowley_ do little +more than echo and expand Dryden's pronouncement, with a rather vaguer +use of the word 'metaphysical'. In Dryden's application it means +correctly 'philosophical'; in Johnson's, no more than 'learned'. 'The +metaphysical poets were men of learning, and to show their learning +was their whole endeavour; but unluckily resolving to show it in +rhyme, instead of writing poetry, they only wrote verses, and very +often such verses as stood the trial of the fingers better than of +the ear.' They 'drew their conceits from recesses of learning not very +much frequented by common readers of poetry'. Waller is exempted +from being a metaphysical poet because 'he seldom fetches an amorous +sentiment from the depths of science; his thoughts are for the most +part easily understood, and his images such as the superficies of +nature readily supplies'. + +Even to those critics with whom began a revived appreciation of +Donne as a poet and preacher, his 'wit' still bulks largely. It +is impossible to escape from it. 'Wonder-exciting vigour,' writes +Coleridge, 'intenseness and peculiarity, using at will the almost +boundless stores of a capacious memory, and exercised on subjects +where we have no right to expect it--this is the wit of Donne.' And +lastly De Quincey, who alone of these critics recognizes the essential +quality which may, and in his best work does, make Donne's wit the +instrument of a mind which is not only subtle and ingenious but +profoundly poetical: 'Few writers have shown a more extraordinary +compass of powers than Donne; for he combined what no other man has +ever done--the last sublimation of dialectical subtlety and address +with the most impassioned majesty. Massy diamonds compose the very +substance of his poem on the Metempsychosis, thoughts and descriptions +which have the fervent and gloomy sublimity of Ezekiel or Aeschylus, +whilst a diamond dust of rhetorical brilliancies is strewed over the +whole of his occasional verses and his prose.' + +What is to-day the value and interest of this wit which has arrested +the attention of so many generations? How far does it seem to us +compatible with poetry in the full and generally accepted sense of +the word, with poetry which quickens the imagination and touches +the heart, which satisfies and delights, which is the verbal and +rhythmical medium whereby a gifted soul communicates to those who have +ears to hear the content of impassioned moments? + +Before coming to close quarters with this difficult and debated +question one may in the first place insist that there is in Donne's +verse a great deal which, whether it be poetry in the full sense +of the word or not, is arresting and of worth both historically +and intrinsically. Whatever we may think of Donne's poetry, it is +impossible not to recognize the extraordinary interest of his mind and +character. In an age of great and fascinating men he is not the least +so. The immortal and transcendent genius of Shakespeare leaves Donne, +as every other contemporary, lost in the shadows and cross-lights of +an age that is no longer ours, but from which Shakespeare emerges +into the clear sunlight. Of Bacon's mind, 'deep and slow, exhausting +thought,' and divining as none other the direction in which the road +led through the débris of outworn learning to a renovated science and +a new philosophy, Donne could not boast. Alike in his poetry and in +his soberest prose, treatise or sermon, Donne's mind seems to want the +high seriousness which comes from a conviction that truth is, and +is to be found. A spirit of scepticism and paradox plays through and +disturbs almost everything he wrote, except at moments when an intense +mood of feeling, whether love or devotion, begets faith, and silences +the sceptical and destructive wit by the power of vision rather than +of intellectual conviction. Poles apart as the two poets seem at a +first glance to lie in feeling and in art, there is yet something of +Tennyson in the conflict which wages perpetually in Donne's poetry +between feeling and intellect. + +But short of the highest gifts of serene imagination or serene wisdom +Donne's mind has every power it well could, wit, insight, imagination; +and these move in such a strange medium of feeling and learning, +mediaeval, renaissance and modern, that every imprint becomes of +interest. To do full justice to that interest one's study of +Donne must include his prose as well as his verse, his paradoxical +_Pseudomartyr_, and equally paradoxical, more strangely mooded +_Biathanatos_, the intense and subtle eloquence of his sermons, +the tormented passion and wit of his devotions, and the gaiety +and melancholy, wit and wisdom, of his letters. But most of these +qualities have left their mark on his poetry, and given it interests +over and above its worth simply as poetry. + +One quality of his verse, which has been somewhat overlooked by +critics intent upon the definition and sources of metaphysical wit, is +wit in our sense of the word, wit like the wit of Swift and Sheridan. +The habit in which this wit masquerades is doubtless old-fashioned. It +is not always the worse for that, for the wit of the Elizabethans +is delightfully blended with fancy and feeling. There is a little +of Jaques in all of them. But if fanciful and at times even boyish, +Donne's wit is still amusing, the quickest and most fertile wit of the +century till we come to the author of _Hudibras_. + +It is not in the _Satyres_ that this wit is to us most obvious. +Nothing grows so soon out of date as contemporary satire. Even the +brilliance and polish of Pope's satire--and Pope's art is nowhere more +perfect than in _The Dunciad_ and the _Imitations of Horace_--cannot +interest us in Lord Hervey, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, and +the forgotten poets of an unpoetic age. How then should we be +interested in Elizabeth's fantastic 'Presence', the streets of +sixteenth-century London, and the knavery of pursuivants, presented +with a satiric art which is wonderfully vivid and caustic but still +tentative,--over-emphatic, rough in style and verse, though with a +roughness which is obviously a studied and in a measure successful +effect. The verses upon _Coryats Crudities_ are in their way a +masterpiece of insult veiled as compliment, but it is a rather boyish +and barbarous way. + +It is in the lighter of his love verses that Donne's laughable wit is +most obvious and most agile. Whatever one may think of the choice of +subject, and the flame of a young man's lust that burns undisguised +in some of the _Elegies_, it is impossible to ignore the dazzling wit +which neither flags nor falters from the first line to the last. And +in the more graceful and fanciful, the less heated _Songs and Sonets_, +the same wit, gay and insolent, disports itself in a philosophy of +love which must not be taken altogether seriously. Donne at least, +as we shall see, outgrew it. His attitude is very much that of +Shakespeare in the early comedies. But the Petrarchian love, which +Shakespeare treats with light and charming irony, the vows and tears +of Romeo and Proteus, Donne openly scoffs. He is one of Shakespeare's +young men as these were in the flesh and the Inns of Court, and he +tells us frankly what in their youthful cynicism (which is often even +more of a pose than their idealism) they think of love, and constancy, +and women. + +Of all miracles, Donne cries, a constant woman is the greatest, of all +strange sights the strangest: + + If thou findst one, let mee know, + Such a Pilgrimage were sweet; + Yet doe not, I would not goe, + Though at next doore wee might meet, + Though shee were true, when you met her, + And last, till you write your letter, + Yet shee + Will bee + False, ere I come, to two, or three. + +But is it true that we desire to find her? Donne's answer is _Woman's +Constancy_: + + Now thou hast lov'd me one whole day, + To-morrow when thou leav'st what wilt thou say? + +She will, like Proteus in the _Two Gentlemen of Verona_, have no +dearth of sophistries--but why elaborate them? + + Vain lunatique, against these scapes I could + Dispute, and conquer, if I would, + Which I abstaine to doe, + For by to-morrow, I may think so too. + +Why ask for constancy when change is the life and law of love? + + I can love both fair and brown; + Her whom abundance melts, and her whom want betrays; + Her who loves loneness best, and her who masks and plays. + . . . . . . . + I can love her and her, and you and you, + I can love any so she be not true. + +It is not often that the reckless and wilful gaiety of youth masking +as cynicism has been expressed with such ebullient wit as in these +and companion songs. And when he adopts for a time the pose of the +faithful lover bewailing the cruelty of his mistress the sarcastic wit +is no less fertile. It would be difficult to find in the language a +more sustained succession of witty surprises than _The Will_. Others +were to catch these notes from Donne, and Suckling later flutes them +gaily in his lighter fashion, never with the same fullness of wit and +fancy, never with the same ardour of passion divinable through the +audacious extravagances. + +But to amuse was by no means the sole aim of Donne's 'wit'; gay humour +touched with fancy and feeling is not its only quality. Donne's 'wit' +has many strands, his humour many moods, and before considering how +these are woven together into an effect that is entirely poetical, +we may note one or two of the soberer strands which run through his +_Letters_, _Epicedes_, and similar poems--descriptive, reflective, and +complimentary. + +Not much of Donne's poetry is given to description. Of the feeling +for nature of the Elizabethans, their pastoral and ideal pictures of +meadow and wood and stream, which delighted the heart of Izaak Walton, +there is nothing in Donne. A greater contrast than that between +Marlowe's _Come live with me_ and Donne's imitation _The Baite_ it +would be hard to conceive. But in _The Storme_ and _The Calme_ Donne +used his wit to achieve an effect of realism which was something new +in English poetry, and was not reproduced till Swift wrote _The City +Shower_. From the first lines, which describe how + + The South and West winds join'd, and as they blew, + Waves like a rolling trench before them threw, + +to the close of _The Storme_ the noise of the contending elements is +deafening: + + Thousands our noises were, yet we 'mongst all + Could none by his right name, but thunder call: + Lightning was all our light, and it rain'd more + Than if the Sunne had drunke the sea before. + . . . . . . . . . + Hearing hath deaf'd our sailors, and if they + Knew how to hear, there's none knowes what to say: + Compared to these stormes, death is but a qualme, + Hell somewhat lightsome, and the Bermuda calme. + +The sense of tropical heat and calm in the companion poem is hardly +less oppressive, and, if the whole is not quite so happy as the +first, it contains two lines whose vivid and unexpected felicity is +as delightful to-day as when Ben Jonson recited them to Drummond at +Hawthornden: + + No use of lanthorns; and in one place lay + Feathers and dust, to-day and yesterday. + +Donne's letters generally fall into two groups. The first comprises +those addressed to his fellow-students at Cambridge and the Inns of +Court, the Woodwards, Brookes, and others, or to his maturer and more +fashionable companions in the quest of favour and employment at Court, +Wotton, and Goodyere, and Lord Herbert of Cherbury. To the other +belong the complimentary and elegant epistles in which he delighted +and perhaps bewildered his noble lady friends and patronesses with +erudite and transcendental flattery. + +In the first class, and the same is true of some of the _Satyres_, +notably the third, and of the satirical _Progresse of the Soule_, +especially at the beginning and the end, the reflective, moralizing +strain predominates. Donne's 'wit' becomes the instrument of a +criticism of life, grave or satiric, melancholy or stoical. Despite +Matthew Arnold's definition, verse of this kind seldom is poetry in +the full sense of the word; but, as Stevenson says in speaking of his +own Scotch verses, talk not song. The first of English poets was a +master of the art. Neither Horace nor Martial, whom Stevenson cites, +is a more delightful talker in verse than Geoffrey Chaucer, and the +archaism of his style seems only to lend the additional charm of a +lisp to his babble. Since Donne's day English poetry has been rich +in such verse talkers--Butler and Dryden, Pope and Swift, Cowper and +Burns, Byron and Shelley, Browning and Landor. It did not come easy to +the Elizabethans, whose natural accent was song. Donne's chief rivals +were Daniel and Jonson, and I venture to think that he excels them +both in the clear and pointed yet easy and conversational development +of his thought, in the play of wit and wisdom, and, despite the +pedantic cast of Elizabethan erudite moralizing, in the power to +leave on the reader the impression of a potent and yet a winning +personality. We seem to get nearer to the man himself in Donne's +letters to Goodyere and Wotton than in Daniel's weighty, but also +heavy, moralizing epistles to the Countess of Cumberland or Sir Thomas +Egerton; and the personality whose voice sounds so distinct and human +in our ear is a more attractive one than the harsh, censorious, burly +but a little blustering Jonson of the epistles on country life and +generous givers. Donne's style is less clumsy, his verse less stiff. +His wit brings to a clear point whatever he has to say, while from +his verse as from his prose letters there disengages itself a very +distinct sense of what it was in the man, underlying his brilliant +intellect, his almost superhuman cleverness, which won for him the +devotion of friends like Wotton and Goodyere and Walton and King, the +admiration of a stranger like Huyghens, who heard him talk as well as +preach:--a serious and melancholy, a generous and chivalrous spirit. + + However, keepe the lively tast you hold + Of God, love him as now, but feare him more, + And in your afternoones thinke what you told + And promis'd him, at morning prayer before. + + Let falshood like a discord anger you, + Else be not froward. But why doe I touch + Things, of which none is in your practise new, + And Tables, or fruit-trenchers teach as much; + + But thus I make you keepe your promise Sir, + Riding I had you, though you still staid there, + And in these thoughts, although you never stirre, + You came with mee to Micham, and are here. + +So he writes to Goodyere, but the letter to Wotton going Ambassador to +Venice is Donne's masterpiece in this simpler style, and it seems to +me that neither Daniel nor Jonson nor Drayton ever catches this note +at once sensitive and courtly. To find a like courtliness we must go +to Wotton; witness the reply to Donne's earlier epistle which I have +printed in the notes. But neither Wotton nor any other of the courtly +poets in Hannah's collection adds to this dignity so poignant a +personal accent. + +This personal interest is very marked in the two satires which are +connected by tone and temper with the letters, the third of the +early, classical _Satyres_ and the opening and closing stanzas of +the _Progresse of the Soule_. Each is a vivid picture of the inner +workings of Donne's soul at a critical period in his life. The first +was doubtless written at the moment that he was passing from the Roman +to the Anglican Church. It is one of the earliest and most thoughtful +appeals for toleration, for the candid scrutiny of religious +differences, which was written perhaps in any country--one of the +most striking symptoms of the new eddies produced in the stream of +religious feeling by the meeting currents of the Reformation and the +Counter-Reformation. + +It was a difficult and dangerous process through which Donne was +passing, this conversion from the Church of his fathers to conformity +with the Church of England as by law established. It would be as +absurd, in the face of a poem like this and of all that we know of +Donne's subsequent life, to call it a conversion in the full sense of +the term, a changed conviction, as to dub it an apostasy prompted +by purely political considerations. Yet doubtless the latter +predominated. The position of a Catholic in the reign of Elizabeth +was that of a man cut off rigorously from the main life of the nation, +with every avenue of honourable ambition closed to him. He had to live +the starved, suspected life of a recusant or to seek service under a +foreign power. Some of the most pathetic documents in Strype's _Annals +of the Reformation_ are those in which we hear the cry of young men of +secure station and means driven by conscientious conviction to abandon +home and country. It is possible that before 1592 Donne himself had +been sent abroad by relatives with a view to his entering a seminary +or the service of a foreign power. His mother spent a great part of +her life abroad, and his own relatives were among those who suffered +most severely under Walsingham's persecution. 'I had', Donne says, 'my +first breeding and conversation with men of suppressed and afflicted +Religion, accustomed to the despite of death, and hungry of an +imagined Martyrdome.' To a young man of ambition, and as yet certainly +with no bent to devotion or martyrdom, it was only common sense to +conform if he might. + +From this dilemma Donne escaped, not by any opportune change of +conviction, or by any insincere profession, but by the way of +intellectual emancipation. He looks round in this satire and sees that +whichever be the true Church it is not by any painful quest of truth, +and through the attainment of conviction, that most people have +accepted the Church to which they may belong. Circumstances and +whim have had more to do with their choice than reason and serious +conviction. Yet it is only by search that truth is to be found: + + On a huge hill + Cragged, and steep, Truth stands, and hee that will + Reach her, about must, and about must goe; + And what the hills suddenes resists win so. + Yet strive so, that before age, deaths twilight, + Thy Soule rest, for none can work in that night. + +It was not often in the sixteenth or seventeenth century that a +completely emancipated and critical attitude on religious, not +philosophical, questions was expressed with such entire frankness and +seriousness. From this position, Walton would have us believe, Donne +advanced through the study of Bellarmine and other controversialists +to a convinced acceptance of Anglican doctrine. The evidence points to +a rather different conclusion on Donne's part. He came to think that +all the Churches were 'virtual beams of one sun', 'connatural pieces +of one circle', a position from which the next step was to the +conclusion that for an Englishman the Anglican Church was the right +choice (Cujus regio, ejus religio); but Donne had not reached this +conclusion when he wrote the _Satyre_, and doubtless did not till he +had satisfied himself that the Church of England offered a reasonable +_via media_. But changes of creed made on purely intellectual grounds, +and prompted by practical motives, are not unattended with danger to +a man's moral and spiritual life. Donne had doubtless outwardly +conformed before he entered Egerton's service in 1598, but long +afterwards, when he is already in Orders, he utters a cry which +betrays how real the dilemma still was: + + Show me, deare Christ, thy spouse, so bright and clear; + +and the first result of his 'conversion' was apparently to deepen the +sceptical vein in his mind. + +Scepticism and melancholy, bitter and sardonic, are certainly the +dominant notes in the sombre fragment of satire _The Progresse of the +Soule_, which he composed in 1601, when he was Sir Thomas Egerton's +secretary, four months before his marriage and six months after the +death of the Earl of Essex. There can be little doubt, as I have +ventured to suggest elsewhere, that it was the latter event which +provoked this strange and sombre explosion of spleen, a satire of the +same order as the _Tale of a Tub_ or the _Vision of Judgment_. The +account of the poem which Jonson gave to Drummond does not seem to be +quite accurate, though it was probably derived from Donne himself. It +was, one suspects from several circumstances, a little Donne's way in +later years to disguise the footprints of his earlier indiscretions. +According to this tradition the final _habitat_ of the soul which +'inanimated' the apple + + Whose mortal taste + Brought death into the world and all our woe, + +was to be John Calvin. The tradition is interesting as marking how far +Donne was in 1601 from his later orthodox Protestantism, for Calvin is +never mentioned but with respect in the _Sermons_. A few months +later he wrote to Egerton disclaiming warmly all 'love of a corrupt +religion'. But, though sceptical in tone, the poem is written from a +Catholic standpoint; its theme is the progress of the soul of heresy. +And, as the seventh stanza clearly indicates, the great heretic in +whom the line closed was to be not Calvin but Queen Elizabeth: + + the great soule which here among us now + Doth dwell, and moves that hand, and tongue, and brow + Which, as the Moone the sea, moves us. + +Donne can hardly have thought of publishing such a poem, or +circulating it in the Queen's lifetime. It was an expression of the +mood which begot the 'black and envious slanders breath'd against +Diana for her divine justice on Actaeon' to which Jonson refers in +_Cynthia's Revels_ the same year. That some copies were circulated in +manuscript later is probably due to the reaction which brought +into favour at James's Court the Earl of Southampton and the former +adherents of Essex generally. + +The tone, moreover, of the stanza quoted above suggests that it was +no vulgar libel on Elizabeth which Donne contemplated. Elizabeth, the +cruel persecutor of his Catholic kinsfolk, now stained with the blood +of her favourite, appeared to him somewhat as she did to Pope Sixtus, +a heretic but a great woman. He felt to her as Burke did to the 'whole +race of Guises, Condés and Colignis'--'the hand that like a destroying +angel smote the country communicated to it the force and energy under +which it suffered.' In a mood of bitter admiration, of sceptical and +sardonic wonder, he contemplates the great bad souls who had troubled +the world and served it too, for the idea on which the poem was to +rest is the disconcerting reflection that we owe many good things to +heretics and bad men: + + Who ere thou beest that read'st this sullen Writ, + Which just so much courts thee, as thou dost it, + Let me arrest thy thoughts; wonder with mee, + Why plowing, building, ruling and the rest, + Or most of those arts, whence our lives are blest, + By cursed _Cains_ race invented be, + And blest _Seth_ vext us with Astronomie. + Ther's nothing simply good, nor ill alone, + Of every quality comparison, + The onely measure is, and judge, opinion. + +It would have been interesting to read Donne's history of the great +souls that troubled and yet quickened the world from Cain to Arius and +from Mahomet to Elizabeth, but unfortunately Donne never got beyond +the introduction, a couple of cantos which describe the progress of +the soul while it is still passing through the vegetable and animal +planes, the motive of which, so far as it can be disentangled, is to +describe the pre-human education of a woman's soul: + + keeping some quality + Of every past shape, she knew treachery, + Rapine, deceit, and lust, and ills enow + To be a woman. + +The fragment has some of the sombre power which De Quincey attributes +to it, but on the whole one must confess it is a failure. The 'wit' of +Donne did not apparently include invention, for many of the episodes +seem pointless as well as disgusting, and indeed in no poem is the +least attractive side of Donne's mind so clearly revealed, that aspect +of his wit which to some readers is more repellent, more fatal to +his claim to be a poet, than too subtle ingenuity or misplaced +erudition--the vein of sheer ugliness which runs through his work, +presenting details that seem merely and wantonly repulsive. The same +vein is apparent in the work of Chapman, of Jonson, and even in places +of Spenser, and the imagery of _Hamlet_ and the tragedies owes some of +its dramatic vividness and power to the same quality. The ugly has its +place in art, and it would not be difficult to find it in every phase +of Renaissance art, marked like the beautiful in that art by the +same evidence of power. Decadence brought with it not ugliness but +prettiness. + +The reflective, philosophic, somewhat melancholy strain of the poems +I have been touching on reappears in the letters addressed to noble +ladies. Here, however, it is softened, less sardonic in tone, while +it blends with or gives place to another strain, that of absurd and +extravagant but fanciful and subtle compliment. Donne cannot write to +a lady without his heart and fancy taking wing in their own passionate +and erudite fashion. Scholastic theology is made the instrument +of courtly compliment and pious flirtation. He blends in the +same disturbing fashion as in some of the songs and elegies that +depreciation of woman in general, which he owes less to classical +poetry than to his over-acquaintance with the Fathers, with an +adoration of her charms in the individual which passes into the +transcendental. He tells the Countess of Huntingdon that active +goodness in a woman is a miracle; but it is clear that she and the +Countess of Bedford and Mrs. Herbert and Lady Carey and the Countess +of Salisbury are all examples of such miracle--ladies whose beauty +itself is virtue, while their virtues are a mystery revealable only to +the initiated. + +The highest place is held by Lady Bedford and Mrs. Herbert. Nothing +could surpass the strain of intellectual and etherealized compliment +in which he addresses the Countess. If lines like the following are +not pure poetry, they haunt some quaint borderland of poetry to which +the polished felicities of Pope's compliments are a stranger. If not +pure fancy, they are not mere ingenuity, being too intellectual and +argumentative for the one, too winged and ardent for the other: + + Should I say I liv'd darker then were true, + Your radiation can all clouds subdue; + But one, 'tis best light to contemplate you. + + You, for whose body God made better clay, + Or tooke Soules stuffe such as shall late decay, + Or such as needs small change at the last day. + + This, as an Amber drop enwraps a Bee, + Covering discovers your quicke Soule; that we + May in your through-shine front your hearts thoughts see. + + You teach (though wee learne not) a thing unknowne + To our late times, the use of specular stone, + Through which all things within without were shown. + + Of such were Temples; so and such you are; + _Beeing_ and _seeming_ is your equall care, + And _vertues_ whole _summe_ is but _know_ and _dare_. + +The long poem dedicated to the same lady's beauty, + + You have refin'd me + +is in a like dazzling and subtle vein. Those addressed to Mrs. +Herbert, notably the letter + + Mad paper stay, + +and the beautiful _Elegie_ + + No Spring, nor Summer Beauty hath such grace + As I have seen in one Autumnall face, + +are less transcendental in tone but bespeak an even warmer admiration. +Indeed it is clear to any careful reader that in the poems addressed +to both these ladies there is blended with the respectful flattery of +the dependant not a little of the tone of warmer feeling permitted to +the 'servant' by Troubadour convention. And I suspect that some poems, +the tone of which is still more frankly and ardently lover-like, were +addressed to Lady Bedford and Mrs. Herbert, though they have come to +us without positive indication. + +The title of the subtle, passionate, sonorous lyric _Twicknam Garden_, + + Blasted with sighs, and surrounded with teares, + +points to the person addressed, for Twickenham Park was the residence +of Lady Bedford from 1607 to 1618, and Donne's intimacy with her seems +to have begun in or about 1608. There can, I think, be little doubt +that it is to her, and neither to his wife nor the mistresses of his +earlier, wandering fancy, that these lines, conventional in theme +but given an amazing _timbre_ by the impulse of Donne's subtle and +passionate mind, were addressed. But if _Twicknam Garden_ was written +to Lady Bedford, so also, one is tempted to think, must have been _A +Nocturnall upon S. Lucies Day_, for Lucy was the Countess's name, +and the thought, feeling, and rhythm of the two poems are strikingly +similar. + +But the _Nocturnall_ is a sincerer and profounder poem than _Twicknam +Garden_, and it is more difficult to imagine it the expression of a +conventional sentiment. Mr. Gosse, and there is no higher authority +when it comes to the interpretation of Donne's character and mind, +rightly, I think, suggests that the death of the lady addressed is +assumed, not actual, but he connects the poem with Donne's earlier and +troubled loves. 'So also in a most curious ode, the _Nocturnal_ ..., +amid fireworks of conceit, he calls his mistress dead and protests +that his hatred has grown cold at last.' But I can find no note of +bitterness, active or spent, in the song. It _might_ have been written +to Ann More. It is a highly metaphysical yet sombre and sincere +description of the emptiness of life without love. The critics have, +I think, failed somewhat to reckon with this stratum in Donne's songs, +of poems Petrarchian in convention but with a Petrarchianism coloured +by Donne's realistic temper and impatient wit. Any interpretation of +so enigmatical a poem must be conjectural, but before one denied too +positively that its subject was Lady Bedford--perhaps her illness +in 1612--one would need to answer two questions, how far could a +conventional passion inspire a strain so sincere, and what was Donne's +feeling for Lady Bedford and hers for him? + +Poetry is the language of passion, but the passion which moves the +poet most constantly is the delight of making poetry, and very little +is sufficient to quicken the imagination to its congenial task. +Our soberer minds are apt to think that there must be an actual, +particular experience behind every sincere poem. But history refutes +the idea of such a simple relation between experience and art. No +poet will sing of love convincingly who has never loved, but that +experience will suffice him for many and diverse webs of song and +drama. Without pursuing the theme, it is sufficient for the moment to +recall that in the fashion of the day Spenser's sonnets were addressed +to Lady Carey, not to his wife; that it was to Idea or to Anne Goodere +that Drayton wrote so passionate a poem as + + Since there's no help, come let us kiss and part; + +and that we know very little of what really lies behind Shakespeare's +profound and plangent sonnets, weave what web of fancy we will. + +Of Lady Bedford's feeling for Donne we know only what his letters +reveal, and that is no more than that she was his warm friend +and generous patroness. It is clear, however, from their enduring +friendship and from the tone of that correspondence that she found in +him a friend of a rarer and finer calibre than in the other poets whom +she patronized in turn, Daniel and Drayton and Jonson--some one whose +sensitive, complex, fascinating personality could hardly fail to touch +a woman's imagination and heart. Friendship between man and woman is +love in some degree. There is no need to exaggerate the situation, or +to reflect on either her loyalty or his to other claims, to recognize +that their mutual feeling was of the kind for which the Petrarchian +convention afforded a ready and recognized vehicle of expression. + +And so it was, one fancies, with Mrs. Herbert. She too found in Donne +a rare and comprehending spirit, and he in her a gracious and delicate +friend. His relation to her, indeed, was probably simpler than to +Lady Bedford, their friendship more equal. The letter and the elegy +referred to already are instinct with affection and tender reverence. +To her Donne sent some of his earliest religious sonnets, with a +sonnet on her beautiful name. And to her also it would seem that at +some period in the history of their friendship, the beginning of which +is very difficult to date, he wrote songs in the tone of hopeless, +impatient passion, of Petrarch writing to Laura, and others which +celebrate their mutual affection as a love that rose superior to +earthly and physical passion. The clue here is the title prefixed to +that strange poem _The Primrose, being at Montgomery Castle upon the +hill on which it is situate_. It is true that the title is found +for the first time in the edition of 1635 and is in none of the +manuscripts. But it is easier to explain the occasional suppression +of a revealing title than to conceive a motive for inventing such +a gloss. The poem is doubtless, as Mr. Gosse says, 'a mystical +celebration of the beauty, dignity and intelligence of Magdalen +Herbert'--a celebration, however, which takes the form (as it might +with Petrarch) of a reproach, a reproach which Donne's passionate +temper and caustic wit seem even to touch with scorn. He appears to +hint to Mrs. Herbert that to wish to be more than a woman, to claim +worship in place of love, is to be a worse monster than a coquette: + + Since there must reside + Falshood in woman, I could more abide + She were by Art, than Nature falsifi'd. + +Woman needs no advantages to arbitrate the fate of man. + +In exactly the same mood as _The Primrose_ is _The Blossome_, possibly +written in the same place and on the same day, for the poet is +preparing to return to London. _The Dampe_ is in an even more scornful +tone, and one hesitates to connect it with Mrs. Herbert. But all these +poems recur so repeatedly together in the manuscripts as to suggest +that they have a common origin. And with them go the beautiful poems +_The Funerall_ and _The Relique_. In the former the cruelty of +the lady has killed her lover, but in the second the tone changes +entirely, the relation between Donne and Mrs. Herbert (note the lines + + Thou shalt be a Mary _Magdalen_ and I + A something else thereby) + +has ceased to be Petrarchian and become Platonic, their love a thing +pure and of the spirit, but none the less passionate for that: + + First, we lov'd well and faithfully, + Yet knew not what wee lov'd, nor why, + Difference of sex no more wee knew, + Then our Guardian Angells doe; + Comming and going, wee + Perchance might kisse, but not between those meales; + Our hands ne'r toucht the seales, + Which nature, injur'd by late law, sets free: + These miracles wee did; but now alas, + All measure, and all language, I should passe, + Should I tell what a miracle shee was. + +Such were the notes that a poet in the seventeenth century might still +sing to a high-born lady his patroness and his friend. No one who +knows the fashion of the day will read into them more than they were +intended to convey. No one who knows human nature will read them as +merely frigid and conventional compliments. Any uncertainty one may +feel about the subject arises not from their being love-poems, but +from the difficulty which Donne has in adjusting himself to the +Petrarchian convention, the tendency of his passionate heart and +satiric wit to break through the prescribed tone of worship and +complaint. + +Without some touch of passion, some vibration of the heart, Donne is +only too apt to accumulate 'monstrous and disgusting hyperboles'. This +is very obvious in the _Epicedes_--his complimentary laments for the +young Lord Harington, Miss Boulstred, Lady Markham, Elizabeth Drury +and the Marquis of Hamilton, poems in which it is difficult to find a +line that moves. Indeed, seventeenth-century elegies are not as a rule +pathetic. A poem in the simple, piercing strain and the Wordsworthian +plainness of style of the Dutch poet Vondel's lament for his little +daughter is hardly to be found in English. An occasional epitaph like +Browne's + + May! be thou never grac'd with birds that sing, + Nor Flora's pride! + In thee all flowers and roses spring, + Mine only died, + +comes near it, but in general seventeenth-century elegy is apt to +spend itself on three not easily reconcilable themes--extravagant +eulogy of the dead, which is the characteristically Renaissance +strain, the Mediaeval meditation on death and its horrors, the more +simply Christian mood of hope rising at times to the rapt vision of +a higher life. In the pastoral elegy, such as _Lycidas_, the poet +was able to escape from a too literal treatment of the first into a +sequence of charming conventions. The second was alien to Milton's +thought, and with his genius for turning everything to beauty Milton +extracts from the reference to the circumstances of King's death the +only touch of pathos in the poem: + + Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding Seas + Wash far away, where ere thy bones are hurld, + +and some of his loveliest allusions: + + Where the great vision of the guarded Mount + Looks towards _Namancos_ and _Bayona's_ hold; + Look homeward Angel now, and melt with ruth. + And, O ye _Dolphins_, waft the hapless youth. + +In the metaphysical elegy as cultivated by Donne, Beaumont, and others +there was no escape from extravagant eulogy and sorrow by way of +pastoral convention and mythological embroidery, and this class of +poetry includes some of the worst verses ever written. In Donne all +three of the strains referred to are present, but only in the third +does he achieve what can be truly called poetry. In the elegies on +Lord Harington and Miss Boulstred and Lady Markham it is difficult to +say which is more repellent--the images in which the poet sets forth +the vanity of human life and the humiliations of death or the frigid +and blasphemous hyperboles in which the virtues of the dead are +eulogized. + +Even the _Second Anniversary_, the greatest of Donne's epicedes, is +marred throughout by these faults. There is no stranger poem in +the English language in its combination of excellences and faults, +splendid audacities and execrable extravagances. 'Fervour of +inspiration, depth and force and glow of thought and emotion and +expression'--it has something of all these high qualities which +Swinburne claimed; but the fervour is in great part misdirected, the +emotion only half sincere, the thought more subtle than profound, +the expression heated indeed but with a heat which only in passages +kindles to the glow of poetry. + +Such are the passages in which the poet contemplates the joys of +heaven. There is nothing more instinct with beautiful feeling in +_Lycidas_ than some of the lines of Apocalyptic imagery at the close: + + There entertain him all the Saints above, + In solemn troops, and sweet Societies + That sing, and singing in their glory move, + And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes. + +But in spiritual sense, in passionate awareness of the transcendent, +there are lines in Donne's poem that seem to me superior to +anything in Milton if not in purity of Christian feeling, yet in the +passionate, mystical sense of the infinite as something other than +the finite, something which no suggestion of illimitable extent and +superhuman power can ever in any degree communicate. + + Think then my soule that death is but a Groome, + Which brings a Taper to the outward roome, + Whence thou spiest first a little glimmering light, + And after brings it nearer to thy sight: + For such approaches does heaven make in death. + . . . . . . . + Up, up my drowsie Soule, where thy new eare + Shall in the Angels songs no discord heere, &c. + +In passages like these there is an earnest of the highest note of +spiritual eloquence that Donne was to attain to in his sermons and +last hymns. + +Another aspect of Donne's poetry in the _Anniversaries_, of his +_contemptus mundi_ and ecstatic vision, connects them more closely +with Tennyson's _In Memoriam_ than Milton's _Lycidas_. Like Tennyson, +Donne is much concerned with the progress of science, the revolution +which was going on in men's knowledge of the universe, and its +disintegrating effect on accepted beliefs. To him the new astronomy is +as bewildering in its displacement of the earth and disturbance of a +concentric universe as the new geology was to be to Tennyson with the +vistas which it opened into the infinities of time, the origin and the +destiny of man: + + The new philosophy calls all in doubt, + The Element of fire is quite put out; + The Sun is lost, and th' earth, and no mans wit + Can well direct him where to look for it. + And freely men confesse that this world's spent, + When in the Planets, and the Firmament + They seeke so many new; they see that this + Is crumbled out againe to his Atomies. + +On Tennyson the effect of a similar dislocation of thought, the +revelation of a Nature which seemed to bring to death and bring to +life through endless ages, careless alike of individual and type, was +religious doubt tending to despair: + + O life as futile, then, as frail! + . . . . . + What hope of answer, or redress? + Behind the veil, behind the veil. + +On Donne the effect was quite the opposite. It was not of religion he +doubted but of science, of human knowledge with its uncertainties, its +shifting theories, its concern about the unimportant: + + Poore soule, in this thy flesh what dost thou know? + Thou know'st thy selfe so little, as thou know'st not, + How thou didst die, nor how thou wast begot. + . . . . . . . . . + Have not all soules thought + For many ages, that our body is wrought + Of Ayre, and Fire, and other Elements? + And now they thinke of new ingredients; + And one Soule thinkes one, and another way + Another thinkes, and 'tis an even lay. + . . . . . . . . . + Wee see in Authors, too stiffe to recant, + A hundred controversies of an Ant; + And yet one watches, starves, freeses, and sweats, + To know but Catechismes and Alphabets + Of unconcerning things, matters of fact; + How others on our stage their parts did Act; + What _Cæsar_ did, yea, and what _Cicero_ said. + +With this welter of shifting theories and worthless facts he contrasts +the vision of which religious faith is the earnest here: + + In this low forme, poore soule, what wilt thou doe? + When wilt thou shake off this Pedantery, + Of being taught by sense, and Fantasie? + Thou look'st through spectacles; small things seeme great + Below; But up unto the watch-towre get, + And see all things despoyl'd of fallacies: + Thou shalt not peepe through lattices of eyes, + Nor heare through Labyrinths of eares, nor learne + By circuit, or collections, to discerne. + In heaven thou straight know'st all concerning it, + And what concernes it not, shalt straight forget. + +It will seem to some readers hardly fair to compare a poem like _In +Memoriam_, which, if in places the staple of its feeling and thought +wears a little thin, is entirely serious throughout, with poems which +have so much the character of an intellectual _tour de force_ as +Donne's _Anniversaries_, but it is easy to be unjust to the sincerity +of Donne in these poems. Their extravagant eulogy did not argue any +insincerity to Sir Robert and Lady Drury. It was in the manner of the +time, and doubtless seemed to them as natural an expression of grief +as the elaborate marble and alabaster tomb which they erected to the +memory of their daughter. The _Second Anniversarie_ was written in +France when Donne was resident there with the Drurys. And it was +on this occasion that Donne had the vision of his absent wife which +Walton has related so graphically. The spiritual sense in Donne was +as real a thing as the restless and unruly wit, or the sensual, +passionate temperament. The main thesis of the poem, the comparative +worthlessness of this life, the transcendence of the spiritual, was +as sincere in Donne's case as was in Tennyson the conviction of the +futility of life if death closes all. It was to be the theme of the +finest passages in his eloquent sermons, the burden of all that +is most truly religious in the verse and prose of a passionate, +intellectual, self-tormenting soul to whom the pure ecstasy of love of +a Vondel, the tender raptures of a Crashaw, the chastened piety of a +Herbert, the mystical perceptions of a Vaughan could never be quite +congenial. + +I have dwelt at some length on those aspects of Donne's 'wit' which +are of interest and value even to a reader who may feel doubtful as to +the beauty and interest of his poetry as such, because they too +have been obscured by the criticism which with Dr. Johnson and Mr. +Courthope represents his wit as a monster of misapplied ingenuity, his +interest as historical and historical only. Apart from poetry there is +in Donne's 'wit' a great deal that is still fresh and vivid, wit as we +understand wit; satire pungent and vivid; reflection on religion +and on life, rugged at times in form but never really unmusical as +Jonson's verse is unmusical, and, despite frequent carelessness, +singularly lucid and felicitous in expression; elegant compliment, +extravagant and grotesque at times but often subtle and piquant; +and in the _Anniversaries_, amid much that is both puerile and +extravagant, a loftier strain of impassioned reflection and vision. It +is not of course that these things are not, or may not be constituents +of poetry, made poetic by their handling. To me it seems that in Donne +they generally are. It is the poet in Donne which flavours them all, +touching his wit with fancy, his reflection with imagination, his +vision with passion. But if we wish to estimate the poet simply in +Donne, we must examine his love-poetry and his religious poetry. It is +here that every one who cares for his unique and arresting genius will +admit that he must stand or fall as a great poet. + +For it is here that we find the full effect of what De Quincey points +to as Donne's peculiarity, the combination of dialectical subtlety +with weight and force of passion. Objections to admit the poetic worth +and interest of Donne's love-poetry come from two sides--from those +who are indisposed to admit that passion, and especially the +passion of love, can ever speak so ingeniously (this was the +eighteenth-century criticism); and from those, and these are his more +modern critics, who deny that Donne is a great poet because with rare +exceptions, exceptions rather of occasional lines and phrases than of +whole poems, his songs and elegies lack beauty. Can poetry be at once +passionate and ingenious, sincere in feeling and witty,--packed with +thought, and that subtle and abstract thought, Scholastic dialectic? +Can love-poetry speak a language which is impassioned and expressive +but lacks beauty, is quite different from the language of Dante +and Petrarch, the loveliest language that lovers ever spoke, or the +picturesque hyperboles of _Romeo and Juliet_? Must not the imagery and +the cadences of love poetry reflect 'l'infinita, ineffabile bellezza' +which is its inspiration? + +The first criticism is put very clearly by Steele, who goes so far as +to exemplify what the style of love-poetry should be; and certainly +it is something entirely different from that of _The Extasie_ or the +_Nocturnall upon S. Lucies Day_. Nothing could illustrate better the +'return to nature' of our Augustan literature than Steele's words: + + 'I will suppose an author to be really possessed with the + passion which he writes upon and then we shall see how he + would acquit himself. This I take to be the safest way to form + a judgement upon him: since if he be not truly moved, he + must at least work up his imagination as near as possible + to resemble reality. I choose to instance in love, which is + observed to have produced the most finished performances in + this kind. A lover will be full of sincerity, that he may be + believed by his mistress; he will therefore think simply; he + will express himself perspicuously, that he may not perplex + her; he will therefore write unaffectedly. Deep reflections + are made by a head undisturbed; and points of wit and fancy + are the work of a heart at ease; these two dangers then into + which poets are apt to run, are effectually removed out of the + lover's way. The selecting proper circumstances, and placing + them in agreeable lights, are the finest secrets of all + poetry; but the recollection of little circumstances is the + lover's sole meditation, and relating them pleasantly, the + business of his life. Accordingly we find that the most + celebrated authors of this rank excel in love-verses. Out of + ten thousand instances I shall name one which I think the most + delicate and tender I ever saw. + + To myself I sigh often, without knowing why; + And when absent from Phyllis methinks I could die. + + A man who hath ever been in love will be touched by the + reading of these lines; and everyone who now feels that + passion, actually feels that they are true.' + +It is not possible to find so distinct a statement of the other view +to which I have referred, but I could imagine it coming from Mr. +Robert Bridges, or (since I have no authority to quote Mr. Bridges in +this connexion) from an admirer of his beautiful poetry. Mr. Bridges' +love-poetry is far indeed from the vapid naturalness which Steele +commended in _The Guardian_. It is as instinct with thought, and +subtle thought, as Donne's own poetry; but the final effect of his +poetry is beauty, emotion recollected in tranquillity, and recollected +especially in order to fix its delicate beauty in appropriate and +musical words: + + Awake, my heart, to be loved, awake, awake! + The darkness silvers away, the morn doth break, + It leaps in the sky: unrisen lustres slake + The o'ertaken moon. Awake, O heart, awake! + + She too that loveth awaketh and hopes for thee; + Her eyes already have sped the shades that flee, + Already they watch the path thy feet shall take: + Awake, O heart, to be loved, awake, awake! + + And if thou tarry from her,--if this could be,-- + She cometh herself, O heart, to be loved, to thee; + For thee would unashamed herself forsake: + Awake to be loved, my heart, awake, awake! + + Awake, the land is scattered with light, and see, + Uncanopied sleep is flying from field and tree: + And blossoming boughs of April in laughter shake; + Awake, O heart, to be loved, awake, awake! + + Lo all things wake and tarry and look for thee: + She looketh and saith, 'O sun, now bring him to me. + Come more adored, O adored, for his coming's sake, + And awake my heart to be loved: awake, awake!' + +Donne has written nothing at once so subtle and so pure and lovely +as this, nothing the end and aim of which is so entirely to leave an +untroubled impression of beauty. + +But it is not true either that the thought and imagery of love-poetry +must be of the simple, obvious kind which Steele supposes, that any +display of dialectical subtlety, any scintillation of wit, must be +fatal to the impression of sincerity and feeling, or on the other hand +that love is always a beautiful emotion naturally expressing itself in +delicate and beautiful language. To some natures love comes as above +all things a force quickening the mind, intensifying its purely +intellectual energy, opening new vistas of thought abstract and +subtle, making the soul 'intensely, wondrously alive'. Of such were +Donne and Browning. A love-poem like 'Come into the garden, Maud' +suspends thought and fills the mind with a succession of picturesque +and voluptuous images in harmony with the dominant mood. A poem such +as _The Anniversarie_ or _The Extasie_, _The Last Ride Together_ or +_Too Late_, is a record of intense, rapid thinking, expressed in the +simplest, most appropriate language--and it is a no whit less natural +utterance of passion. Even the abstractness of the thought, on +which Mr. Courthope lays so much stress in speaking of Donne and the +'metaphysicals' generally, is no necessary implication of want of +feeling. It has been said of St. Augustine 'that his most profound +thoughts regarding the first and last things arose out of prayer ... +concentration of his whole being in prayer led to the most abstract +observation'. So it may be with love-poetry--so it was with Dante in +the _Vita Nuova_, and so, on a lower scale, and allowing for the time +that the passion is a more earthly and sensual one, the thought more +capricious and unruly, with Donne. The _Nocturnall upon S. Lucies +Day_ is not less passionate because that passion finds expression in +abstract and subtle thought. Nor is it true that all love-poetry is +beautiful. Of none of the four poems I have mentioned in the last +paragraph is pure beauty, beauty such as is the note of Mr. Bridges' +song, the distinctive quality. It is rather vivid realism: + + And alive I shall keep and long, you will see! + I knew a man, was kicked like a dog + From gutter to cesspool; what cared he + So long as he picked from the filth his prog? + He saw youth, beauty and genius die, + And jollily lived to his hundredth year. + But I will live otherwise: none of such life! + At once I begin as I mean to end. + +But this sacrifice of beauty to dramatic vividness is a characteristic +of passionate poetry. Beauty is not precisely the quality we should +predicate of the burning lines of Sappho translated by Catullus: + + lingua sed torpet, tenuis sub artus + flamma demanat, sonitu suopte + tintinant aures geminae, teguntur + lumina nocte. + +Beauty is the quality of poetry which records an ideal passion +recollected in tranquillity, rather than of poetry either dramatic or +lyric which utters the very movement and moment of passion itself. + +Donne's love-poetry is a very complex phenomenon, but the two dominant +strains in it are just these: the strain of dialectic, subtle play +of argument and wit, erudite and fantastic; and the strain of vivid +realism, the record of a passion which is not ideal nor conventional, +neither recollected in tranquillity nor a pure product of literary +fashion, but love as an actual, immediate experience in all its +moods, gay and angry, scornful and rapturous with joy, touched with +tenderness and darkened with sorrow--though these last two moods, +the commonest in love-poetry, are with Donne the rarest. The first of +these strains comes to Donne from the Middle Ages, the dialectic of +the Schools, which passed into mediaeval love-poetry almost from +its inception; the second is the expression of the new temper of the +Renaissance as Donne had assimilated it in Latin countries. Donne uses +the method, the dialectic of the mediaeval love-poets, the poets +of the _dolce stil nuovo_, Guinicelli, Cavalcanti, Dante, and their +successors, the intellectual, argumentative evolution of their +_canzoni_, but he uses it to express a temper of mind and a conception +of love which are at the opposite pole from their lofty idealism. The +result, however, is not so entirely disintegrating as Mr. Courthope +seems to think: 'This fine Platonic edifice is ruthlessly demolished +in the poetry of Donne. To him love, in its infinite variety and +inconsistency, represented the principle of perpetual flux in +nature.'[1] The truth is rather that, owing to the fullness of Donne's +experience as a lover, the accident that made of the earlier libertine +a devoted lover and husband, and from the play of his restless and +subtle mind on the phenomenon of love conceived and realized in this +less ideal fashion, there emerged in his poetry the suggestion of +a new philosophy of love which, if less transcendental than that +of Dante, rests on a juster, because a less dualistic and ascetic, +conception of the nature of the love of man and woman. + +The fundamental weakness of the mediaeval doctrine of love, despite +its refining influence and its exaltation of woman, was that it +proved unable to justify love ethically against the claims of the +counter-ideal of asceticism. Taking its rise in a relationship which +excluded the thought of marriage as the end and justification of love, +which presumed in theory that the relation of the 'servant' to his +lady must always be one of reverent and unrewarded service, this +poetry found itself involved from the beginning in a dualism from +which there was no escape. On the one hand the love of woman is the +great ennobler of the human heart, the influence which elicits its +latent virtue as the sun converts clay to gold and precious stones. On +the other hand, love is a passion which in the end is to be repented +of in sackcloth and ashes. Lancelot is the knight whom love has made +perfect in all the virtues of manhood and chivalry; but the vision of +the Holy Grail is not for him, but for the virgin and stainless Sir +Galahad. + +In the high philosophy of the Tuscan poets of the 'sweet new style' +that dualism was apparently transcended, but it was by making love +identical with religion, by emptying it of earthly passion, making +woman an Angel, a pure Intelligence, love of whom is the first +awakening of the love of God. 'For Dante and the poets of the learned +school love and virtue were one and the same thing; love _was_ +religion, the lady beloved the way to heaven, symbol of philosophy and +finally of theology.'[2] The culminating moment in Dante's love for +Beatrice arrives when he has overcome even the desire that she should +return his salutation and he finds his full beatitude in 'those words +that do praise my lady'. The love that begins in the _Vita Nuova_ is +completed in the _Paradiso_. + +The dualism thus in appearance transcended by Dante reappears sharply +and distinctly in Petrarch. 'Petrarch', says Gaspary, 'adores not the +idea but the person of his lady; he feels that in his affections there +is an earthly element, he cannot separate it from the desire of the +senses; this is the earthly tegument which draws us down. If not as, +according to the ascetic doctrine, sin, if he could not be ashamed of +his passion, yet he could repent of it as a vain and frivolous thing, +regret his wasted hopes and griefs.'[3] Laura is for Petrarch the +flower of all perfection herself and the source of every virtue in her +lover. Yet his love for Laura is a long and weary aberration of +the soul from her true goal, which is the love of God. This is the +contradiction from which flow some of the most lyrical strains in +Petrarch's poetry, as the fine canzone 'I'vo pensando', where he +cries: + + E sento ad ora ad or venirmi in core + Un leggiadro disdegno, aspro e severo, + Ch'ogni occulto pensero + Tira in mezzo la fronte, ov' altri 'l vede; + Che mortal cosa amar con tanta fede, + Quanta a Dio sol per debito convensi, + Più si disdice a chi più pregio brama. + +Elizabethan love-poetry is descended from Petrarch by way of Cardinal +Bembo and the French poets of the _Pléiade_, notably Ronsard +and Desportes. Of all the Elizabethan sonneteers the most finely +Petrarchian are Sidney and Spenser, especially the former. For Sidney, +Stella is the school of virtue and nobility. He too writes at times in +the impatient strain of Petrarch: + + But ah! Desire still cries, give me some food. + +And in the end both Sidney and Spenser turn from earthly to heavenly +love: + + Leave me, O love, which reachest but to dust, + And thou, my mind, aspire to higher things: + Grow rich in that which never taketh rust, + Whatever fades but fading pleasure brings. + +And so Spenser: + + Many lewd lays (Ah! woe is me the more) + In praise of that mad fit, which fools call love, + I have in the heat of youth made heretofore; + That in light wits affection loose did move, + But all these follies now I do reprove. + +But two things had come over this idealist and courtly love-poetry by +the end of the sixteenth century. It had become a literary artifice, a +refining upon outworn and extravagant conceits, losing itself at +times in the fantastic and absurd. A more important fact was that this +poetry had begun to absorb a new warmth and spirit, not from Petrarch +and mediaeval chivalry, but from classical love-poetry with its +simpler, less metaphysical strain, its equally intense but more +realistic description of passion, its radically different conception +of the relation between the lovers and of the influence of love in a +man's life. The courtly, idealistic strain was crossed by an Epicurean +and sensuous one that tends to treat with scorn the worship of woman, +and echoes again and again the Pagan cry, never heard in Dante or +Petrarch, of the fleetingness of beauty and love: + + Vivamus, mea Lesbia, atque amemus! + Soles occidere et redire possunt: + Nobis quum semel occidit brevis lux + Nox est perpetua una dormienda. + + Vivez si m'en croyez, n'attendez à demain; + Cueillez dès aujourd'hui les roses de la vie. + + Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, + But sad mortality o'er-sways their power, + How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea + Whose action is no stronger than a flower? + +Now if we turn from Elizabethan love-poetry to the _Songs and Sonets_ +and the _Elegies_ of Donne, we find at once two distinguishing +features. In the first place his poetry is in one respect less +classical than theirs. There is far less in it of the superficial +evidence of classical learning with which the poetry of the +'University Wits' abounds, pastoral and mythological imagery. The +texture of his poetry is more mediaeval than theirs in as far as it is +more dialectical, though a dialectical evolution is not infrequent +in the Elizabethan sonnet, and the imagery is less picturesque, more +scientific, philosophic, realistic, and homely. The place of the + + goodly exiled train + Of gods and goddesses + +is taken by images drawn from all the sciences of the day, from the +definitions and distinctions of the Schoolmen, from the travels and +speculations of the new age, and (as in Shakespeare's tragedies or +Browning's poems) from the experiences of everyday life. Maps and sea +discoveries, latitude and longitude, the phoenix and the mandrake's +root, the Scholastic theories of Angelic bodies and Angelic knowledge, +Alchemy and Astrology, legal contracts and _non obstantes_, 'late +schoolboys and sour prentices,' 'the king's real and his stamped +face'--these are the kind of images, erudite, fanciful, and homely, +which give to Donne's poems a texture so different at a first glance +from the florid and diffuse Elizabethan poetry, whether romantic epic, +mythological idyll, sonnet, or song; while by their presence and +their abundance they distinguish it equally (as Mr. Gosse has +justly insisted) from the studiously moderate and plain style of +'well-languaged Daniel'. + +But if the imagery of Donne's poetry be less classical than that of +Marlowe or the younger Shakespeare there is no poet the spirit of +whose love-poetry is so classical, so penetrated with the sensual, +realistic, scornful tone of the Latin lyric and elegiac poets. If one +reads rapidly through the three books of Ovid's _Amores_, and then +in the same continuous rapid fashion the _Songs_ and the _Elegies_ of +Donne, one will note striking differences of style and treatment. +Ovid develops his theme simply and concretely, Donne dialectically and +abstractly. There is little of the ease and grace of Ovid's verses in +the rough and vehement lines of Donne's _Elegies_. Compare the song, + + Busie old foole, unruly Sunne, + +with the famous thirteenth Elegy of the first book, + + Iam super oceanum venit a seniore marito, + Flava pruinoso quae vehit axe diem. + +Ovid passes from one natural and simple thought to another, from one +aspect of dawn to another equally objective. Donne just touches one or +two of the same features, borrowing them doubtless from Ovid, but the +greater part of the song is devoted to the subtle and extravagant, if +you like, but not the less passionate development of the thought that +for him the woman he loves is the whole world. + +But if the difference between Donne's metaphysical conceits and Ovid's +naturalness and simplicity is palpable it is not less clear that the +emotions which they express, with some important exceptions to which I +shall recur, are identical. The love which is the main burden of their +song is something very different from the ideal passion of Dante or of +Petrarch, of Sidney or Spenser. It is a more sensual passion. The same +tone of witty depravity runs through the work of the two poets. There +is in Donne a purer strain which, we shall see directly, is of the +greatest importance, but such a rapid reader as I am contemplating +might be forgiven if for the moment he overlooked it, and declared +that the modern poet was as sensual and depraved as the ancient, that +there was little to choose between the social morality reflected in +the Elizabethan and in the Augustan poet. + +And yet even in these more cynical and sensual poems a careful reader +will soon detect a difference between Donne and Ovid. He will begin +to suspect that the English poet is imitating the Roman, and that +the depravity is in part a reflected depravity. In revolt from one +convention the young poet is cultivating another, a cynicism and +sensuality which is just as little to be taken _au pied de la +lettre_ as the idealizing worship, the anguish and adoration of the +sonneteers. There is, as has been said already, a gaiety in the poems +elaborating the thesis that love is a perpetual flux, fickleness the +law of its being, which warns us against taking them too seriously; +and even those _Elegies_ which seem to our taste most reprehensible +are aerated by a wit which makes us almost forget their indecency. In +the last resort there is all the difference in the world between the +untroubled, heartless sensuality of the Roman poet and the gay wit, +the paradoxical and passionate audacities and sensualities of the +young Elizabethan law-student impatient of an unreal convention, and +eager to startle and delight his fellow students by the fertility and +audacity of his wit. + +It is not of course my intention to represent Donne's love-poetry +as purely an 'evaporation' of wit, to suggest that there is in it +no reflection either of his own life as a young man or the moral +atmosphere of Elizabethan London. It would be a much less interesting +poetry if this were so. Donne has pleaded guilty to a careless and +passionate youth: + + In mine Idolatry what showres of raine + Mine eyes did waste? what griefs my heart did rent? + That sufferance was my sinne; now I repent; + Cause I did suffer I must suffer pain. + +From what we know of the lives of Essex, Raleigh, Southampton, +Pembroke, and others it is probable that Donne's _Elegies_ come quite +as close to the truth of life as Sidney's Petrarchianism or Spenser's +Platonism. The later cantos of _The Faerie Queene_ reflect vividly the +unchaste loves and troubled friendships of Elizabeth's Court. Whether +we can accept in its entirety the history of Donne's early amours +which Mr. Gosse has gathered from the poems or not, there can be no +doubt that actual experiences do lie behind these poems as behind +Shakespeare's sonnets. In the one case as in the other, to recognize a +literary model is not to exclude the probability of a source in actual +experience. + +But however we may explain or palliate the tone of these poems it is +impossible to deny their power, the vivid and packed force with which +they portray a variously mooded passion working through a swift and +subtle brain. If there is little of the elegant and accomplished art +which Milton admired in the Latin Elegiasts while he 'deplored' their +immorality, there is more strength and sincerity both of thought and +imagination. The brutal cynicism of + + Fond woman which would have thy husband die, + +the witty anger of _The Apparition_, the mordant and paradoxical +wit of _The Perfume_ and _The Bracelet_, the passionate dignity and +strength of _His Picture_, + + My body a sack of bones broken within, + And powders blew stains scatter'd on my skin, + +the passion that rises superior to sensuality and wit, and takes wing +into a more spiritual and ideal atmosphere, of _His parting from her_, + + I will not look upon the quick'ning Sun, + But straight her beauty to my sense shall run; + The ayre shall note her soft, the fire most pure; + Water suggest her clear, and the earth sure-- + +compare these with Ovid and the difference is apparent between an +artistic, witty voluptuary and a poet whose passionate force redeems +many errors of taste and art. Compare them with the sonnets and +mythological idylls and _Heroicall Epistles_ of the Elizabethans and +it is they, not Donne, who are revealed as witty and 'fantastic' poets +content to adorn a conventional sentiment with mythological fancies +and verbal conceits. Donne's interest is his theme, love and woman, +and he uses words not for their own sake but to communicate his +consciousness of these surprising phenomena in all their varying and +conflicting aspects. The only contemporary poems that have the same +dramatic quality are Shakespeare's sonnets and some of Drayton's later +sonnets. In Shakespeare this dramatic intensity and variety is of +course united with a rarer poetic charm. Charm is a quality which +Donne's poetry possesses in a few single lines. But to the passion +which animates these sensual, witty, troubled poems the closest +parallel is to be sought in Shakespeare's sonnets to a dark lady and +in some of the verses written by Catullus to or of Lesbia: + + The expense of spirit in a waste of shame. + +But neither sensual passion, nor gay and cynical wit, nor scorn +and anger, is the dominant note in Donne's love-poetry. Of the last +quality there is, despite the sardonic emphasis of some of the poems, +less than in either Shakespeare or Catullus. There is nothing in +his poetry which speaks so poignantly of an outraged heart, a love +lavished upon one who was worthless, as some of Shakespeare's sonnets +and of Catullus's poems. The finest note in Donne's love-poetry is the +note of joy, the joy of mutual and contented passion. His heart might +be subtle to plague itself; its capacity for joy is even more obvious. +Other poets have done many things which Donne could not do. They have +invested their feelings with a garb of richer and sweeter poetry. They +have felt more deeply and finely the reverence which is in the heart +of love. But it is only in the fragments of Sappho, the lyrics of +Catullus, and the songs of Burns that one will find the sheer joy +of loving and being loved expressed in the same direct and simple +language as in some of Donne's songs, only in Browning that one will +find the same simplicity of feeling combined with a like swift and +subtle dialectic. + + I wonder by my troth what thou and I + Did till we loved. + + For God's sake hold your tongue and let me love. + + If yet I have not all thy love, + Deare, I shall never have it all. + +Lines like these have the same direct, passionate quality as + + [Greek: phainetai moi kênos isos theoisin emmen ônêr] + +or + + O my love's like a red, red rose + That's newly sprung in June. + +The joy is as intense though it is of a more spiritual and +intellectual quality. And in the other notes of this simple passionate +love-poetry, sorrow which is the shadow of joy, and tenderness, +Donne does not fall far short of Burns in intensity of feeling and +directness of expression. These notes are not so often heard in Donne, +but + + So, so break off this last lamenting kiss + +is of the same quality as + + Had we never lov'd sae kindly + +or + + Take, O take those lips away. + +And strangest of all perhaps is the tenderness which came into Donne's +poetry when a sincere passion quickened in his heart, for tenderness, +the note of + + O wert thou in the cauld blast, + +is the last quality one would look for in the poetry of a nature at +once so intellectual and with such a capacity for caustic satire. But +the beautiful if not flawless _Elegy XVI_, + + By our first strange and fatal interview, + +and the _Valedictions_ which he wrote on different occasions of +parting from his wife, combine with the peculiar _élan_ of all Donne's +passionate poetry and its intellectual content a tenderness as perfect +as anything in Burns or in Browning: + + O more than Moone, + Draw not up seas to drowne me in thy spheare, + Weepe me not dead in thine armes, but forbeare + To teach the sea, what it may doe too soone. + + Let not thy divining heart + Forethink me any ill, + Destiny may take thy part + And may thy feares fulfill; + But thinke that we + Are but turn'd aside to sleep; + They who one another keepe + Alive, ne'er parted be. + + Such wilt thou be to mee, who must + Like th' other foot, obliquely runne; + Thy firmnes makes my circle just, + And makes me end, where I begunne. + +The poet who wrote such verses as these did not believe any longer +that 'love ... represents the principle of perpetual flux in nature'. + +But Donne's poetry is not so simple a thing of the heart and of the +senses as that of Burns and Catullus. Even his purer poetry has more +complex moods--consider _The Prohibition_--and it is metaphysical, not +only in the sense of being erudite and witty, but in the proper sense +of being reflective and philosophical. Donne is always conscious of +the import of his moods; and so it is that there emerges from his +poems a philosophy or a suggested philosophy of love to take the place +of the idealism which he rejects. Set a song of the joy of love +by Burns or by Catullus such as I have cited beside Donne's +_Anniversarie_, + + All Kings, and all their favorites, + All glory of honors, beauties, wits, + The Sun itselfe, which makes times, as they passe, + Is elder by a year, now, than it was + When thou and I first one another saw, + +and the difference is at once apparent. Burns gets no further than the +experience, Catullus than the obvious and hedonistic reflection that +time is flying, the moment of pleasure short. In Donne's poem one +feels the quickening of the brain, the vision extending its range, the +passion gathering sweep with the expanding rhythms, and from the mind +thus heated and inspired emerges, not a cry that time might stay its +course, + + Lente, lente currite noctis equi, + +but a clearer consciousness of the eternal significance of love, not +the love that aspires after the unattainable, but the love that +unites contented hearts. The method of the poet is, I suppose, too +dialectical to be popular, for the poem is in few Anthologies. It may +be that the Pagan and Christian strains which the poet unites are not +perfectly blended--if it is possible to do so--but to me it seems that +the joy of love has never been expressed at once with such intensity +and such elevation. + +And it is with sorrow as with joy. There is the same difference +of manner in the expression between Donne and these poets, and the +deepest thought is the same. The _Nocturnall on S. Lucies Day_ is +at the opposite pole of Donne's thought from the _Anniversarie_, and +compared with + + Had we never loved sae kindly + +or + + Take, O take those lips away, + +both the feeling and its expression are metaphysical. But the passion +is felt through the subtle and fantastic web of dialectic; and the +thought from which the whole springs is the emptiness of life without +love. + +What, then, is the philosophy which disengages itself from Donne's +love-poetry studied in its whole compass? It seems to me that it is +more than a purely negative one, that consciously or unconsciously +he sets over against the abstract idealism, the sharp dualism of the +Middle Ages, a justification of love as a natural passion in the human +heart the meaning and end of which is marriage. The sensuality and +exaggerated cynicism of so much of the poetry of the Renaissance was +a reaction from courtly idealism and mediaeval asceticism. But a mere +reaction could lead no-whither. There are no steps which lead only +backward in the history of human thought and feeling. Poems like +Donne's _Elegies_, like Shakespeare's _Venus and Adonis_, like +Marlowe's _Hero and Leander_ could only end in penitent outcries like +those of Sidney and Spenser and of Donne himself. The true escape from +courtly or ascetic idealism was a poetry which should do justice to +love as a passion in which body and soul alike have their part, and of +which there is no reason to repent. + +And this with all its imperfections Donne's love-poetry is. It was not +for nothing that Sir Thomas Egerton's secretary made a runaway match +for love. For Dante the poet, his wife did not exist. In love of his +wife Donne found the meaning and the infinite value of love. In later +days he might bewail his 'idolatry of profane mistresses'; he never +repented of having loved. Between his most sensual and his most +spiritual love-songs there is no cleavage such as separates natural +love from Dante's love of Beatrice, who is in the end Theology. The +passion that burns in Donne's most outspoken elegies, and wantons +in the _Epithalamia_, is not cast out in _The Anniversarie_ or _The +Canonization_, but absorbed. It is purified and enriched by being +brought into harmony with his whole nature, spiritual as well as +physical. It has lost the exclusive consciousness of itself which +is lust, and become merged in an entire affection, as a turbid and +discoloured stream is lost in the sea. + +This justification of natural love as fullness of joy and life is the +deepest thought in Donne's love-poems, far deeper and sincerer than +the Platonic conceptions of the affinity and identity of souls with +which he plays in some of the verses addressed to Mrs. Herbert. The +nearest approach that he makes to anything like a reasoned statement +of the thought latent rather than expressed in _The Anniversarie_ +is in _The Extasie_, a poem which, like the _Nocturnall_, only Donne +could have written. Here with the same intensity of feeling, and +in the same abstract, dialectical, erudite strain he emphasizes the +interdependence of soul and body: + + As our blood labours to beget + Spirits, as like soules as it can, + Because such fingers need to knit + That subtile knot, which makes us man: + So must pure lovers soules descend + T'affections, and to faculties, + Which sense may reach and apprehend, + _Else a great Prince in prison lies_. + +It may be that Donne has not entirely succeeded in what he here +attempts. There hangs about the poem just a suspicion of the +conventional and unreal Platonism of the seventeenth century. In +attempting to state and vindicate the relation of soul and body he +falls perhaps inevitably into the appearance, at any rate, of the +dualism which he is trying to transcend. He places them over against +each other as separate entities and the lower bulks unduly. In love, +says Pascal, the body disappears from sight in the intellectual and +spiritual passion which it has kindled. That is what happens in _The +Anniversarie_, not altogether in _The Extasie_. Yet no poem makes one +realize more fully what Jonson meant by calling Donne 'the first poet +in the world for some things'. 'I should never find any fault with +metaphysical poems,' is Coleridge's judgement, 'if they were all like +this or but half as excellent.' + +It was only the force of Donne's personality that could achieve even +an approximate harmony of elements so divergent as are united in his +love-verses, that could master the lower-natured steed that drew the +chariot of his troubled and passionate soul and make it subservient to +his yoke-fellow of purer strain who is a lover of honour, and modesty, +and temperance, and the follower of true glory. In the work of his +followers, who were many, though they owed allegiance to Jonson +also, the lower elements predominated. The strain of metaphysical +love-poetry in the seventeenth century with its splendid _élan_ and +sonorous cadence is in general Epicurean and witty. It is only now and +again--in Marvell, perhaps in Herrick's + + Bid me to live, and I will live, + Thy Protestant to be, + +certainly in Rochester's songs, in + + An age in her embraces past + Would seem a winter's day, + +or the unequalled: + + When wearied with a world of woe + To thy safe bosom I retire, + Where love, and peace, and truth does flow, + May I contented there expire, + +that the accents of the _heart_ are clearly audible, that passion +prevails over Epicurean fancy or cynical wit. On the other hand, the +idealism of seventeenth-century poetry and romances, the Platonism of +the Hôtel de Rambouillet that one finds in Habington's _Castara_, in +Kenelm Digby's _Private Memoirs_, in the French romances of chivalry +and their imitations in English is the silliest, because the emptiest, +that ever masqueraded as such in any literature, at any period. A +sensual and cynical flippancy on the one hand, a passionless, mannered +idealism on the other, led directly to that thinly veiled contempt +of women which is so obvious in the satirical essays of Addison and +Pope's _Rape of the Lock_. + +But there was one poet who meditated on the same problem as Donne, who +felt like him the power and greatness of love, and like him could +not accept a doctrine of love which seemed to exclude or depreciate +marriage. In 1640, just before his marriage, as rash in its way as +Donne's but less happy in the issue, Milton, defending his character +against accusations of immorality, traced the development of his +thought about love. The passage, in _An Apology against a Pamphlet +called 'A Modest Confutation'_, &c., has been taken as having a +reference to the _Paradise Lost_. But Milton rather seems at the time +to have been meditating a work like the _Vita Nuova_ or a romance like +that of Tasso in which love was to be a motive as well as religion, +for the whole theme of his thought is love, true love and its +mysterious link with chastity, of which, however, 'marriage is no +defilement'. In the arrogance of his youthful purity Milton would +doubtless have looked with scorn or loathing on the _Elegies_ and the +more careless of Donne's songs. But perhaps pride is a greater enemy +of love than such faults of sense as Donne in his passionate youth was +guilty of, and from which Dante by his own evidence was not exempt. +Whatever be the cause--pride, and the disappointment of his marriage, +and political polemic--Milton never wrote any English love-poetry, +except it be the one sonnet on the death of the wife who might have +opened the sealed wells of his heart; and some want of the experience +which love brought to Dante has dimmed the splendour of the great poem +in which he undertook to justify the ways of God to men. Donne is not +a Milton, but he sounded some notes which touch the soul and quicken +the intellect in a way that Milton's magnificent and intense but +somewhat hard and objective art fails to achieve. + +That the simpler and purer, the more ideal and tender of Donne's +love-poems were the expression of his love for Ann More cannot of +course be proved in the case of each individual poem, for all Donne's +verses have come to us (with a few unimportant exceptions) undated +and unarranged. But the general thesis, that it was a great experience +which purified and elevated Donne's poetry, receives a striking +confirmation from the better-known history of his devotional poetry. +Here too wit, often tortured wit, fancy, and the heat which Donne's +wit was always able to generate, would have been all his verse had to +show but for the great sorrow which struck him down in 1617 and gave +to his subsequent sonnets and hymns a sincerer and profounder note, +his imagery a more magnificent quality, his rhythms a more sonorous +music. + +Donne was not by nature a devotional poet in the same way and to the +same degree as Giles Fletcher or Herbert or Crashaw. It was a sound +enough instinct which, despite his religious upbringing and his wide +and serious interest in theological questions, made him hesitate to +cross the threshold of the ministry and induced him to seek rather for +some such public service as fell to the lot of his friend Wotton. It +was not, I think, the transition from the Roman to the Anglican Church +which was the obstacle. I have tried to describe what seems to me to +have been the path of enlightenment which opened the way for him to +a change which on every ground of prudence and ambition was desirable +and natural. But to conform, and even to take a part as a free-lance +in theological controversy was one thing, to enter the ministry +another. When this was pressed upon him by Morton or by the King it +brought him into conflict with something deeper and more fundamental +than theological doctrines, namely, a temperament which was rather +that of the Renaissance than that either of Puritan England or of the +Counter-Reformation, whether in Catholic countries or in the Anglican +Church--the temperament of Raleigh and Bacon rather than of Milton or +Herbert or Crashaw. + +The simple way of describing Donne's difficulty is Walton's, according +to whom Donne shrank from entering the ministry for fear the notorious +irregularities of his early years should bring discredit on the sacred +calling. But there was more in Donne's life than a youth of pleasure, +an old age of prayers. It is not the case that all which was best and +most serious in Donne's nature led him towards Holy Orders. In his +earliest satires and even in his 'love-song weeds' there is evidence +enough of an earnest, candid soul underneath the extravagances of +wit and youthful sensuality. Donne's mind was naturally serious and +religious; it was not naturally devout or ascetic, but worldly and +ambitious. But to enter the ministry was, for Donne and for all +the serious minds of his age, to enter a profession for which the +essential qualifications were a devotional and an ascetic life. +The country clergy of the Anglican Church were often careless and +scandalous livers before Laud took in hand the discipline of the +Church; but her bishops and most eminent divines, though they might +be courtly and sycophantic, were with few exceptions men of devout and +ascetic life. When Donne finally crossed the Rubicon, convinced that +from the King no promotion was to be hoped for in any other line of +life, it was rather with the deliberate resolution that he would make +his life a model of devotion and ascetic self-denial than as one drawn +by an irresistible attraction or impelled by a controlling sense of +duty to such a life. Donne was no St. Augustine whose transition from +libertinism to saintliness came entirely from within. The noblest +feature of Donne's earlier clerical life was the steadfast spirit in +which he set himself to realize the highest ideals of the calling +he had chosen, and the candour with which he accepted the contrast +between his present position and his earlier life, leaving to +whosoever wished to judge while he followed the path of duty and +penitence. + +But such a spirit will not easily produce great devotional poetry. +There are qualities in the religious poetry of simpler and purer souls +to which Donne seldom or never attains. The natural love of God which +overflows the pages of the great mystics, which dilates the heart +and the verses of a poet like the Dutchman Vondel, the ardour and +tenderness of Crashaw, the chaste, pure piety and penitence of +Herbert, the love from which devotion and ascetic self-denial come +unbidden--to these Donne never attained. The high and passionate joy +of _The Anniversary_ is not heard in his sonnets or hymns. Effort is +the note which predominates--the effort to realize the majesty of God, +the heinousness of sin, the terrors of Hell, the mercy of Christ. +Some of the very worst traits in Donne's mind are brought out in +his religious writing. _The Essays on Divinity_ are an extraordinary +revelation of his accumulations of useless Scholastic erudition, and +his capacity to perform feats of ingenious deduction from traditional +and accepted premises. To compare these freakish deductions from the +theory of verbal inspiration with the luminous sense of the _Tractatus +Theologico-Politicus_ is to realize how much rationalism was doing +in the course of the century for the emancipation and healing of the +human intellect. Some of the poems, and those the earliest written, +before Donne had actually taken Orders, are not much more than +exercises in these theological subtleties, poems such as that _On +the Annunciation and Passion falling in the same year_ (1608), _The +Litany_ (1610), _Good-Friday_ (1613), and _The Cross_ (_c._ 1615) +are characteristic examples of Donne's intense and imaginative wit +employed on traditional topics of Catholic devotion to which no +change of Church ever made him indifferent. Donne never ignored in his +sermons the gulf that separated the Anglican from the Roman Church, or +the link that bound her to the Protestant Churches of the Continent. +'Our great protestant divines' are one of his courts of appeal, +and included Luther and Calvin of whom he never speaks but with the +deepest respect. But he was unwilling to sacrifice to a fanatical +puritanism any element of Catholic devotion which was capable of +an innocent interpretation. His language is guarded and perhaps not +always consistent, but it would not be difficult to show from his +sermons and prose-writings that many of the most distinctively +Catholic tenets were treated by him with the utmost tenderness. + +But, as Mr. Gosse has pointed out, the sincerest and profoundest of +Donne's devotional poetry dates from the death of his wife. The loss +of her who had purified and sweetened his earliest love songs lent +a new and deeper _timbre_ to the sonnets and lyrics in which he +contemplates the great topics of personal religion,--sin, death, +the Judgement, and throws himself on the mercy of God as revealed in +Christ. The seven sonnets entitled _La Corona_ have been generally +attributed to this period, but it is probable that they were composed +earlier, and their treatment of the subject of Christ's life and death +is more intellectual and theological than spiritual and poetical. It +is when the tone becomes personal, as in the _Holy Sonnets_, when he +is alone with his own soul in the prospect of death and the Judgement, +that Donne's religious poetry acquires something of the same unique +character as his love songs and elegies by a similar combination +of qualities, intensity of feeling, subtle turns of thought, and +occasional Miltonic splendour of phrase. Here again we meet the +magnificent openings of the _Songs and Sonets_:-- + + This is my playes last scene; here heavens appoint + My pilgrimages last mile; and my race + Idly yet quickly run hath this last space, + My spans last inch, my minutes latest point; + +or, + + At the round earths imagin'd quarters blow + Your trumpets, Angels, and arise, arise + From death you numberlesse infinities + Of soules, and to your scatter'd bodies go: + +and again-- + + What if this present were the worlds last night! + Marke in my heart, O Soule, where thou dost dwell, + The picture of Christ crucified, and tell + Whether that countenance can thee affright, + Teares in his eyes quench the amazing light, + Blood fills his frownes, which from his pierc'd head fell. + +This passionate penitence, this beating as it were against the bars +of self in the desire to break through to a fuller apprehension of +the mercy and love of God, is the intensely human note of these latest +poems. Nothing came easily to his soul that knew so well how to be +subtle to plague itself. The vision of divine wrath he can conjure up +more easily than the beatific vision of the love that 'moves the sun +in heaven and all the stars'. Nevertheless it was that vision which +Donne sought. He could never have been content with Milton's heaven of +majesty and awe divorced from the quickening spirit of love. And there +are moments when he comes as close to that beatific vision as perhaps +a self-tormenting mind involved in the web of seventeenth-century +theology ever could,--at moments love and ecstasy gain the upper hand +of fear and penitence. But it is in the sermons that he reaches these +highest levels. There is nothing in the florid eloquence of Jeremy +Taylor that can equal the splendour of occasional passages in Donne's +sermons, when the lava-like flow of his heated reasoning seems +suddenly to burst and flower in such a splendid incandescence of +mystical rapture as this:-- + + 'Death and life are in the power of the tongue, says Solomon, + in another sense: and in this sense too, If my tongue, + suggested by my heart, and by my heart rooted in faith, can + say, _non moriar, non moriar_: If I can say (and my conscience + do not tell me that I belie mine own state) if I can say, That + the blood of the Saviour runs in my veins, That the breath of + his spirit quickens all my purposes, that all my deaths + have their Resurrection, all my sins their remorses, all my + rebellions their reconciliations, I will hearken no more after + this question as it is intended _de morte naturali_, of a + natural death; I know I must die that death; what care I? nor + _de morte spirituali_, the death of sin, I know I doe, and + shall die so; why despair I? but I will find out another + death, _mortem raptus_, a death of rapture and of extasy, that + death which St. Paul died more than once, the death which St. + Gregory speaks of, _divina contemplatio quoddam sepulchrum + animae_, the contemplation of God and heaven is a kind of + burial and sepulchre and rest of the soul; and in this death + of rapture and extasy, in this death of the Contemplation of + my interest in my Saviour, I shall find myself and all my + sins enterred, and entombed in his wounds, and like a Lily in + Paradise, out of red earth, I shall see my soul rise out of + his blade, in a candor, and in an innocence, contracted there, + acceptable in the sight of his Father.' + +This is the highest level that Donne ever reached in eloquence +inspired by the vision of the joy and not the terror of the Christian +faith, higher than anything in the _Second Anniversary_, but in his +last hymns hope and confidence find a simpler and a tenderer note. The +noble hymn, 'In what torn ship so ever I embark,' is in somewhat +the same anguished tone as the _Holy Sonnets_; but the highly +characteristic + + Since I am coming to that Holy roome, + Where with thy Quire of Saints for evermore, + I shall be made thy Musique; + +and the _Hymn to God the Father_, speak of final faith and hope in +tones which recall--recall also by their sea-coloured imagery, and +by their rhythm--the lines in which another sensitive and tormented +poet-soul contemplated the last voyage: + + I have a sinne of feare, that when I have spunne + My last thred, I shall perish on the shore; + Swear by thy self that at my death thy sunne + Shall shine as he shines now and heretofore: + And having done that, Thou hast done, + I feare no more. + +Beside the passion of these lines even Tennyson's grow a little pale: + + Twilight and evening bell + And after that the dark; + And may there be no sadness of farewell + When I embark: + For though from out our bourne of Time and Place + The flood may bear me far, + I hope to see my Pilot face to face + When I have crost the bar. + +It has not been the aim of the present editor to attempt to pronounce +a final judgement upon Donne. It seems to him idle to compare Donne's +poetry with that of other poets or to endeavour to fix its relative +worth. Its faults are great and manifest; its beauties _sui generis_, +incommunicable and incomparable. My endeavour here has been by +an analysis of some of the different elements in this composite +work--poems composed at different times and in different moods; flung +together at the end so carelessly that youthful extravagances of witty +sensuality and pious aspirations jostle each other cheek by jowl; +and presenting a texture so diverse from that of poetry as we usually +think of it--to show how many are the strands which run through it, +and that one of these is a poetry, not perfect in form, rugged of line +and careless in rhyme, a poetry in which intellect and feeling are +seldom or never perfectly fused in a work that is of imagination all +compact, yet a poetry of an extraordinarily arresting and haunting +quality, passionate, thoughtful, and with a deep melody of its own. + + + + + [Footnote 1: _History of English Poetry_, iii. 154. Mr. + Courthope qualifies this statement somewhat on the next + page: 'From this spirit of cynical lawlessness he was + perhaps reclaimed by genuine love,' &c. But he has, I think, + insufficiently analysed the diverse strains in Donne's + love-poetry.] + + [Footnote 2: Gaspary: _History of Italian Literature_ + (Oelsner's translation), 1904. Consult also Karl Vossler: + _Die philosophischen Grundlagen des 'süssen neuen Stils'_, + Heidelberg, 1904, and _La Poesia giovanile &c. di Guido + Cavalcanti: Studi di Giulio Salvadori_, Roma, 1895.] + + [Footnote 3: Gaspary: _Op. Cit._] + + + * * * * * + + + + +II + +THE TEXT AND CANON OF DONNE'S POEMS + + + + +TEXT + + +Both the text and the canon of Donne's poems present problems which +have never been frankly faced by any of his editors--problems which, +considering the greatness of his reputation in the seventeenth +century, and the very considerable revival of his reputation which +began with Coleridge and De Quincey and has advanced uninterruptedly +since, are of a rather surprising character. An attempt to define and, +as far as may be, to solve these problems will begin most simply with +a brief account of the form in which Donne's poems have come down to +us. + +Three of Donne's poems were printed in his lifetime--the Anniversaries +(i.e. _The Anatomy of the World_ with _A Funerall Elegie_ and _The +Progresse of the Soule_) in 1611 and 1612, with later editions in +1621 and 1625; the _Elegie upon the untimely death of the incomparable +Prince Henry_, in Sylvester's _Lachrymae Lachrymarum_, 1613; and the +lines prefixed to _Coryats Crudities_ in 1611. We know nothing of any +other poem by Donne being printed prior to 1633. It is noteworthy, +as Mr. Gosse has pointed out, that none of the _Miscellanies_ which +appeared towards the end of the sixteenth century, as _Englands +Parnassus_[1] (1600), or at the beginning of the seventeenth century, +as Davison's _Poetical Rhapsody_,[2] contained poems by Donne. The +first of these is a collection of witty and elegant passages from +different authors on various general themes (Dissimulation, Faith, +Learning, &c.) and is just the kind of book for which Donne's poems +would have been made abundant use of at a somewhat later period. +There are in our libraries manuscript collections of 'Donne's choicest +conceits', and extracts long or short from his poems, dating from the +second quarter of the seventeenth century.[3] The editor of the second +of the anthologies mentioned, Francis Davison, became later much +interested in Donne's poems. In notes which he made at some date after +1608, we find him inquiring for 'Satyres, Elegies, Epigrams etc., by +John Don', and querying whether they might be obtained 'from Eleaz. +Hodgson and Ben Johnson'. Among the books again which he has lent to +his brother at a later date are 'John Duns Satyres'. This interest on +the part of Davison in Donne's poems makes it seem to me very unlikely +that if he had known them earlier he would not have included some of +them in his _Rhapsody_, or that if he had done so he would not +have told us. It has been the custom of late to assign to Donne the +authorship of one charming lyric in the _Rhapsody_, 'Absence hear thou +my protestation.' I hope to show elsewhere that this is the work, not +of Donne, but of another young wit of the day, John Hoskins, whose few +extant poems are a not uninteresting link between the manner of Sidney +and the Elizabethans and of Donne and the 'Metaphysicals'. + +The first collected edition of Donne's poems was issued in 1633, two +years after his death. This is a small quarto, the title-page of which +is here reproduced. + + + + + POEMS, + + _By_ J. D. + + WITH + + ELEGIES + + ON THE AUTHORS + + DEATH. + + + LONDON. + + Printed by _M. F._ for IOHN MARRIOT, + and are to be sold at his shop in S^t '_Dunstans_ + Church-yard in _Fleet-street_. 1633. + + +The first eight pages (Sheet A) are numbered, and contain (1) _The +Printer to the Understanders_,[4] (2) the _Hexastichon Bibliopolae_, +(3) the dedication of, and introductory epistle to, _The Progresse of +the Soule_, with which poem the volume opens. The poems themselves, +with some prose letters and the _Elegies upon the Author_, fill pages +1-406. The numbers on some of the pages are misprinted. The order of +the poems is generally chaotic, but in batches the poems follow the +order preserved in the later editions. Of the significance of this, +and of the source and character of this edition, I shall speak later. +As regards text and canon it is the most trustworthy of all the old +editions. The publisher, John Marriot, was a well-known bookseller +at the sign of the Flower de Luce, and issued the poems of Breton, +Drayton, Massinger, Quarles, and Wither. The printer was probably +Miles Fletcher, or Flesher, a printer of considerable importance +in Little Britain from 1611 to 1664. It would almost seem, from +the heading of the introductory letter, that the printer was more +responsible for the issue than the bookseller Marriot, and it is +perhaps noteworthy that when in 1650 the younger Donne succeeded in +getting the publication of the poems into his own hand, John Marriot's +name remained on the title-page (1650) as publisher, but the printer's +initials disappeared, and his prefatory letter made way for a +dedication by the younger Donne. (See page 4.) It should be added that +copies of the 1633 edition differ considerably from one another. In +some a portrait has been inserted. Occasionally _The Printer to the +Understanders_ is omitted, the _Infinitati Sacrum &c._ following +immediately on the title-page. In some poems, notably _The Progresse +of the Soule_, and certain of the _Letters_ to noble ladies, the text +underwent considerable alteration as the volume passed through the +press. Some copies are more correct than others. A few of the errors +of the 1635 edition are traceable to the use by the printer of a +comparatively imperfect copy of the 1633 edition. + + + POEMS, + + _By_ J. D. + + WITH + + ELEGIES + + ON + + THE AUTHORS + + DEATH. + + + _LONDON_ + + Printed by _M. F._ for JOHN MARRIOT, + and are to be sold at his Shop in S^t _Dunstans_ + Church-yard in _Fleet-street_. + + 1635. + + +The _Poems by J. D. with Elegies on the Authors Death_ were reprinted +by M. F. for John Harriot in 1635 (the title-page is here reproduced), +but with very considerable alterations. The introductory material +remained unchanged except that to the _Hexastichon Bibliopolae_ was +added a _Hexastichon ad Bibliopolam. Incerti_. (See p. 3.) To the +title-page was prefixed a portrait in an oval frame. Outside the frame +is engraved, to the left top, ANNO DNI. 1591. ÆTATIS SVÆ. 18.; to +the right top, on a band ending in a coat of arms, ANTES MVERTO +QUE MVDADO. Underneath the engraved portrait and background is the +following poem: + + _This was for youth, Strength, Mirth, and wit that Time + Most count their golden Age; but t'was not thine. + Thine was thy later yeares, so much refind + From youths Drosse, Mirth, & wit; as thy pure mind + Thought (like the Angels) nothing but the Praise + Of thy Creator, in those last, best Dayes. + Witnes this Booke, (thy Embleme) which begins + With Love; but endes, with Sighes, & Teares for sins._ + IZ: WA: + + _Will: Marshall sculpsit_.[5] + +_The Printer to the Understanders_ is still followed immediately by +the dedication, _Infinitati Sacrum_, of _The Progresse of the Soule_, +although the poem itself is removed to another part of the volume. The +printer noticed this mistake, and at the end of the _Elegies upon the +Author_ adds this note: + + _Errata_.[6] + + _Cvrteous Reader, know, that that Epistle intituled, Infinitati + Sacrum, 16. of August, 1601. which is printed in the + beginning of the Booke, is misplaced; it should have beene + printed before the Progresse of the Soule, in Page 301. + before which it was written by the Author; if any other in the + Impression doe fall out, which I know not of, hold me excused + for I have endeavoured thy satisfaction._ + + Thine, I. M. + + +The closing lines of Walton's poem show that it must have been written +for this edition, as they refer to what is the chief feature in the +new issue of the poems (pp. 1-388, including some prose letters in +Latin and English, pp. 275-300, but not including the _Elegies upon +the Author_ which in this edition and those of 1639, 1649, 1650, +and 1654 are added in unnumbered pages). This new feature is their +arrangement in a series of groups:[7]-- + + Songs and Sonets. + Epigrams. + Elegies. + Epithalamions, _or_, Marriage Songs. + Satyres. + Letters to Severall Personages. + Funerall Elegies, (including _An Anatomie of the + World_ with _A Funerall Elegie_, _Of the Progresse of + the Soule_, and _Epicedes and Obsequies upon the + deaths of sundry Personages_.) + (Letters in Prose).[8] + The Progresse of the Soule. + Divine Poems. + +While the poems were thus rearranged, the canon also underwent some +alteration. One poem, viz. Basse's _Epitaph on Shakespeare_ ('Renowned +Chaucer lie a thought more nigh To rare Beaumont'), which had found +its way into _1633_, was dropped; but quite a number were added, +twenty-eight, or twenty-nine if the epitaph _On Himselfe_ be reckoned +(as it appears) twice. Professor Norton, in the bibliographical note +in the Grolier Club edition (which I occasionally call Grolier for +convenience), has inadvertently given the _Elegie on the L. C._ as one +of the poems first printed in _1635_. This is an error. The poem was +included in _1633_ as the sixth in a group of _Elegies_, the rest of +which are love poems. The editor of _1635_ merely transferred it to +its proper place among the _Funerall Elegies_, just as modern editors +have transferred the _Elegie on his Mistris_ ('By our first strange +and fatall interview') from the funeral to the love _Elegies_. + +The authenticity of the poems added in _1635_ will be fully discussed +later. The conclusion of the present editor is that of the English +poems fifteen are certainly Donne's; three or four are probably or +possibly his; the remaining eleven are pretty certainly _not_ by +Donne. There is no reason to think that _1635_ is in any way a more +authoritative edition than _1633_. It has fewer signs of competent +editing of the text, and it begins the process of sweeping in poems +from every quarter, which was continued by Waldron, Simeon, and +Grosart. + +The third edition of Donne's poems appeared in 1639. This is identical +in form, contents, and paging with that of 1635. The dedication and +introduction to _The Progresse of the Soule_ are removed to their +right place and the _Errata_ dropped, and there are a considerable +number of minor alterations of the text. + + + + + POEMS, + + _By_ J. D. + + VVITH + + ELEGIES + + ON + + THE AUTHORS + + DEATH. + + [Illustration] + + + _LONDON_, + + Printed by _M. F._ for JOHN MARRIOT, + and are to be sold at his Shop in S^t _Dunstans_ + Church-yard in _Fleet-street_. + + 1639. + + +In the issuing of all these editions of Donne's poems, the younger +Donne, who seems to have claimed the right to benefit by his father's +literary remains, had apparently no part.[9] What assistance, if +any, the printer and publisher had from others of Donne's friends and +executors it is impossible now to say, though one can hardly imagine +that without some assistance they could have got access to so many +poems or been allowed to publish the elegies on his death, some of +which refer to the publication of the poems.[10] Walton, as we have +seen, wrote verses to be prefixed to the second edition. At any +rate in 1637 the younger John Donne made an effort to arrest the +unauthorized issue of his father's works. Dr. Grosart first printed +in his edition of the poems (_Fuller Worthies' Library_, 1873, ii, +p. lii) the following petition and response preserved in the Record +Office: + + To y^e most Reverende Father in God + William Lorde Arch-Bisshop of + Canterburie Primate, and + Metropolitan of all Eng- + lande his Grace. + + The humble petition of John Donne, Clercke. Doth show unto + your Grace that since y^e death of his Father (latly Deane of + Pauls) there hath bene manie scandalous Pamflets printed, and + published, under his name, which were none of his, by severall + Boocksellers, withoute anie leave or Autoritie; in particuler + one entitoled Juvenilia, printed for Henry Seale; another + by John Marriott and William Sheares, entitoled Ignatius his + Conclave, as allsoe certaine Poems by y^e sayde John Marriote, + of which abuses thay have bene often warned by your Pe^tr + and tolde that if thay desisted not, thay should be proceeded + against beefore your Grace, which thay seeme soe much + to slight, that thay profess soddainly to publish new + impressions, verie much to the greife of your Pe^tr and the + discredite of y^e memorie of his Father. + + Wherefore your Pe^tr doth beeseece your Grace that you + would bee pleased by your Commaunde, to stopp their farther + proceedinge herein, and to cale the forenamed boocksellers + beefore you, to giue an account, for what thay haue allreadie + done; and your Pe^tr shall pray, &c. + + I require y^e Partyes whom this Pe^t concernes, not to meddle + any farther w^th y^e Printing or Selling of any y^e pretended + workes of y^e late Deane of St. Paules, saue onely such as + shall be licensed by publicke authority, and approued by the + Peticon^r, as they will answere y^e contrary at theyr perill. + And of this I desire Mr. Deane of y^e Arches to take care. + + Dec: 16, 1637. W. Cant. + +Despite this injunction the edition of 1639 was issued, as the +previous ones had been, by Marriot and M. F. It was not till ten years +later that the younger Donne succeeded in establishing his claim. In +1649 Marriot prepared a new edition, printed as before by M. F. The +introductory matter remained unchanged except that the printing being +more condensed it occupies three pages instead of five; the use of +Roman and Italic type is exactly reversed; and there are some slight +changes of spelling. The printing of the poems is also more condensed, +so that they occupy pp. 1-368 instead of 1-388 in _1635-39_. The text +underwent some generally unimportant alteration or corruption, and two +poems were added, the lines _Upon Mr. Thomas Coryats Crudities_ (p. +172. It had been printed with _Coryats Crudities_ in 1611) and the +short poem called _Sonnet. The Token_ (p. 72). + +Only a very few copies of this edition were issued. W. C. Hazlitt +describes one in his _Bibliographical Collections, &c._, _Second +Series_ (1882), p. 181. The only copy of whose existence I am aware is +in the Library of Harvard College. It was used by Professor Norton in +preparing the Grolier Club edition, and I owe my knowledge of it +to this and to a careful description made for me by Miss Mary H. +Buckingham. The title-page is here reproduced. + + + + + POEMS, + + _By_ J. D. + + WITH + + ELEGIES + + ON + + THE AUTHORS + + DEATH. + + + [Illustration] + + + _LONDON_ + + Printed by _M. F._ for JOHN MARRIOT, + and are to be sold at his shop in S^t _Dunstans_ + Church-yard in _Fleet-Street_. + + 1649. + + +What happened seems to have been this. The younger Donne intervened +before the edition was issued, and either by authority or agreement +took it over. Marriot remained the publisher. The title-page which in +_1649_ was identical with that of _1635-39_, except for the change of +date and the 'W' in 'WITH', now appeared as follows: + + + + + POEMS, + + _By_ J. D. + + WITH + + ELEGIES + + ON THE + + AUTHORS DEATH. + + TO WHICH + + _Is added divers Copies under his own hand + never before in print._ + + + _LONDON_, + + Printed for _John Marriot_, and are + to be sold by _Richard Marriot_ at his shop + by _Chancery_ lane end over against the Inner + Temple gate. 1650. + + +The initials of the printer, M. F., disappear, and the name of John +Marriot's son, partner, and successor, Richard, appears along with his +own. There is no great distance between St. Dunstan's Churchyard and +the end of Chancery Lane. With M. F. went the introductory _Printer +to the Understanders_, its place being taken by a dedicatory letter +in young Donne's most courtly style to William, Lord Craven, Baron of +Hamsted-Marsham. + +In the body of the volume as prepared in 1649 no alteration was made. +The 'divers Copies ... never before in print', of which the new editor +boasts, were inserted in a couple of sheets (or a sheet and a half, +aa, bb incomplete) at the end. These are variously bound up in +different copies, being sometimes before, sometimes at the end of +the _Elegies upon the Author_, sometimes before and among them. They +contain a quite miscellaneous assortment of writings, verse and +prose, Latin and English, by, or presumably by, Donne, with a few +complimentary verses on Donne taken from Jonson's _Epigrams_. + +The text of Donne's own writings is carelessly printed. In short, +Donne's son did nothing to fix either the text or the canon of his +father's poems. The former, as it stands in the body of the volume +in the editions of 1650-54, he took over from Marriot and M. F. As +regards the latter, he speaks of the 'kindnesse of the Printer, ... +adding something too much, lest any spark of this sacred fire might +perish undiscerned'; but he does not condescend to tell us, if he +knew, what these unauthentic poems are. He withdrew nothing. + +In 1654 the poems were published once more, but printed from the same +types as in 1650. The text of the poems (pp. 1-368) is identical in +_1649_, _1650_, _1654_; of the additional matter (pp. 369-392) in +_1650_, _1654_. The only change made in the last is on the title-page, +where a new publisher's name appears,[11] as in the following +facsimile: + + + + + POEMS, + + _By_ J. D. + + WITH + + ELEGIES + + ON THE + + AUTHORS DEATH. + + TO WHICH + + _Is added divers Copies under his own hand + never before in Print._ + + + _LONDON_, + + Printed by _J. Flesher_, and are to be sold + by _John Sweeting_ at the Angel in + Popeshead-Alley. 1654. + + +James Flesher was the son of Miles Flesher, or Fletcher, who is +probably the M. F. of the earlier editions. John Sweeting was an +active bookseller and publisher, first at the Crown in Cornhill, and +subsequently at the Angel as above (1639-1661). He was the publisher +of many plays and poems, and in 1657 the publication of Donne's +_Letters to Severall Persons of Honour_ was transferred to him from +Richard Marriot, who issued them in 1651. + + + + + POEMS, &c. + + BY + + JOHN DONNE, + + _late Dean of St._ Pauls. + + WITH + + ELEGIES + + ON THE + + AUTHORS DEATH. + + To which is added + + _Divers Copies under his own hand_, + + +Never before Printed.+ + + + _In the SAVOY_, + + Printed by _T. N._ for _Henry Herringman_, at the sign of + the _Anchor_, in the lower-walk of the + _New-Exchange._ 1669. + + +The last edition of Donne's poems which bears evidence of recourse +to manuscript sources, and which enlarged the canon of the poems, was +that of 1669. The younger Donne died in 1662, and this edition was +purely a printer's venture. Its title-page runs as opposite. + +This edition added two elegies which a sense of propriety had hitherto +excluded from Donne's printed works, though they are in almost all +the manuscript collections, and a satire which most of the manuscripts +assign not to Donne but to Sir John Roe. The introductory material +remains as in _1650-54_ and unpaged; but the _Elegies to the Author_ +are now paged, and the poems with the prose letters inserted in _1633_ +and added to in _1635_ (see above, p. lxiii, note 8), the _Elegies to +the Author_, and the additional sheets inserted in _1650_, occupy pp. +1-414. The love _Elegies_ were numbered as in earlier editions, but +the titles which some had borne were all dropped. _Elegie XIIII_ (XII +in this edition) was enlarged. Two new Elegies were added, one (_Loves +Progress_) as _Elegie XVIII_, the second (_Going to Bed_) unnumbered +and simply headed _To his Mistress going to bed_. The text of the +poems underwent considerable alteration, some of the changes showing +a reversion to the text of _1633_, others a reference to manuscript +sources, many editorial conjecture. + +The edition of 1669 is the last edition of Donne's poems which can +be regarded as in any degree an authority for the text of the poems, +because it is the last which affords evidence of access to independent +manuscript sources. All subsequent editions, till we come to those of +Grosart and Chambers, were based on these. If the editor preferred one +reading to another it was on purely internal evidence, a result of +his own decision as to which was the more correct or the preferable +reading. In 1719, for example, a new edition was brought out by the +well-known publisher Jacob Tonson. The title-page runs as over. + + + + + POEMS + + ON SEVERAL + + OCCASIONS. + + Written by the Reverend + + _JOHN DONNE_, D.D. + + Late Dean of St. PAUL'S. + + WITH + + ELEGIES on the Author's Death. + + To this Edition is added, + + Some ACCOUNT of the LIFE + of the AUTHOR. + + + _LONDON_: + + Printed for J. TONSON, and Sold by + W. TAYLOR at the _Ship_ in + _Pater-noster-Row_. 1719. + + +This edition opens with the Epistle Dedicatory as in _1650-69_, +which is followed by an abridgement of Walton's _Life_ of Donne. An +examination of the text of the poems shows clearly that this +edition was printed from that of 1669, but is by no means a slavish +reproduction. The editor has consulted earlier editions and corrected +mistakes, but I have found no evidence either that he knew the +editions of 1633 and 1635, or had access to manuscript collections. He +very wisely dropped the Satire 'Sleep next Society', inserted for the +first time by the editor of _1669_, and certainly not by Donne. It was +reinserted by Chalmers in 1810.[12] + +These, then, are the early editions of Donne's poems. But the printed +editions are not the only form in which the poems, or the great +majority of the poems, have come down to us. None of these editions, +we have seen, was issued before the poet's death. None, so far as +we can discover (I shall discuss this point more fully later), was +printed from sources carefully prepared for the press by the author, +as were for example the _LXXX Sermons_ issued in 1640. But Donne's +poems were well known to many readers before 1633. One of the earliest +published references to them occurs in 1614, in a collection of +Epigrams by Thomas Freeman, called _Runne_ | _And a great Cast_ | +_The_ | _Second Book_. + + + Epigram 84. + + To Iohn Dunne. + + The _Storme_ describ'd hath set thy name afloate, + Thy _Calme_ a gale of famous winde hath got: + Thy _Satyres_ short, too soone we them o'relooke, + I prethee Persius write a bigger booke. + +In 1616 Ben Jonson's _Epigrammes_ were published in the first (folio) +edition of his works, and they contain the Epigram, printed in this +edition, _To Lucy, Countesse of Bedford, with Mr. Donnes Satyres_. In +these and similar cases the 'bookes' referred to are not printed but +manuscript works. Mr. Chambers has pointed out (_Poems of John Donne_, +i, pp. xxxviii-ix) an interesting reference in Drayton's _Epistle to +Reynolds_ to poems circulating thus 'by transcription'; and Anthony +Wood speaks of Hoskins having left a 'book of poems neatly written'. +In Donne's own letters we find references to his poems, his paradoxes +and problems, and even a long treatise like the [Greek: BIATHANATOS], +being sent to his friends with injunctions of secrecy, and in the case +of the last with an express statement that it had not been, and was +not to be, printed. Sometimes the manuscript collection seems to have +been made by Donne himself, or on his instruction, for a special +friend and patron like Lord Ancrum; but after he had become a +distinguished Churchman who, as Jonson told Drummond, 'repenteth +highlie and seeketh to destroy all his poems,' it was his friends and +admirers who collected and copied them. An instructive reference to +the interest awakened in Donne's early poems by his fame as a preacher +comes to us from Holland. Constantine Huyghens, the Dutch poet, and +father of the more famous scientist, Christian, was a member of the +Dutch embassy in 1618, 1621-23, and again in 1624. He moved in the +best circles, and made the acquaintance of Donne ('great preacher and +great conversationalist', he calls him) at the house probably of Sir +Robert Killigrew. Writing to his friend and fellow-poet Hooft, in +1630, he says:[13] + + 'I think I have often entertained you with reminiscences of + Dr. Donne, now Dean of St. Pauls in London, and on account + of this remunerative post (such is the custom of the English) + held in high esteem, in still higher for the wealth of his + unequalled wit, and yet more incomparable eloquence in the + pulpit. Educated early at Court in the service of the great; + experienced in the ways of the world; sharpened by study; in + poetry, he is more famous than anyone. Many rich fruits from + the green branches of his wit[14] have lain mellowing among + the lovers of art, which now, when _nearly rotten with age_, + they _are distributing_. Into my hands have fallen, by the + help of my special friends among the gentlemen of that nation, + some five and twenty of the best sort of medlars. Among + our people, I cannot select anyone to whom they ought to be + communicated sooner than to you,[15] as this poets manner of + conceit and expression are exactly yours, Sir.' + +This is a very interesting piece of evidence as to the manner in which +Donne's poems had been preserved by his friends, and the form in which +they were being distributed. There is no reference to publication. It +is doubtless due to this activity in collecting and transcribing the +poems of the now famous preacher that we owe the number of manuscript +collections dating from the years before and immediately after 1630. + +Had Donne undertaken the publication of his own poems, such of these +manuscript collections as have been preserved--none of which +are autograph, and few or none of which have a now traceable +history--would have little importance for a modern editor. The most +that they could do would be to show us occasionally what changes a +poem had undergone between its earliest and its latest appearance. +But Donne's poems were not published in this way, and the manuscripts +cannot be ignored. They must have for his editor at least the +same interest and importance as the Quartos have for the editor +of Shakespeare. Whatever opinion he may hold, on _a priori_ or _a +posteriori_ grounds, regarding the superior authority of the First +Folio of Shakespeare's plays, no editor, not 'thirled to' a theory, +will deny that a right reading has been preserved for us often by the +Quartos and the Quartos only. No wise man will neglect the assistance +even of the more imperfect of them. Before therefore discussing the +relative value of the different editions, and the use that may be made +of the manuscripts, it will be well to give a short description of the +manuscripts which the present editor has consulted and used, of their +relation to one another, their comparative value, and the relation of +_some_ of them to the editions. It is, of course, possible that there +are manuscripts of Donne's poems which have not yet come to light; and +among them may be some more correctly transcribed than any which +has come into the present editor's hands. He has, however, examined +between twenty and thirty, and with the feeling recently of moving +in a circle--that new manuscripts were in part or whole duplicates of +those which had been already examined, and confirmed readings already +noted but did not suggest anything fresh. + +I will divide the manuscripts into four classes, of which the first +two, it will be seen at a glance, are likely to be the most important +for the textual critic. + +(1) Manuscript collections of portions of Donne's poems, e.g. the +_Satyres_. The 'booke' to which Freeman refers in the epigram quoted +above was probably a small collection of this kind, and we have seen +that Jonson sent the _Satyres_ to Lady Bedford, and Francis Davison +lent them to his brother. Of such collections I have examined the +following: + + +_Q._ This is a small quarto manuscript, bound up with a number of +other manuscripts, in a volume (MS. 216) in the library of Queen's +College, Oxford. It is headed _Mr. John Dunnes Satires_, and contains +the five Satires (which alone I have accepted as Donne's own) followed +by _A Storme_, _A Calme_, and one song, _The Curse_ (see p. 41), here +headed _Dirae_. As Mr. Chambers says (_Poems of John Donne_, i, p. +xxxvi), this is probably just the kind of 'booke' which Freeman read. +The poems it contains are probably those of Donne's poems which were +first known outside the circle of his intimate friends. + +What seems to be a duplicate of _Q_ is preserved among the Dyce MSS. +in the South Kensington Museum. This contains the five _Satyres_, and +the _Storme_ and _Calme_. The MSS. are evidently transcribed from the +same source, but one is not a copy of the other. They agree in such +exceptional readings as e.g. _Satyres_, I. 58 'Infanta of London'; 94 +'goes in the way' &c.; II. 86 'In wringing each acre'; 88 'Assurances +as bigge as glossie civill lawes'. The last suggests that the one is +a copy of the other, but again they diverge in such cases as III. 49 +'Crants' _Dyce MS._; 'Crates' _Q_; and IV. 215-16 'a Topclief would +have ravisht him quite away' _Q_, where the _Dyce MS._ preserves the +normal 'a Pursevant would have ravisht him quite away'. + +If manuscripts like _Q_ and the _Dyce MS._ carry us back, as they seem +to do, to the form in which the _Satyres_ circulated before any of the +later collections of Donne's poems were made (between 1620 and 1630), +they are clearly of great importance for the editor. The text of the +_Satyres_ in _1633_ and the later editions, which closely resembles +that of one of the later MS. collections, presents many variants from +the older tradition. It is a difficult matter to decide how far these +may be the corrections of the author himself, or of the collector and +editor. + + +_W._ This, the Westmoreland MS., belonging to Mr. Edmund Gosse, is +one of the most interesting and valuable manuscripts of Donne's poems +which have come down to us. It is bound in its original vellum, and +was written, Mr. Warner, late Egerton Librarian, British Museum, +conjectured from the handwriting, 'a little later than 1625'. This +date agrees with what one would gather from the contents, for the +manuscript contains sonnets which must have been written after 1617, +but does not contain any of the hymns written just at the close of +Donne's life. + +_W_ is a much larger 'book' than _Q_. It begins with the five +_Satyres_, as that does. Leaving one page blank, it then continues +with a collection of the _Elegies_ numbered, thirteen in all, of which +twelve are Love Elegies, and one, the last, a Funeral Elegy, 'Sorrow +who to this house.'[16] These are followed by an _Epithalamion_ (that +generally called 'made at Lincolns Inn') and a number of verse letters +to different friends, some of which are not contained in any of the +old editions. So many of them are addressed to Rowland Woodward, or +members of his family, that Mr. Gosse conjectures that the manuscript +was prepared for him, but this cannot be proved.[17] The letters are +followed by the _Holy Sonnets_, these by _La Corona_, and the book +closes (as many collections of the poems do) with a bundle of prose +_Paradoxes_, followed in this case by the _Epigrams_. Both the _Holy +Sonnets_ and the _Epigrams_ contain poems not printed in any of the +old editions. + +It should be noted that though _W_ as a whole may have been +transcribed as late as 1625, it clearly goes back in portions to an +earlier date. The letters are headed e.g. To Mr. H. W., To Mr. C. +B., &c. Now the custom in manuscripts and editions is to bring these +headings up to date, changing 'To Mr. H. W.' into 'To S^r Henry +Wotton'. That they bear headings which were correct at the date when +the poems were written points to their fairly direct descent from the +original copies. + +If _Q_ probably represents the kind of manuscript which circulated +pretty widely, _W_ is a good representative of the kind which +circulated only among Donne's friends. Some of the poems escaped being +transcribed into larger collections and were not published till our +own day. The value of _W_ for the text of Donne's poems must stand +high. For some of the letters and religious poems it is our sole +authority. Though a unique manuscript now, it was probably not so +always, for Addl. MS. 23229 in the British Museum contains a single +folio which must have been torn from a manuscript identical with _W_. +The handwriting is slightly different, but the order of the poems and +their text prove the identity. + + +_A23._ This same manuscript (Addl. MS. 23229), which is a very +miscellaneous collection of fragments, presented to the Museum by John +Wilson Croker, contains two other portions of what seem to have been +similar small 'books' of Donne's poems. The one is a fragment of what +seems to have been a carefully written copy of the _Epithalamion_, +with introductory _Eclogue_, written for the marriage of the Earl of +Somerset. Probably it was one of those prepared and circulated at +the time. The other consists of some leaves from a collection of the +_Satyres_ finely written on large quarto sheets. + + +_G._ This is a manuscript containing only the _Metempsychosis_, or +_Progresse of the Soule_, now in the possession of Mr. Gosse, who +(_Life &c. of John Donne_, i. 141) states that it 'belonged to a +certain Bradon, and passed into the Phillipps Collection'. It is not +without errors, but its text is, on the whole, more correct than that +of the manuscript source from which the version of 1633 was set up in +the first instance. + + +(2) In the second class I place manuscripts which are, or aim at +being, complete collections of Donne's poems. Most of these belong to +the years between 1620 and 1633. They vary considerably in accuracy of +text, and in the care which has been taken to include only poems that +are authentic. They were made probably by professional copyists, +and some of those whose calligraphy is most attractive show that the +scribe must have paid the smallest attention to the meaning of what he +was writing. + +Of those which I have examined, two groups of manuscripts seem to me +especially noteworthy, because both show that their collectors had a +clear idea of what were, and what were not, Donne's poems, and because +of the general accuracy with which the poems in one of them are +transcribed. Taken with the edition of 1633 they form an invaluable +starting-point for the determination of the canon of Donne's poems. + +The first of these is represented by three manuscripts which I +have examined, _D_ (Dowden), _H49_ (Harleian MS. 4955), and _Lec_ +(Leconfield). + + +_D_ is a small quarto manuscript, neatly written in a thin, clear hand +and in ordinary script. It was formerly in the Haslewood collection, +and is now in the possession of Professor Edward Dowden, Trinity +College, Dublin, by whose kindness I have had it by me almost all the +time that I have been at work on my edition. + + +_H49_ is a collection of Donne's poems, in the British Museum, bound +up with some by Ben Jonson and others. It is a large folio written +throughout apparently in the same hand. It opens with some poems and +masques by Jonson. A certain Doctor Andrewes' poems occupy folios +57-87. They are signed _Franc: Andrilla. London August 14. 1629_. +Donne's poems follow, filling folios 88 to 144_b_. Thereafter follow +more poems by Andrewes, Jonson, and others, with some prose letters by +Jonson. + + +_Lec._ This is a large quarto manuscript, beautifully transcribed, +belonging to Lord Leconfield and preserved at Petworth House. Many of +the manuscripts in this collection were the property of Henry, ninth +Earl of Northumberland (1564-1632), the friend who communicated the +news of Donne's marriage to his father-in-law. + + +These three manuscripts are obviously derived from one common source. +They contain the same poems, except that _D_ has one more than _H49_, +and both of these have some which are not in _Lec_. The order of the +poems is the same, except that _D_ and _Lec_ show more signs of +an attempt to group the poems than _H49_. The text, with some +divergences, especially on the part of _Lec_, is identical. One +instance seems to point to one of them being the source of the others. +In the long _Obsequies to the Ld. Harrington, Brother to the Countess +of Bedford_, the original copyist, after beginning l. 159 'Vertue +whose flood', had inadvertently finished with the second half of l. +161, 'were [_sic_] blowne in, by thy first breath.' This error is +found in all the three manuscripts. It may, however, have come from +the common source of this poem, and there are divergences in order and +text which make me think that they are thus derived from one common +source. + +A special interest attaches to this collection, apart from the +relative excellence of its text and soundness of its canon, from the +probability that a manuscript of this kind was used for a large, and +that textually the best, part of the edition of 1633. This becomes +manifest on a close examination of the order of the poems and of their +text. Mr. Gosse has said, in speaking of the edition of 1633: 'The +poems are thrown together without any attempt at intelligent order; +neither date, nor subject, nor relation is in the least regarded.' +This is not entirely the case. Satires, Elegies, Epigrams, Songs are +grouped to some extent. The disorder which prevails is due to two +causes: (1) to the fact that the printer set up from a variety +of sources. There was no previous collected edition to guide him. +Different friends supplied collections, and of a few poems there were +earlier editions. He seems to have passed from one of these to another +as was most convenient at the moment. Perhaps some were lent him only +for a time. The differences between copies of _1633_ show that it was +prepared carefully, but emended from time to time while the printing +was actually going on. (2) The second source of the order of the poems +is their order in the manuscripts from which they were copied. Now +a comparison of the order in _1633_ with that in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ +reveals a close connexion between them, and throws light on the +composition of _1633_. + +It is necessary, before instituting this comparison with _1633_, to +say a word on the order of the poems in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ themselves, +as it is not quite the same in all three. _H49_ is the most irregular, +perhaps therefore the earliest, each of the others showing efforts +to obtain a better grouping of the poems. All three begin with the +_Satyres_, of which _D_ and _Lec_ have five, _H49_ only four; but +the text of _Lec_ differs from that of the other two, agreeing +more closely with the version of _1633_ and of another group of +manuscripts. They have all, then, thirteen _Elegies_ in the same +order. After these _H49_ continues with a number of letters (_The +Storme_, _The Calme_, _To S^r Henry Wotton_, _To S^r Henry Goodyere_, +_To the Countesse of Bedford_, _To S^r Edward Herbert_, and others) +intermingled with Funeral Elegies (_Lady Markham_, _Mris Boulstred_) +and religious poems (_The Crosse_, _The Annuntiation_, _Good Friday_). +Then follows a long series of lyrical pieces, broken after _The +Funerall_ by _A Letter to the Lady Carey, and Mrs. Essex Rich_, the +_Epithalamion_ on the Palatine marriage, and an _Old Letter_ ('At once +from hence', p. 206). The lyrical pieces are then resumed, and the +collection ends with the Somerset _Eclogue_ and _Epithalamion_, the +_Letanye_, both sets of _Holy Sonnets_, a letter (_To the Countesse of +Salisbury_), and the long _Obsequies to the Ld. Harrington_. + + +_D_ makes an effort to arrange the poems following the _Elegies_ in +groups. The _Funeral Elegies_ come first, and two blank pages are +headed _An Elegye on Prince Henry_. The letters are then brought +together, and are followed by the religious poems dispersed in _H49_. +The lyrical poems follow piece by piece as in _H49_, and the whole +closes with the two epithalamia and the _Obsequies to the Ld. +Harrington_. + +The order in _Lec_ resembles that of _H49_ more closely than that of +_D_. The mixed letters, funeral elegies, and religious poems follow +the _Elegies_ as in _H49_, but _Lec_ adds to them the two letters +(_Lady Carey_ and _The Countess of Salisbury_) and the _Letanie_ which +in _H49_ are dispersed through the lyrical pieces. _Lec_ does not +contain any of the _Holy Sonnets_, but after _The Letanie_ ten pages +are left blank, evidently intended to receive them. Thereafter, the +lyrical poems follow piece by piece as in _D_, _H49_, except that _The +Prohibition_ ('Take heed of loving mee') is omitted--a fact of some +interest when we come to consider _1633_. _Lec_ closes, like _D_, with +the epithalamia and the _Obsequies to the Lo: Harrington_. + +Turning now to _1633_, we shall see that, whatever other sources the +editor of that edition used, one was a collection identical with, or +closely resembling, _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, especially _Lec_. That edition +begins with the _Progresse of the Soule_, which was _not_ derived from +this manuscript. Thereafter follow the two sets of _Holy Sonnets_, the +second set containing exactly the same number of sonnets, and in the +same order, as in _D_, _H49_, whereas other manuscripts, e.g. _B_, +_O'F_, _S_, _S96_, which will be described later, have more sonnets +and in a different order; and _W_, which agrees otherwise with _B_, +_O'F_, _S_, _S96_, adds three that are found nowhere else. The sonnets +are followed in _1633_ by the _Epigrams_, which are not in _D_, _H49_, +_Lec_, but after that the resemblance of _1633_ to _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ +becomes quite striking. These manuscripts, we have seen, begin +with the _Satyres_. The edition, however, passes on at once to the +_Elegies_. Of the thirteen given in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, _1633_ prints +eight, omitting the first (_The Bracelet_), the second (_Going to +Bed_), the tenth (_Loves Warr_), the eleventh (_On his Mistris_), +and the thirteenth (_Loves Progresse_). That the editor, however, +had before him, and intended to print, the _Satyres_ and the thirteen +_Elegies_ as he found them in _his_ copy of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, is +proved by the following extract which Mr. Chambers quotes from the +Stationers' Register: + + 13^o September, 1632 + + John Marriot. Entered for his copy under the hands of Sir + Henry Herbert and both the Wardens, a book + of verse and poems (the five Satires, the first, + second, tenth, eleventh and thirteenth Elegies + being excepted) and these before excepted to + be his, when he brings lawful authority. + vi_d._ + + written by Doctor John Dunn + +This note is intelligible only when compared with this particular +group of manuscripts. In others the order is quite different. + +This bar--which was probably dictated by reasons of propriety, though +it is difficult to see why the first and the eleventh _Elegies_ should +have been singled out--was got over later as far as the _Satyres_ were +concerned. They are printed after all the other poems, just before +the prose letters. But by this time the copy of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ had +perhaps passed out of Marriot's hands, for the text of the _Satyres_ +seems to show that they were printed, not from this manuscript, but +from one represented by another group, which I shall describe later. +This is, however, not quite certain, for in _Lec_ the version of the +_Satyres_ given is not the same as in _D_, _H49_, but is that of this +second group of manuscripts. Several little details show that of +the three manuscripts _D_, _H49_, and _Lec_ the last most closely +resembles _1633_. + +Following the _Elegies_ in _1633_ come a group of letters, epicedes, +and religious poems, just as in _H49_, _Lec_ (_D_ re-groups +them)--_The Storme_, _The Calme_, _To Sir Henry Wotton_, ('Sir, more +than kisses'), _The Crosse_, _Elegie on the Lady Marckham_, _Elegie +on Mris Boulstred_ ('Death I recant'), _To Sr Henry Goodyere_, _To Mr. +Rowland Woodward_, _To Sr Henry Wootton_ ('Here's no more newes'), _To +the Countesse of Bedford_ ('Reason is our Soules left hand'), _To +the Countesse of Bedford_ ('Madam, you have refin'd'), _To Sr Edward +Herbert, at Julyers_. Here _1633_ diverges. Having got into letters +to noble and other people the editor was anxious to continue them, +and accordingly from another source (which I shall discuss later) +he prints a long series of letters to the Countess of Bedford, the +Countess of Huntingdon, Mr. T. W., and other more intimate friends +(they are 'thou', the Countesses 'you'), and Mrs. Herbert. He perhaps +returns to _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ in those to _The Lady Carey and Mrs. +Essex Riche, from Amyens_, and _To the Countesse of Salisbury_; and, +as in that manuscript, the Palatine and Essex epithalamia (to which, +however, _1633_ adds that written at Lincoln's Inn) are followed +immediately by the long _Obsequies to Lord Harrington_. Three odd +_Elegies_ follow, two of which (_The Autumnall_ and _The Picture_, +'Image of her') occur in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ in the same detached +fashion. Other manuscripts include them among the numbered _Elegies_. +_The Elegie on Prince Henry_, _Psalme 137_ (probably not by Donne), +_Resurrection, imperfect_, _An hymne to the Saints, and to Marquesse +Hamilton_, _An Epitaph upon Shakespeare_ (certainly not by Donne), +_Sapho to Philaenis_, follow in _1633_--a queerly consorted lot. The +_Elegie on Prince Henry_ is taken from the _Lachrymae Lachrymarum_ of +Joshua Sylvester (1612); the rest were possibly taken from some small +commonplace-book. This would account for the doubtful poems, the only +doubtful poems in _1633_. These past, the close connexion with our +manuscript is resumed. _The Annuntiation_ is followed, as in _H49_, +_Lec_, by _The Litanie_. Thereafter the lyrical pieces begin, as in +these manuscripts, with the song, 'Send home my long strayd eyes +to me.' This is followed by two pieces which are not in _D_, _H49_, +_Lec_,--the impressive, difficult, and in manuscripts comparatively +rare _Nocturnall upon S. Lucies day_, and the much commoner +_Witchcraft by a picture_. Thereafter the poems follow piece by piece +the order in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_[18] until _The Curse_ is reached.[19] +Then, in what seems to have been the editor's or printer's regular +method of proceeding in this edition, he laid aside the manuscript +from which he was printing the _Songs and Sonets_ to take up another +piece of work that had come to hand, viz. _An Anatomie of the World_ +with _A Funerall Elegie_ and _Of the Progresse of the Soule_, which +he prints from the edition of 1625. Without apparent rhyme or reason +these long poems are packed in between _The Curse_ and _The Extasie_. +With the latter poem _1633_ resumes the songs and (with the exception +of _The Undertaking_) follows the order in _Lec_ to _The Dampe_, with +which the series in the manuscripts closes. It has been noted that in +_Lec_, _The Prohibition_ (which in _D_, _H49_ follows _Breake of day_ +and precedes _The Anniversarie_) is omitted. This must have been the +case in the manuscript used for _1633_, for it is omitted at this +place and though printed later was probably not derived from this +source. + +With _The Dampe_ the manuscript which I am supposing the editor to +have followed in the main probably came to an end. The poems which +follow in _1633_ are of a miscellaneous character and strangely +conjoined. _The Dissolution_ (p. 64), _A Ieat Ring sent_ (p. 65), +_Negative Love_ (p. 66), _The Prohibition_ (p. 67), _The Expiration_ +(p. 68), _The Computation_ (p. 69), complete the tale of lyrics. A few +odd elegies follow ('Language thou art,' 'You that are she,' 'To +make the doubt clear') with _The Paradox_. _A Hymne to Christ, at the +Authors last going into Germany_ is given a page to itself, and is +followed by _The Lamentations of Jeremy_, _The Satyres_, and _A Hymne +to God the Father_. Thereafter come the prose letters and the _Elegies +upon the Author_. + +What this comparison of the order of the poems points to is borne out +by an examination of the text. The critical notes afford the materials +for a further verification, and I need not tabulate the resemblances +at length. In _Elegie IV_, for example, ll. 7, 8, which occur in all +the other manuscripts and editions, are omitted by _1633_ and by +_D_, _H49_, _Lec_. Again, when a song has no title in _1633_ it +has frequently none in the manuscript. When there are evidently two +versions of a poem, as e.g. in _The Good-morrow_ and _The Flea_, the +version given in _1633_ is generally that of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. Later +editions often contaminate this with another version of the poem. At +the same time there are ever and again divergences between the edition +and the manuscript which are not to be ignored, and cannot always be +explained. Some are due to error in one or the other, but some point +either to divergence between the text of the editor's manuscript and +ours, or to the use by the editor of other sources as well as this. +In the fifth elegy (_The Picture_), for example, _1633_ twice seems +to follow, not _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, but another source, another group of +manuscripts which has been preserved; and in _The Aniversarie_ ll. 23, +24, the version of _1633_ is not that of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ but of +the same second group, which will be described later. On the whole, +however, it is clear that a manuscript closely resembling that now +represented by these three manuscripts supplied the editor of _1633_ +with the bulk of the shorter poems, especially the older and more +privately circulated poems, the _Songs and Sonets_ and _Elegies_. When +he is not following this manuscript he draws from miscellaneous and +occasionally inferior sources. + +It would be interesting if we could tell whence this manuscript was +obtained, and whether it was _a priori_ likely to be a good one. On +this point we can only conjecture, but it seems to me a fairly tenable +conjecture (though not to be built on in any way) that the nucleus of +the collection, at any rate, may have been a commonplace-book which +had belonged to Sir Henry Goodyere. The ground for this conjecture is +the inclusion in the edition of some prose letters addressed to this +friend, one in Latin and seven in English. There is indeed also one +addressed to the Countess of Bedford; but in the preceding letter to +Goodyere Donne says, 'I send you, with this, a letter which I sent to +the Countesse. It is not my use nor duty to do so. But for your having +it, there were but two consents, and I am sure you have mine, and you +are sure you have hers.' He goes on to refer to some verses which are +the subject of the letter to the Countesse. There can be no doubt that +the letter printed is the letter sent to Goodyere. The Burley MS. (see +Pearsall-Smith's _Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton_, Oxford, 1907) +gives us a good example of how a gentleman in the seventeenth century +dealt with his correspondence. That contains, besides various letters, +as of Sidney to Queen Elizabeth on the Anjou marriage, and other +matter which recurs in commonplace-books, a number of poems and +letters, sent to Wotton by his friends, including Donne, and +transcribed by one or other of Wotton's secretaries. The letters have +no signatures appended, which is the case with the letters in the +1633 edition of Donne's poems. Wotton and Goodyere did not need to be +reminded of the authors, and perhaps did not wish others to know. The +reason then for the rather odd inclusion of nine prose letters in a +collection of poems is probably, that the principal manuscript used +by the printer was an 'old book'[20] which had belonged to Sir Henry +Goodyere and in which his secretaries had transcribed poems and +letters by Donne. Goodyere's collection of Donne's poems would not +necessarily be exhaustive, but it would be full; it would not like the +collections of others include poems that were none of Donne's; and its +text would be accurate, allowing for the carelessness, indifference, +and misunderstandings of secretaries and copyists. + +After _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, the most carefully made collection of Donne's +poems is one represented now by four distinct manuscripts: + +_A18._ Additional MS. 18646, in the British Museum. + +_N._ The Norton MS. in Harvard College Library, Boston, of which an +account is given by Professor Norton in a note appended to the Grolier +Club edition. + +_TCC._ A manuscript in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge. + +_TCD._ A large manuscript in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin, +containing two apparently quite independent collections of poems--the +first a collection of Donne's poems with one or two additional poems +by Sir John Roe, Francis Beaumont, Sir Thomas Overbury, and Corbet; +the second a quite miscellaneous collection, put together some time in +the thirties of the seventeenth century, and including some of Donne's +poems. It is only the first of these which belongs to the group in +question. + +These four manuscripts are closely connected with one another, but a +still more intimate relation exists between _A18_ and _TCC_ on the +one hand, _N_ and _TCD_ on the other. _N_ and _TCD_ are the larger +collections; _A18_ and _TCC_ contain each a smaller selection from the +same body of poems. Indeed it would seem that _N_ is a copy of _TCD, +A18_ of _TCC_. + + +_TCD_, to start with it, is a beautifully written collection +of Donne's poems beginning with the _Satyres_, passing on to an +irregularly arranged series of elegies, letters, lyrics and epicedes, +and closing with the _Metempsychosis_ or _Progresse of the Soule_ and +the _Divine Poems_, which include the hymns written in the last years +of the poet's life. _N_ has the same poems, arranged in the same +order, and its readings are nearly always identical with those of +_TCD_, so far as I can judge from the collation made for me. The +handwriting, unlike that of _TCD_, is in what is known as secretary +hand and is somewhat difficult to read. What points to the one +manuscript being a copy of the other is that in 'Sweetest Love, I do +not go' the scribe has accidentally dropped stanza 4, by giving its +last line to stanza 3, and passing at once to the fifth stanza. Both +manuscripts make this mistake, whereas _A18_ and _TCC_ contain the +complete poem. In other places _N_ and _TCD_ agree in their readings +where _A18_ and _TCC_ diverge. If the one is a copy of the other, +_TCD_ is probably the more authoritative, as it contains some marginal +indications of authorship which _N_ omits. + + +_TCC_ is a smaller manuscript than _TCD_, but seems to be written +in the same clear, fine hand. It does not contain the _Satyres_, the +Elegy (XI. in this edition) _The Bracelet_, and the epistles _The +Storme_ and _The Calme_, with which _N_ and _TCD_ open. It looks, +however, as though the sheets containing these poems had been torn +out. Besides these, however, _TCC_ omits, without any indication +of their being lost, an _Elegie to the Lady Bedford_ ('You that are +she'), the Palatine Epithalamion, a long series of letters[21] +which in _N_, _TCD_ follow that _To M.M.H._ and precede _Sapho to +Philaenis_, the elegies on Prince Henry and on Lord Harington, and +_The Lamentations of Jeremy_. There are occasional differences in +the grouping of the poems; and _TCC_ does not contain some poems by +Beaumont, Corbet, Sir John Roe, and Sir Thomas Overbury which are +found in _N_ and _TCD_. In _TCD_ these, with the exception of that +by Beaumont, are carefully initialled, and therefore not ascribed to +Donne. In _N_ these initials are in some cases omitted; and some of +the poems have found their way into editions of Donne's poems. + +Presumably _TCC_ is the earlier collection, and when _TCD_ was made, +the copyist was able to add fresh poems. It is clear, however, that +in the case of even those poems which the two have in common, the +one manuscript is not simply a copy of the others. There are several +divergences, and the mistake referred to above, in 'Sweetest Love, I +do not go', is not made in _TCC_. Strangely enough, a similar mistake +is made by _TCC_ in transcribing _Loves Deitie_ and is reproduced in +_A18_. + + +_A18_, indeed, would seem to be a copy of _TCC_. It is not in the same +handwriting, but in secretary hand. It omits the opening _Satyres_, +&c., as does _TCC_, but there is no sign of excision. Presumably, +then, the copy was made after these poems were, if they ever were, +torn out of _TCC_. Wherever _TCC_ diverges from _TCD_, _A18_ follows +_TCC_.[22] + +Whoever was responsible for this collection of Donne's poems, it was +evidently made with care, at least as regards the canon. Very few +poems that are not certainly by Donne are included, and they are +correctly initialled. The only uninitialled doubtful poems are _A +Paradox_, 'Whoso terms Love a fire,' which in all the four manuscripts +follows 'No Lover saith, I love', and Beaumont's letter to the +Countess of Bedford, which begins, 'Soe may my verses pleasing be.' In +_N_, _TCD_ this follows Donne's letter to the same lady, 'You that are +she and you.' It is regrettable that the text of the poems is not +so good as the canon is pure. The punctuation is careless. There are +numerous stupid blunders, and there are evidences of editing in the +interest of more regular metre or a more obvious meaning. At times, +however, it would seem that the copyist is following a different +version of a poem or poems (e.g. the _Satyres_) from that given +in _D_, _H49_, and other manuscripts, and is embodying corrections +perhaps made by the author himself. It is quite credible that Donne, +in sending copies of his poems at different times to different people, +may have revised and amended them. It is quite clear, as my notes will +show, that of certain poems more than one version (each correct in +itself) was in circulation. + +Was _A18_, _N_, _TC_, or a manuscript resembling it one of the sources +of the edition of _1633_? In part, I think, it was. The most probable +case at first sight is that of the _Satyres_. These, we have seen, +Marriot was at first prohibited from printing. Otherwise they would +have followed the _Epigrams_, and immediately preceded the _Elegies_. +As it is, they come after all the other poems; they are edited with +some cautious dashes; and their text is almost identical with that of +_N_, _TCD_. In the first satire the only difference between _1633_ +and _N_, _TCD_ occurs in l. 70, where _N_, _TCD_, with all the other +manuscripts read-- + + Sells for a little state his libertie; + +_1633_, + + Sells for a little state high libertie; + +'high' is either a slip or an editorial emendation. There are other +cases of similar editing, not all of which it is possible to correct +with confidence; but a study of the textual notes will show that in +general _1633_ follows the version preserved in _N_, _TCD_, and also +in _L74_ (of which later), when the rest of the manuscripts present an +interestingly different text. But strangely enough this version of +the _Satyres_ is also in _Lec_. This is the feature in which that +manuscript diverges most strikingly from _D_ and _H49_. Moreover in +some details in which _1633_ differs from _A18_, _N_, _TC_ it agrees +with _Lec_. It is possible therefore that the _Satyres_ were printed +from the same manuscript as the majority of the poems. + +Again in the _Letters_ not found in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ there is a close +but not invariable agreement between the text of _1633_ and that of +this group of manuscripts. Those letters, which follow that _To Sir +Edward Herbert_, are printed in _1633_ in the same order as in +this edition (pp. 195-226), except that the group of short letters +beginning at p. 203 ('All haile sweete Poet') is here amplified and +rearranged from _W_. Now in _A18_, _N_, _TC_ these letters are also +brought together (_N_, _TCD_ adding some which are not in _A18_, +_TCC_), and the special group referred to, of letters to intimate +friends, are arranged in exactly the same order as in _1633_; have the +same headings, the same omissions, and the same accidental linking +of two poems. In the other letters, to the Countesses of Bedford, +Huntingdon, Salisbury, &c., the textual notes will show some striking +resemblances between the edition and the manuscripts. In the difficult +letter, 'T'have written then' (p. 195), _1633_ follows _N_, _TCD_ +where _O'F_ gives a different and in some details more correct text. +In 'This twilight of two yeares' (p. 198) the strange reading of +l. 35, 'a prayer prayes,' is obviously due to _N_, _TCD_, where 'a +praiser prayes' has accidentally but explicably been written 'a prayer +praise'. In the letter _To the Countesse of Huntingdon_ (p. 201) the +_1633_ version of ll. 25, 26 is a correct rendering of what _N_, _TCD_ +give wrongly: + + Shee guilded us, But you are Gold; and shee + Vs inform'd, but transubstantiates you. + +On the other hand there are some differences, as e.g. in the placing +of ll. 40-2 in 'Honour is so sublime' (p. 218), which make it +impossible to affirm that these poems were taken direct from +this group of manuscripts as we know them, without alteration or +emendation. The _Progresse of the Soule_ or _Metempsychosis_, as +printed in _1633_, must have been taken in the first instance from +this manuscript. In both the manuscripts and the edition, at l. 83 of +the poem a blank space is left after 'did'; in both, l. 137 reads, +'To see the Prince, and soe fill'd the waye'; in both, 'kinde' is +substituted for 'kindle' at l. 150; in l. 180 the 'uncloth'd child' of +1633 is explicable as an emendation of the 'encloth'd' of _A18_, +_N_, _TC_; and similarly the 'leagues o'rpast', l. 296 of _1633_, is +probably due to the omission of 'many' before 'leagues' in _A18_, _N_, +_TC_--'o'rpast' supplies the lost foot. It is clear, however, from a +comparison of different copies that as _1633_ passed through the press +this poem underwent considerable correction and alteration; and in +its final printed form there are errors which I have been enabled to +correct from _G_. + +The paraphrase of _Lamentations_, and the _Epithalamion made at +Lincolns Inn_ (which is not in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_) are other poems +which show, in passages where there are divergent readings, a tendency +to follow the readings of _A18_, _N_, _TC_, though in neither of +these poems is the identity complete. It is further noteworthy that +to several poems unnamed in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ the editor of _1633_ has +given the title which these bear in _A18_, _N_, _TCC_, and _TCD_, as +though he had access to both the collections at the same time. + +These two groups of manuscripts, which have come down to us, thus seem +to represent the two principal sources of the edition of _1633_. What +other poems that edition contains were derived either from previously +printed editions (The _Anniversaries_ and the _Elegy on Prince Henry_) +or were got from more miscellaneous and less trustworthy sources. + + +A third manuscript collection of Donne's poems is of interest because +it seems very probable that it or a similar collection came into the +hands of the printer before the second edition of 1635 was issued. A +considerable number of the errors, or inferior readings, of the +later editions seem to be traceable to its influence. At least it is +remarkable how often when _1635_ and the subsequent editions depart +from _1633_ and the general tradition of the manuscripts they have +the support of this manuscript and this manuscript alone. This is the +manuscript which I have called + +_O'F_, because it was at one time in the possession of the Rev. T. R. +O'Flaherty, of Capel, near Dorking, a great student of Donne, and +a collector. He contributed several notes on Donne to _Notes and +Queries_. I do not know of any more extensive work by him on the +subject. + +This manuscript has been already described by Mr. R. Warwick Bond in +the Catalogue of Ellis and Elvey, 1903. It is a large but somewhat +indiscriminate collection, made apparently with a view to publication. +The title-page states that it contains 'The Poems of D. J. Donne (not +yet imprinted) consisting of + + Divine Poems, beginning Pag. 1 + Satyres 57 + Elegies 113 + Epicedes and Obsequies 161 + Letters to severall personages 189 + Songs and Sonnets 245 + Epithalamions 317 + Epigrams 337 + With his paradoxes and problems 421 + finished this 12 of October 1632.' + +The reader will notice how far this arrangement agrees with, how far +it differs from, that adopted in 1635. + +Of the twenty-eight new poems, genuine, doubtful, and spurious, added +in _1635_, this manuscript contains twenty, a larger number than I +have found in any other single manuscript. An examination of the text +of these does not, however, make it certain that all of them were +derived from this source or from this source only. The text, for +example, of the _Elegie XI. The Bracelet_, in _1635_, is evidently +taken from a manuscript differing in important respects from _O'F_ and +resembling closely _Cy_ and _P_. _Elegie XII_, also, _His parting +from her_, can hardly have been derived from _O'F_, as _1635_ gives +an incomplete, _O'F_ has an entire, version of the poem. In others, +however, e.g. _Elegie XIII. Julia_; _Elegie XVI. On his Mistris_; +_Satyre_, 'Men write that love and reason disagree,' it will be seen +that the text of 1635 agrees more closely with _O'F_ than with any of +the other manuscripts cited. The second of these, _On his Mistris_, is +a notable case, and so are the four _Divine Sonnets_ added in _1635_. +Most striking of all is the case of the _Song_, probably not by Donne, +'Soules joy now I am gone,' where the absurd readings 'Words' +for 'Wounds' and 'hopes joyning' for 'lipp-joyning' (or perhaps +'lipps-joyning') must have come from this source. One can hardly +believe that two independent manuscripts would perpetrate two such +blunders. Taken with the many changes from the text of _1633_ in which +_1635_ has the support of _O'F_, one can hardly doubt that among the +fresh manuscript collections which came into the hands of the printer +of _1635_ (often only to mislead him) _O'F_ was one. + +Besides the twenty poems which passed into _1635_, _O'F_ attributes +some eighteen other poems to Donne, of which few are probably +genuine.[23] Of the other manuscript collections I must speak more +shortly. There is no evidence that any of them was used by the +seventeenth-century editors. + + +_B_ is a handsome, vellum-bound manuscript belonging to the Earl of +Ellesmere's library at Bridgewater House. I am, I think, the first +editor who has examined it. The volume bears on the fly-leaf +the autograph signature ('J. Bridgewater') of the first Earl of +Bridgewater, the son of Donne's early patron, Elizabeth's Lord Keeper +and later Lord Chancellor. On the title-page 'Dr Donne' is written in +the same hand. John Egerton, it will be remembered, was, like Donne, a +volunteer in Essex's expedition to the Azores in 1597. In 1599 he and +his elder brother Thomas were in Ireland, where the latter was killed, +leaving John to be his father's heir. The book-number, inscribed +on the second leaf, is in the handwriting of the second Earl of +Bridgewater, the Elder Brother of Milton's _Comus_. The manuscript has +thus interesting associations, and links with Donne's earliest patron. +I had hoped that it might prove, being made for those who had known +Donne all his life, an exceptionally good manuscript, but can hardly +say that my expectations were fulfilled. It was probably put together +in the twenties, because though it contains the _Holy Sonnets_ it +does not contain the hymns written at the close of the poet's life. It +resembles _O'F_, _S_, _S96_, and _P_, rather than either of the first +two collections which I have described, _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ and _A18_, +_N_, _TC_, in that it includes with Donne's poems a number of poems +not by Donne,[24] but most of them apparently by his contemporaries, +Sir John Roe, Francis Beaumont, Jonson, and other of the wits of the +first decade of the seventeenth century, the men who collaborated in +writing witty poems on Coryat, or _Characters_ in the style of Sir +Thomas Overbury. In the case of some of these initials are added, and +a later, but not modern, hand has gone over the manuscript and denied +or queried Donne's authorship of others. Textually also _B_ tends to +range itself, especially in certain groups of poems, as the _Satyres_ +and _Holy Sonnets_, with _O'F_, _S96_, _W_ when these differ from _D_, +_H49_, _Lec_ and _A18_, _N_, _TC_. In such cases the tradition which +it represents is most correctly preserved in _W_. In a few poems the +text of _B_ is identical with that of _S96_. On the whole _B_ cannot +be accepted in any degree as an independent authority for the text. +It is important only for its agreements with other manuscripts, as +helping to establish what I may call the manuscript tradition, in +various passages, as against the text of the editions. + +Still less valuable as an independent textual authority is + + +_P_. This manuscript is a striking example of the kind of collections +of poems, circulating in manuscript, which gentlemen in the +seventeenth century caused to be prepared, and one cannot help +wondering how they managed to understand the poems, so full is the +text of gross and palpable errors. _P_ is a small octavo manuscript, +once in the Phillipps collection, now in the possession of Captain C. +Shirley Harris, Oxford. On the cover of brown leather is stamped the +royal arms of James I. On p. 1 is written, '1623 me possidet Hen. +Champernowne de Dartington in Devonia, generosus.' Two other members +of this old, and still extant, Devonshire family have owned the +volume, as also Sir Edward Seymour (Knight Baronett) and Bridgett +Brookbrige. The poems are written in a small, clear hand, and in +Elizabethan character. Captain Harris has had a careful transcript of +the poems made, and he allowed me after collating the original with +the transcript to keep the latter by me for a long time. + +The collection is in the nature of a commonplace-book, and includes +a prose letter to Raleigh, and a good many poems by other poets than +Donne, but the bulk of the volume is occupied with his poems,[25] and +most of the poems are signed 'J. D. Finis.' The date of the collection +is between 1619, when the poem _When he went with the Lo Doncaster_ +was written, and 1623, the date on the title-page. Neither for text +nor for canon is _P_ an authority, but the very carelessness +with which it is written makes its testimony to certain readings +indisputable. It makes no suggestion of conscious editing. In certain +poems its text is identical with that of _Cy_, even to absurd errors. +It sometimes, however, supports readings which are otherwise confined +to _O'F_ and the later editions of the poem, showing that these may be +older than 1632-5. + + +_Cy._ The Carnaby MS. consists of one hundred folio pages bound in +flexible vellum, and is now in the Harvard College Library, Boston. +It is by no means an exhaustive collection; the poems are chaotically +arranged; the text seems to be careless, and the spelling unusually +erratic; but most of the poems it contains are genuine.[26] This +manuscript is not as a whole identical with _P_, but some of the poems +it contains must have come from that or from a common source. + + +_JC._ The John Cave MS. is a small collection of Donne's poems now +in the possession of Mr. Elkin Matthews, who has kindly allowed me +to collate it. It was formerly in Mr. O'Flaherty's possession. The +original possessor had been a certain John Cave, and the volume opens +with the following poem, written, it will be seen, while Donne was +still alive: + + Oh how it joys me that this quick brain'd Age + can nere reach thee (Donn) though it should engage + at once all its whole stock of witt to finde + out of thy well plac'd words thy more pure minde. + Noe, wee are bastard Aeglets all; our eyes + could not endure the splendor that would rise + from hence like rays from out a cloud. That Man + who first found out the Perspective which can + make starrs at midday plainly seen, did more + then could the whole Chaos of Arte<s> before + or since; If I might have my wish 't shuld bee + That Man might be reviv'd againe to see + If hee could such another frame, whereby + the minde might bee made see as farr as th' eye. + Then might we hope to finde thy sense, till then + The Age of Ignorance I'le still condemn. + + IO. CA. + Jun. 3. 1620. + +The manuscript is divided into three parts, the first containing the +five _Satyres_, the _Litany_ and the _Storme_ and _Calme_. The second +consists of _Elegies_ and _Epigrammes_ and the third of _Miscellanea, +Poems, Elegies, Sonnets by the same Author_. The elegies in the second +part are, as in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and _W_, thirteen in number. +Their arrangement is that of _W_, and, like _W_, _JC_ gives _The +Comparison_, which, _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ do not, but drops _Loves +Progress_, which the latter group contains. The text of these poems is +generally that of _W_, but here and throughout _JC_ abounds in errors +and emendations. It contains one or two poems which were published +in the edition of 1650, and which I have found in no other manuscript +except _O'F_. In these _JC_ supplies some obvious emendations. The +poems in the third part are very irregularly arranged. This is the +only manuscript, professing to be of Donne's poems, which contains the +elegy, 'The heavens rejoice in motion,' which the younger Donne +added to the edition of 1650. It is not a very correct, but is an +interesting manuscript, with very few spurious poems. At the other end +of the manuscript from Donne's, are poems by Corbet. + +What seems to be practically a duplicate of _JC_ is preserved in the +Dyce Collection at the South Kensington Museum. It belonged originally +to a certain 'Johannes Nedlam e Collegio Lincolniense' and is dated +1625. Cave's poem 'Upon Doctor Donne's Satyres' is inscribed and the +contents and arrangement of the volume are identical with those of +_JC_ except that one poem, _The Dampe_, is omitted, probably by an +oversight, in the Dyce MS. After my experience of _JC_ I did not think +it necessary to collate this manuscript. It was from it that Waldron +printed some of the unpublished poems of Donne and Corbet in _A +Collection of Miscellaneous Poetry_ (1802). + + +_H40_ and _RP31_, i.e. Harleian MS. 4064 in the British Museum, +and Rawlinson Poetical MS. 31, in the Bodleian Library, are two +manuscripts containing a fairly large number of Donne's poems +intermingled with poems by other and contemporary authors. A note on +the fly-leaf of _RP31_ declares that the manuscript contains 'Sir John +Harringtons poems written in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth', which is +certainly not an accurate description.[27] Some of the poems must have +been written as late as 1610, and they are by various authors, +Wotton, Jonson, Sir Edward Herbert, Sir John Roe, Donne, Beaumont, +and probably others, but names of authors are only occasionally given. +Each manuscript starts with the words 'Prolegomena Quaedam', and the +poem, 'Paynter while there thou sit'st.' The poems follow the same +order in the two manuscripts, but of poems not by Donne _RP31_ +contains several which are not in _H40_, and, on the other hand, +of poems by Donne _H40_ inserts at various places quite a number, +especially of songs, which are not in _RP31_. The latter is, in short, +a miscellaneous collection of Elizabethan and early Jacobean poems, +including several of Donne's; the former, the same collection in which +Donne's poems have become by insertion the principal feature. I have +cited the readings of _H40_ throughout; those of _RP31_ only when +they differ from _H40_, or when I wish to emphasize their agreement. +Wherever derived from, the poems are generally carefully and +intelligently transcribed. They contain some unpublished poems of +Jonson, Sir Edward Herbert, and probably Daniel. + + +_L74._ The Lansdowne MS. 740, in the British Museum, is an interesting +collection of Donne's mainly earlier and secular poems, along with +several by contemporaries.[28] The text of the _Satyres_ connects +this collection with _A18_, _N_, _TC_, but it is probably older, as +it contains none of the _Divine Poems_ and no poem written later +than 1610. Its interest, apart from the support which it lends to the +readings of other manuscripts, centres in the evidence it affords as +to the authorship of some of the unauthentic poems which have been +ascribed to Donne. + + +_S._ The Stephens MS., now in the Harvard College Library, Boston, is +the manuscript on which Dr. Grosart based his edition (though he does +not reproduce it either consistently or with invariable accuracy) in +1873--an unhappy choice even were it legitimate to adopt any +single manuscript in preference to the edition of 1633. Of all the +manuscripts I have examined (I know it only through the collation +made for me and from Dr. Grosart's citations) it is, I think, without +exception the worst, the fullest of obvious and absurd blunders. There +are too in it more evidences of stupid editing than in _P_, whose +blunders are due to careless copying by eye or to dictation, and +therefore more easy to correct. + +The manuscript is dated, at the end, '19th July 1620,' and contains +no poems which are demonstrably later than this date, or indeed +than 1610. As, however, it contains several of the _Divine Poems_, +including _La Corona_, but _not_ the _Holy Sonnets_, it affords a +valuable clue to the date of these poems,--of which more elsewhere. +The collection is an ambitious one, and an attempt has been made at +classification. Six Satires are followed by twenty-seven Elegies (one +is torn out) under which head love and funeral elegies are included, +and these by a long series of songs with the _Divine Poems_ +interspersed. Some of the songs, as of the elegies, are not by +Donne.[29] + + +_S96._ Stowe MS. 961 is a small folio volume in the British Museum, +containing a collection of Donne's poems very neatly and prettily +transcribed. It cannot have been made before 1630 as it contains all +the three hymns written during the poet's last illnesses. Indeed it is +the only manuscript which I have found containing a copy of the _Hymne +to God, my God in my Sicknes_. It is a very miscellaneous collection. +Three satires are followed by the long obsequies to the Lord +Harington, and these by a sequence of Letters, Funeral Elegies, +Elegies, and Songs intermingled. It is regrettable that so +well-written a manuscript is not more reliable, but its text is poor, +its titles sometimes erroneous, and its ascriptions inaccurate.[30] + +(3) In the third class I place manuscripts which are not primarily +collections of Donne's poems but collections of seventeenth-century +poems among which Donne's are included. It is not easy to draw a hard +and fast line between this class and the last because, as has been +seen, most of the manuscripts at the end of the last list contain +poems which are not, or probably are not, by Donne. Still, in these +collections Donne's work predominates, and the tendency of the +collector is to bring the other poems under his aegis. Initials like +J. R., F. B., J. H. disappear, or J. D. takes their place. In the case +of these last collections this is not so. Poems by Donne are included +with poems which the collector assigns to other wits. Obviously this +class could be made to include many different kinds of collections, +ranging from those in which Donne is a prominent figure to those +which include only one or two of his poems. But such manuscripts have +comparatively little value and no authority for the textual critic, +though they are not without importance for the student of the canon +of Donne's poetry. I shall mention only one or two, though I have +examined a good many more. + + +_A25._ Additional MS. 25707, in the British Museum, is a large and +interesting collection, written in several different hands, of early +seventeenth-century poems, Jacobean and Caroline. It contains an +_Elegie_ by Henry Skipwith on the death of King Charles I, but most +of the poems are early Jacobean, and either the bulk of the collection +was made before this and some other poems were inserted, or it is +derived from older collections. Indeed, most of the poems by Donne +were probably got from some older collection or collections not +unlike some of those already described. They consist of twelve elegies +arranged in the same order as in _JC_, _W_, and to some extent _O'F_, +which is not the order of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ and _1633_; a number of +_Songs_ with some _Letters_ and _Obsequies_ following one another +sometimes in batches, at times interspersed with poems by other +writers; the five _Satyres_, separated from the other poems and +showing some evidences in the text of deriving from a collection like +_Q_ or its duplicate in the Dyce collection.[31] The only one of the +_Divine Poems_ which _A25_ contains is _The Crosse_. No poem which can +be proved to have been written later than 1610 is included. + +The poems by Donne in this manuscript are generally, but not always, +initialled J. D., and are thus distinguished from others by F. B., H. +K., N. H., H. W., Sr H. G., T. P., T. G., G. Lucy., No. B., &c. The +care with which this has been done lends interest to those poems which +are here ascribed to Donne but are not elsewhere assigned to him. +_A25_ (with its partial duplicate _C_) is the only manuscript which +attributes to 'J. D.' the Psalm, 'By Euphrates flowery side,' that was +printed in _1633_ and all the subsequent editions.[32] + + +_C._ A strange duplicate of certain parts of _A25_ is a small +manuscript in the Cambridge University Library belonging to the +Baumgartner collection. It is a thin folio, much damaged by damp, and +scribbled over. A long poem, _In cladem Rheensen_ ('Verses upon the +slaughter at the Isle of Rhees'), has been used by the cataloguer to +date the manuscript, but as this has evidently been inserted when the +whole was bound, the rest of the contents may be older or younger. The +collection opens with three of the _Elegies_ contained in _A25_. It +then omits eleven poems which are in _A25_, and continues with twenty +_Songs_ and _Obsequies_, following the order of _A25_ but omitting the +intervening poems. Some nine more poems are given, following the order +of _A25_, but many are omitted in _C_ which are found in _A25_, and +the poems in _C_ are often only fragments of the whole poems in _A25_. +Evidently _C_ is a selection of poems either made directly from _A25_, +or from the collection of Donne's poems (with one or two by Beaumont +and others) which _A25_ itself drew from. + + +_A10._ Additional MS. 10309, in the British Museum, is a little octavo +volume which was once the property of Margaret Bellasis, probably +the eldest daughter of Thomas, first Lord Fauconberg. It is a very +miscellaneous collection of prose (Hall's _Characterismes of Vice_) +and verse. Of Donne's undoubted poems there are very few, but there +is an interesting group of poems by Roe or others (the authors are not +named in the manuscript) which are frequently found with Donne's, and +some of which have been printed as his.[33] + + +_M._ This is a manuscript bought by Lord Houghton and now in the +library of the Marquis of Crewe. It is entitled + + A Collection of + + Original Poetry + + written about the time of + + Ben: Jonson + + qui ob. 1637 + +A later hand, probably Sir John Simeon's, has added 'Chiefly in +the Autograph of Dr. Donne Dean of St. Pauls', but this is quite +erroneous. It is a miscellaneous collection of poems by Donne, Jonson, +Pembroke, Shirley, and others, with short extracts from Fletcher and +Shakespeare. Donne's are the most numerous, and their text generally +good, but such a collection can have no authority. It is important +only as supporting readings and ascriptions of other manuscripts. I +cite it seldom. + + +_TCD_ (_Second Collection_).[34] The large manuscript volume in +Trinity College, Dublin, contains two collections of poems (though +editors have spoken of them as one) of very different character and +value. The first I have already described. It occupies folios 1 to +292. On folio 293 a new hand begins with the song, 'Victorious Beauty +though your eyes,' and from that folio to folio 565 (but some folios +are torn out) follows a long and miscellaneous series of early +seventeenth-century poems. There are numerous references to +Buckingham, but none to the Long Parliament or the events which +followed, so that the collection was probably put together before +1640. The poems are ascribed to different authors in a very haphazard +and untrustworthy fashion. James I is credited with Jonson's epigram +on the Union of the Crowns; Donne's _The Baite_ is given to Wotton; +and Wotton's 'O Faithless World' to Robert Wisedom. Probably there +is more reliance to be put on the ascriptions of later and Caroline +poems, but for the student of Donne and early Jacobean poetry the +collection has no value. Some of Donne's poems occur, and it is +noteworthy that the version given is often a different one from that +occurring in the first part of the volume. Probably two distinct +collections have been bound up together. + +Another collection frequently cited by Grosart, but of little +value for the editor of Donne, is the _Farmer-Chetham MS._, a +commonplace-book in the Chetham Library, Manchester, which has been +published by Grosart. It contains one or two of Donne's poems, but +its most interesting contents are the 'Gulling Sonnets' of Sir John +Davies, and some poems by Raleigh, Hoskins, and others. Nothing could +be more unsafe than to ascribe poems to Donne, as Grosart did, because +they occur here in conjunction with some that are certainly his. + +A similar collection, which I have not seen, is the +_Hazlewood-Kingsborough MS._, as Dr. Grosart called it. To judge from +the analysis in Thorpe's Catalogue, 1831, this too is a miscellaneous +anthology of poems written by, or at any rate ascribed to, +Shakespeare, Jonson, Bacon, Raleigh, Donne, and others. There is no +end to the number of such collections, and it is absurd to base a text +upon them. + + +The _Burley MS._, to which I refer once or twice, and which is a +manuscript of great importance for the editor of Donne's letters, +is not a collection of poems. It is a commonplace-book of Sir Henry +Wotton's in the handwriting of his secretaries. Amid its varied +contents are some letters, unsigned but indubitably by Donne; ten of +his _Paradoxes_ with a covering letter; and a few poems of Donne's +with other poems. Of the last, one is certainly by Donne (_H. W. in +Hibernia belligeranti_), and I have incorporated it. The others seem +to me exceedingly doubtful. They are probably the work of other +wits among Wotton's friends. I have printed a selection from them in +Appendix C.[35] + + +Of the manuscripts of the first two classes, which alone could put +forward any claim to be treated as independent sources of the text +of an edition of Donne's poems, it would be impossible, I think, to +construct a complete genealogy. Different poems, or different groups +of poems in the same manuscript, come from different sources, and +to trace each stream to its fountain-head would be a difficult task, +perhaps impossible without further material, and would in the end +hardly repay the trouble, for the difficulties in Donne's text are +not of so insoluble a character as to demand such heroic methods. +The interval between the composition of the poems and their first +publication ranges from about forty years at the most to a year or +two. There is no case here of groping one's way back through centuries +of transmission. The surprising fact is rather that so many of the +common errors of a text preserved and transmitted in manuscript should +have appeared so soon, that the text and canon of Donne's poems should +present an editor in one form or another with all the chief problems +which confront the editor of a classical or a mediaeval author. + +The manuscripts fall into three main groups (1) _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. +These with a portion of _1633_ come from a common source. (2) _A18_, +_N_, _TCC_, _TCD_. These also come from a single stream and some parts +of _1633_ follow them. _L74_ is closely connected with them, at least +in parts. (3) _A25_, _B_, _Cy_, _JC_, _O'F_, _P_, _S_, _S96_, _W_. +These cannot be traced in their entirety to a single head, but in +certain groups of poems they tend to follow a common tradition which +may or may not be that of one or other of the first two groups. Of the +_Elegies_, for example, _A25_, _JC_, _O'F_ and _W_ transcribe twelve +in the same order and with much the same text. Again, _B_, _O'F_, +_S96_, and _W_ have taken the _Holy Sonnets_ from a common source, +but _O'F_ has corrected or altered its readings by a reference to a +manuscript resembling _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, while _W_ has a more correct +version than the others of the common tradition, and three sonnets +which none of these include. Generally, whenever _B_, _O'F_, _S96_, +and _W_ derive from the same source, _W_ is much the most reliable +witness. + +Indeed, our first two groups and _W_ have the appearance of being +derived from some authoritative source, from manuscripts in the +possession of members of Donne's circle. All the others suggest, by +the headings they give to occasional poems, their misunderstanding +of the true character of some poems, their erroneous ascriptions of +poems, that they are the work of amateurs to whom Donne was not known, +or who belonged to a generation that knew Donne as a divine, only +vaguely as a wit. + +These being the materials at our command, the question is, how are we +to use them to secure as accurate a text as possible of Donne's poems, +to get back as close as may be to what the poet wrote himself. The +answer is fairly obvious, though it could not be so until some effort +had been made to survey the manuscript material as a whole. + +Of the three most recent editors--the first to attempt to obtain a +true text--of Donne's poems, each has pursued a different plan. +The late Dr. Grosart[36] proceeded on a principle which makes it +exceedingly difficult to determine accurately what is the source of, +or authority for, any particular reading he adopted. He printed now +from one manuscript, now from another, but corrected the errors of +the manuscript by one or other of the editions, most often by that of +1669. He made no estimate of the relative value of either manuscripts +or editions, nor used them in any systematic fashion. + +The Grolier Club edition[37] was constructed on a different principle. +For all those poems which _1633_ contains, that edition was accepted +as the basis; for other poems, the first edition, whichever that +might be. The text of _1633_ is reproduced very closely, even when the +editor leans to the acceptance of a later reading as correct. Only +one or two corrections are actually incorporated in the text. But the +punctuation has been freely altered throughout, and no record of these +changes is preserved in the textual notes even when they affect the +sense. In more than one instance the words of _1633_ are retained +in this edition but are made to convey a different meaning from that +which they bear in the original. + +The edition of Donne's poems prepared by Mr. E. K. Chambers[38] for +the _Muses Library_ was not based, like Dr. Grosart's, on a casual +use of individual manuscripts and editions, nor like the Grolier Club +edition on a rigid adherence to the first edition, but on an eclectic +use of all the seventeenth-century editions, supplemented by an +occasional reference to one or other of the manuscript collections, +either at first hand or through Dr. Grosart. + +Of these three methods, that of the Grolier Club editor is, there can +be no doubt, the soundest. The edition of 1633 comes to us, indeed, +with no _a priori_ authority. It was not published, or (like the +sermons) prepared for the press[39] by the author; nor (as in the case +of the first folio edition of Shakespeare's plays) was it issued by +the author's executors. + +But if we apply to _1633_ the _a posteriori_ tests described by +Dr. Moore in his work on the textual criticism of Dante's _Divina +Commedia_, if we select a number of test passages, passages where +the editions vary, but where one reading can be clearly shown to be +intrinsically the more probable, by certain definite tests,[40] we +shall find that _1633_ is, taken all over, far and away superior to +any other single edition, and, I may add at once, to any _single_ +manuscript. + +Moreover, any careful examination of the later editions, of their +variations from _1633_, and of the text of the poems which they print +for the first time, shows clearly that some method more trustworthy +than individual preference must be found if we are to distinguish +between those of their variations which have, and those which have +not, some authority behind them; those which are derived from a +fresh reference to manuscript sources, and those which are due to +carelessness, to misunderstanding, or to unwarrantable emendation. +Apart from some such sifting, an edition of Donne based, like Mr. +Chambers', on an eclectic use of the editions is exactly in the same +position as would be an edition of Shakespeare based on an eclectic +use of the Folios, helped out by a quite occasional and quite eclectic +reference to a quarto. A plain reprint of _1633_ like Alford's (of +such poems as he publishes) has fewer serious errors than an eclectic +text. + +It is here that the manuscripts come to our aid. To take, indeed, any +single manuscript, as Dr. Grosart did, and select this or that reading +from it as seems to you good, is not a justifiable procedure. This is +simply to add to the editions one more possible source of error. There +is no single manuscript which could with any security be substituted +for _1633_. Our analysis of that edition has made it appear probable +that a manuscript resembling _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ was the source of +a large part of its text. But it would be very rash to prefer _D_, +_H49_, _Lec_ as a whole to _1633_.[41] It corrects some errors in that +edition; it has others of its own. Even _W_, which has a completer +version of some poems than _1633_, in these poems makes some mistakes +which _1633_ avoids. + +If the manuscripts are to help us it must be by collating them, and +establishing what one might call the agreement of the manuscripts +whether universal or partial, noting in the latter case the +comparative value of the different groups. When we do this we get at +once an interesting result. We find that in about nine cases out of +ten the agreement of the manuscripts is on the side of those readings +of _1633_ which are supported by the tests of intrinsic probability +referred to above,[42] and on the other hand we find that sometimes +the agreement of the manuscripts is on the side of the later editions, +and that in such cases there is a good deal to be said for the later +reading.[43] + +The first result of a collation of the manuscripts is thus to +vindicate _1633_, and to provide us with a means of distinguishing +among later variants those which have, from those which have not, +authority. But in vindicating _1633_ the agreement of the manuscripts +vindicates itself. If _B_'s evidence is found always or most often to +support _A_, a good witness, on those points on which _A_'s evidence +is in itself most probably correct, not only is _A_'s evidence +strengthened but _B_'s own character as a witness is established, and +he may be called in when _A_, followed by _C_, an inferior witness, +has gone astray. In some cases the manuscripts _alone_ give us what +is obviously the correct reading, e.g. p. 25, l. 22, 'But wee no more' +for 'But now no more'; p. 72, l. 26, 'his first minute' for 'his short +minute'. These are exceptionally clear cases. There are some where, I +have no doubt, my preference of the reading of the manuscripts to that +of the editions will not be approved by every reader. I have adopted +no rigid rule, but considered each case on its merits. All the +circumstances already referred to have to be weighed--which reading +is most likely to have arisen from the other, what is Donne's usage +elsewhere, what Scholastic or other 'metaphysical' dogma underlies the +conceit, and what is the source of the text of a particular poem in +_1633_. + +For my analysis of this edition has thrown light upon what of itself +is evident--that of some poems or groups of poems _1633_ provides a +more accurate text than of others, viz. of those for which its source +was a manuscript resembling _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, but possibly more +correct than any one of these, or revised by an editor who knew the +poems. But in printing some of the poems, e.g. _The Progresse of the +Soule_, a number of the letters to noble ladies and others,[44] the +_Epithalamion made at Lincolns Inne_, _The Prohibition_, and a few +others, for which _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ was not available, _1633_ seems +to have followed an inferior manuscript, _A18_, _N_, _TC_ or one +resembling it. In these cases it is possible to correct _1633_ by +comparing it with a better single manuscript, as _G_ or _W_, or group +of manuscripts, as _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. Sometimes even a generally +inferior manuscript like _O'F_ seems to offer a better text of an +individual poem, at least in parts, for occasionally the correct +reading has been preserved in only one or two manuscripts. Only _W_ +among eleven manuscripts which I have recorded (and I have examined +others) preserves the reading in the _Epithalamion made at Lincolns +Inne_, p. 143, l. 57: + + His steeds nill be restrain'd + +--which is quite certainly right. Only three manuscripts have the, to +my mind, most probably correct reading in _Satyre I_, l. 58, p. 147: + + The Infanta of London; + +and only two, _Q_ and the _Dyce MS._ which is its duplicate, the +tempting and, I think, correct reading in _Satyre IV_, l. 38, p. 160: + + He speaks no language. + +Lastly, there are poems for which _1633_ is not available. The +authenticity of these will be discussed later. Their text is generally +very corrupt, especially of those added in _1650_ and _1669_. Here +the manuscripts help us enormously. With their aid I have been able to +give an infinitely more readable text of the fine _Elegie XII_, 'Since +she must go'; the brilliant though not very edifying _Elegies XVII_, +_XVIII_, and _XIX_; as well as of most of the poems in the Appendixes. +The work of correcting some of these had been begun by Dr. Grosart and +Mr. Chambers, but much was still left to do by a wider collation. Dr. +Grosart was content with one or two generally inferior manuscripts, +and Mr. Chambers mentions manuscripts which time or other reasons did +not allow him to examine, or he could not have been content to leave +the text of these poems as it stands in his edition. + +One warning which must be borne in mind when making a comparison +of alternative readings has been given by Mr. Chambers, and my +examination of the manuscripts bears it out: 'In all probability most +of Donne's poems existed in several more or less revised forms, and +it was sometimes a matter of chance which form was used for printing a +particular edition.' The examination of a large number of manuscripts +has shown that it is not probable, but certain, that of some poems +(e.g. _The Flea_, _A Lecture upon the Shadow_, _The Good-Morrow_, +_Elegie XI. The Bracelet_) more than one distinct version was in +circulation. Of the _Satyres_, too, many of the variants represent, +I can well believe, different versions of the poems circulated by the +poet among his friends. And the same may possibly be true of variants +in other poems. Our analysis of _1633_ has shown us what versions +were followed by that edition. What happened in later editions was +frequently that the readings of two different versions were combined +eclectically. In the present edition, when it is clear that there +were two versions, my effort has been to retain one tradition pure, +recording the variants in the notes, even when in individual cases +the reading of the text adopted seemed to me inferior to its rival, +provided it was not demonstrably wrong. + +In view of what has been said, the aim of the present edition may be +thus briefly stated: + +(1) To restore the text of _1633_ in all cases where modern editors +have abandoned or disguised it, if there is no evidence, internal +or external, to prove its error or inferiority; and to show, in the +textual notes, how far it has the general support of the manuscripts. + +(2) To correct _1633_ when the meaning and the evidence of the +manuscripts point to its error and suggest an indubitable or highly +probable emendation. + +(3) To correct throughout, and more drastically, by help of the +manuscripts when such exist, the often carelessly and erroneously +printed text of those poems which were added in _1635_, _1649_, +_1650_, and _1669_. + +(4) By means of the commentary to vindicate or defend my choice of +reading, and to elucidate Donne's thought by reference to his other +works and (but this I have been able to do only very partially) to his +scholastic and other sources. + +As regards punctuation, it was my intention from the outset to +preserve the original, altering it only (_a_) when, judged by its own +standards, it was to my mind wrong--stops were displaced or dropped, +or the editor had misunderstood the poet; (_b_) when even though +defensible the punctuation was misleading, tested frequently by the +fact that it had misled editors. In doing this I frequently made +unnecessary changes because it was only by degrees that I came to +understand all the subtleties of older punctuation and to appreciate +some of its nuances. A good deal of my work in the final revision has +consisted in restoring the original punctuation. In doing this I +have been much assisted by the study of Mr. Percy Simpson's work on +_Shakespearian Punctuation_. My punctuation will not probably in the +end quite satisfy either the Elizabethan purist, or the critic who +would have preferred a modernized text. I will state the principles +which have guided me. + +I do not agree with Mr. Chambers that the punctuation, at any rate +of _1633_, is 'exceptionally chaotic'. It is sometimes wrong, and in +certain poems, as the _Satyres_, it is careless. But as a rule it +is excellent on its own principles. Donne, indeed, was exceptionally +fastidious about punctuation and such typographical details as capital +letters, italics, brackets, &c. The _LXXX Sermons_ of 1640 are a model +of fine rhetorical and rhythmical pointing, pointing which inserted +stops to show you where to stop. The sermons were not printed in his +lifetime, but we know that he wrote them out for the press, hoping +that they might be a source of income to his son. + +But Donne did not prepare his poems for the press. Their punctuation +is that of the manuscript from which they were taken, revised by the +editor or printer. One can often recognize in _D_ the source of a stop +in _1633_, or can see what the pointing and use of capitals would have +been had Donne himself supervised the printing. The printer's man was +sometimes careless; the printer or editor had prejudices of his own +in certain things; and Donne is a difficult and subtle poet. All these +circumstances led to occasional error. + +The printer's prejudice was one which Donne shared, but not, I +think, to quite the same extent. Compared, for example, with the +_Anniversaries_ (printed in Donne's lifetime) _1633_ shows a fondness +for the semicolon,[45] not only within the sentence, but separating +sentences, instead of a full stop, when these are closely related in +thought to one another. In an argumentative and rhetorical poet like +Donne the result is excellent, once one grows accustomed to it, as +is the use of commas, where we should use semicolons, within the +sentence, dividing co-ordinate clauses from one another. On the other +hand this use of semicolons leads to occasional ambiguity when one +which separates two sentences comes into close contact with another +within the sentence. For example, in _Satyre III_, ll. 69-72, +how should an editor, modernizing the punctuation, deal with the +semicolons in ll. 70 and 71? Should he print thus?-- + + But unmoved thou + Of force must one, and forc'd but one allow; + And the right. Ask thy father which is shee; + Let him ask his. + +With trifling differences that is how Chambers and the Grolier Club +editor print them. But the lines might run, to my mind preferably-- + + But unmoved thou + Of force must one, and forc'd but one allow. + And the right; ask thy father which is shee, + Let him ask his. + +'And the right' being taken as equivalent to 'And as to the right'. +One might even print-- + + And the right? Ask, &c. + +One of the semicolons is equivalent to a little more than a comma, the +other to a little less than a full stop. + +Another effect of this finely-shaded punctuation is that the question +is constantly forced upon an editor, is it correct? Has the printer +understood the subtler connexion of Donne's thought, or has he placed +the semicolon where the full stop should be, the comma where the +semicolon? My solution of these difficulties has been to face and try +to overcome them. I have corrected the punctuation where it seemed +to me, on its own principles, definitely wrong; and I have, but more +sparingly, amended the pointing where it seemed to me to disguise the +subtler connexions of Donne's thought or to disturb the rhetoric and +rhythm of his verse paragraphs. In doing so I have occasionally taken +a hint from the manuscripts, especially _D_ and _W_, which, by the +kindness of Mr. Gosse and Professor Dowden, I have had by me while +revising the text. But if I occasionally quote these manuscripts in +support of my punctuation, it is only with a view to showing that I +have not departed from the principles of Elizabethan pointing. I do +not quote them as authoritative. On questions of punctuation none +of the extant manuscripts could be appealed to as authorities. Their +punctuation is often erratic and chaotic, when it is not omitted +altogether. Finally, I have recorded every change that I have made. +A reader should be able to gather from the text and notes combined +exactly what was the text of the first edition of each poem, whether +it appeared in _1633_ or a subsequent edition, in every particular, +whether of word, spelling, or punctuation. My treatment of the last +will not, as I have said, satisfy every reader. I can only say that I +have given to the punctuation of each poem as much time and thought as +to any part of the work. In the case of Donne this is justifiable. +I am not sure that it would be in the case of a simpler, a less +intellectual poet. It would be an easier task either to retain the +old punctuation and leave a reader to correct for himself, or to +modernize. With all its refinements, Elizabethan punctuation erred +by excess. A reader who gives thought and sympathy to a poem does not +need all these commands to pause, and they frequently irritate and +mislead. + + + [Footnote 1: _Englands Parnassus; or The Choysest Flowers + of our Moderne Poets: with their Poetical Comparisons. + Descriptions of Bewties, Personages, Castles, Pallaces, + Mountaines, Groves, Seas, Springs, Rivers etc. Whereunto + are annexed Other Various Discourses both Pleasaunt and + Profitable. Imprinted at London, For N. L. C. B. And T. H._ + 1600.] + + [Footnote 2: _A Poetical Rhapsody Containing, Diuerse Sonnets, + Odes, Elegies, Madrigalls, and other Poesies, both in Rime and + Measured Verse. Never yet published._ &c. 1602. The work was + republished in 1608, 1611, and 1621. It was reprinted by Sir + Samuel Egerton Brydges in 1814, by Sir Harris Nicolas in 1826, + and by A. H. Bullen in 1890. + + _Englands Helicon_, printed in 1600, is a collection of songs + almost without exception in pastoral guise. The _Eclogue_ + introducing the Somerset _Epithalamion_ is Donne's only + experiment in this favourite convention. Donne's friend + Christopher Brooke contributed an _Epithalamion_ to this + collection, but not until 1614. It is remarkable that Donne's + poem _The Baite_ did not find its way into _Englands Helicon_ + which contains Marlowe's song and two variants on the theme. + In 1600 Eleazar Edgar obtained a licence to publish _Amours by + J. D. with Certen Oyr._ (i.e. other) _sonnetes by W. S._ Were + Donne and Shakespeare to have appeared together? The volume + does not seem to have been issued.] + + [Footnote 3: e.g. Among Drummond of Hawthornden's + miscellaneous papers; in Harleian MS. 3991; in a manuscript in + Emmanuel College, Cambridge.] + + [Footnote 4: So on the first page, and the opening sentences + of the letter defend the use of the word 'Understanders'. + Nevertheless the second and third pages have the heading, + running across from one to the other, 'The Printer to the + Reader.'] + + [Footnote 5: 'Will: Marshall sculpsit' implies that Marshall + executed the plate from which the whole frontispiece is taken, + including portrait and poem, not that he is responsible for + the portrait itself. To judge from its shape the latter would + seem to have been made originally from a medallion. Marshall, + the _Dictionary of National Biography_ says, 'floruit c. + 1630,' so could have hardly executed a portrait of Donne in + 1591. Mr. Laurence Binyon, of the Print Department of the + British Museum, thinks that the original may have been by + Nicholas Hilyard (see II. p. 134) whom Donne commends in _The + Storme_. The Spanish motto suggests that Donne had already + travelled. + + The portrait does not form part of the preliminary matter, + which consists of twelve pages exclusive of the portrait. It + was an insertion and is not found in all the extant copies. + The paper on which it is printed is a trifle smaller than the + rest of the book.] + + [Footnote 6: One or two copies seem to have got into + circulation without the _Errata_. One such, identical in other + respects with the ordinary issue, is preserved in the library + of Mr. Beverley Chew, New York. I am indebted for this + information to Mr. Geoffrey Keynes, of St. Bartholomew's + Hospital, who is preparing a detailed bibliography of Donne's + works.] + + [Footnote 7: Some such arrangement may have been intended by + Donne himself when he contemplated issuing his poems in 1614, + for he speaks, in a letter to Sir Henry Goodyere (see II. + pp. 144-5), of including a letter in verse to the Countess + of Bedford 'amongst the rest to persons of that rank'. The + manuscripts, especially the later and more ambitious, e.g. + _Stephens_ and _O'Flaherty_, show similar groupings; and in + _1633_, though there is no consistent sequence, the poems + fall into irregularly recurring groups. The order of the poems + within each of these groups in _1633_ is generally retained in + _1635_. In the _1633_ arrangement there were occasional errors + in the placing of individual poems, especially _Elegies_, + owing to the use of that name both for love poems and for + funeral elegies or epicedes. These were sometimes corrected in + later editions. + + Modern editors have dealt rather arbitrarily and variously + with the old classification. Grosart shifted the poems about + according to his own whims in a quite inexplicable fashion. + The Grolier Club edition preserves the groups and their + original order (except that the _Epigrams_ and _Progresse of + the Soule_ follow the _Satyres_), but corrects some of the + errors in placing, and assigns to their relevant groups the + poems added in _1650_. Chambers makes similar corrections and + replacings, but he further rearranges the groups. In his first + volume he brings together--possibly because of their special + interest--the _Songs and Sonets_, _Epithalamions_, _Elegies_, + and _Divine Poems_, keeping for his second volume the _Letters + to Severall Personages_, _Funerall Elegies_, _Progresse of the + Soul_, _Satyres_, and _Epigrams_. There is this to be said + for the old arrangement, that it does, as Walton indicated, + correspond generally to the order in which the poems were + written, to the succession of mood and experience in Donne's + life. In the present edition this original order has been + preserved with these modifications: (1) In the _Songs and + Sonets_, _The Flea_ has been restored to the place which it + occupied in _1633_; (2) the rearrangement of the misplaced + _Elegies_ by modern editors has been accepted; (3) their + distribution of the few poems added in _1650_ (in two sheets + bound up with the body of the work) has also been accepted, + but I have placed the poem _On Mr. Thomas Coryats Crudities_ + after the _Satyres_; (4) two new groups have been inserted, + _Heroical Epistles_ and _Epitaphs_. It was absurd to + class _Sappho to Philaenis_ with the _Letters to Severall + Personages_. At the same time it is not exactly an _Elegy_. + There is a slight difference again between the _Funerall + Elegy_ and the _Epitaph_, though the latter term is sometimes + loosely used. Ben Jonson speaks of Donne's _Epitaph on Prince + Henry_. (5) The _Letter, to E. of D. with six holy Sonnets_ + has been placed before the _Divine Poems_. (6) The _Hymne to + the Saints, and to Marquesse Hamylton_ has been transferred + to the _Epicedes_. (7) Some poems have been assigned to an + Appendix as doubtful.] + + [Footnote 8: The edition of 1633 contained one Latin, and + seven English, letters to Sir Henry Goodyere, with one letter + to the Countess of Bedford, a copy of which had been sent + to Goodyere. To these were added in _1635_ a letter in Latin + verse, _De libro cum mutuaretur_ (see p. 397), and four prose + letters in English, one _To the La. G._ written from _Amyens_ + in February, 1611-2, and three _To my honour'd friend G. + G. Esquier_, the first dated April 14, 1612, the two last + November 2, 1630, and January 7, 1630.] + + [Footnote 9: In the copy of the 1633 edition belonging to the + Library of Christ Church, Oxford, which has been used for the + present edition, and bears the name 'Garrard att his quarters + in ϑermyte' (_perhaps_ Donne's friend George Garrard or + Gerrard: see Gosse: _Life and Letters &c._ i. 285), are some + lines, signed J. V., which seem to imply that the writer had + some hand in the publication of the poems; but the reference + may be simply to his gift: + + An early offer of him to yo^r sight + Was the best way to doe the Author right + My thoughts could fall on; w^ch his soule w^ch knew + The weight of a iust Prayse will think't a true. + Our commendation is suspected, when + Wee Elegyes compose on sleeping men, + The Manners of the Age prevayling so + That not our conscience wee, but witts doe show. + And 'tis an often gladnes, that men dye + Of unmatch'd names to write more easyly. + Such my religion is of him; I hold + It iniury to have his merrit tould; + Who (like the Sunn) is righted best when wee + Doe not dispute but shew his quality. + Since all the speech of light is less than it. + An eye to that is still the best of witt. + And nothing can express, for truth or haste + So happily, a sweetnes as our taste. + W^ch thought at once instructed me in this + Safe way to prayse him, and yo^r hands to kisse. + + Affectionately y^rs + J. V. + tu longe sequere et vestigia + semper adora + Vaughani + + The name at the foot of the Latin line, scribbled at the + bottom of the page, seems to identify J. V. with a Vaughan, + probably John Vaughan (1603-74) who was a Christ Church man. + In 1630 (_D.N.B._) he was a barrister at the Inner Temple, and + a friend of Selden. He took an active part in politics later, + and in 1668 was created Sir John Vaughan and appointed Chief + Justice of the Common Pleas.] + + [Footnote 10: I am inclined to believe that Henry King, the + poet, and later Bishop of Chichester, assisted the printer. + The 1633 edition bears more evidence of competent editing + by one who knew and understood Donne's poems than any later + edition. See p. 255.] + + [Footnote 11: Professor Norton (Grolier Club edition, i, + p. xxxviii) states that the _Epistle Dedicatory_ and the + _Epigram_ by Jonson are omitted in this edition. This is an + error, perhaps due to the two pages having been torn out of + or omitted in the copy he consulted. They are in the Christ + Church, Oxford, copy which I have used.] + + [Footnote 12: In 1779 Donne's poems were included in Bell's + _Poets of Great Britain_. The poems were grouped in an + eccentric fashion and the text is a reprint of _1719_. In + 1793 Donne's poems were reissued in a _Complete Edition of the + Poets of Great Britain_, published by Arthur Arch, London, and + Bell and Bradfute, Edinburgh, under the editorship of Robert + Anderson. The text and arrangement of the poems show that this + is a reprint of Bell's edition. The same is true of the text, + so far as I have checked it, in Chalmers's _English Poets_, + vol. v, 1810. But in the arrangement of the poems the editor + has recurred to the edition of 1669, and has reprinted some + poems from that source. Southey printed selections from + Donne's poems in his _Select Works of the British Poets from + Chaucer to Jonson_ (1831). The text is that of _1669_. In + 1839 Dean Alford included some of Donne's poems in his very + incomplete edition of the _Works of Donne_. He printed these + from a copy of the 1633 edition. + + There were two American editions of the poems before the + Grolier Club edition. Donne's poems were included in _The + Works of the British Poets with Lives of their Authors_, by + Ezekiel Sanford, Philadelphia, 1819. The text is based on the + edition of 1719. A complete and separate edition was published + at Boston in 1850. This has an eclectic text, but the editor + has relied principally on the editions after _1633_. Variants + are sparingly and somewhat inaccurately recorded. + + In 1802 F. G. Waldron printed in his _Shakespeare Miscellany_ + 'Two Elegies of Dr. Donne not in any edition of his Works'. Of + these, one, 'Loves War,' is by Donne. The other, 'Is Death so + great a gamster,' is by Lord Herbert of Cherbury. In + 1856-7 Sir John Simeon printed in the _Miscellanies_ of the + Philobiblon Society several 'Unpublished Poems of Donne'. Very + few of them are at all probably poems of Donne. + + Of Grosart's edition (1873), the Grolier Club edition (1895), + and Chambers's edition (1896), a full account will be given + later.] + + [Footnote 13: Huyghens sent some translations with the letter. + He translated into Dutch (retaining the original metres, + except that Alexandrines are substituted for decasyllabics) + nineteen pieces in all. An examination of these shows that the + text he used was a manuscript one, the readings he translates + being in more than one instance those of the manuscript, as + opposed to the printed, tradition. In a note which he prefixed + to the translations when he published them many years later + in his _Korenbloemen_ (1672) he states that Charles I, having + heard of his intention to translate Dr. Donne, 'declared he + did not believe that anyone could acquit himself of that task + with credit'--an interesting testimony to the admiration + which Charles felt for the poetry of Donne. A copy of the 1633 + edition now in the British Museum is said to have belonged to + the King, and to bear the marks of his interest in particular + passages. Huyghens's comment on Charles's criticism shows what + it was in the English language which most struck a foreigner + speaking a tongue of a purer Germanic strain: 'I feel sure + that he would not have passed so absolute a sentence had he + known the richness of our language, a moderate command of + which is sufficient to enable one to render the thoughts of + peoples of all countries with ease and delight. From these I + must, however, except the English; for their language is all + languages; and as it pleases them, Greek and Latin become + plain English. But since _we_ do not thus admit foreign words + it is easy to understand in what difficulty we find ourselves + when we have to express in a pure German speech, _Ecstasis_, + _Atomi_, _Influentiae_, _Legatum_, _Alloy_, and the like. Set + these aside and the rest costs us no great effort.' + + At the end of his life Huyghens wrote a poem of reminiscences, + _Sermones de Vita Propria_, in which he recalls the impression + that Donne had left upon his mind: + + Voortreffelyk Donn, o deugdzaam leeraer, duld + Dat ik u bovenal, daar'k u bij voorkeur noeme, + Als godlijk Dichter en welsprekend Reednaer roeme, + Uit uwen gulden mond, 'tzij ge in een vriendenzaal + Of van den kansel spraakt, klonk louter godentaal, + Wier nektar ik zoo vaak met harte wellust proefde. + + 'Suffer me, all-surpassing Donne, virtuous teacher, to name + you first and above all; and sing your fame as god-like poet + and eloquent preacher. From your golden mouth, whether in + the chamber of a friend, or in the pulpit, fell the speech + of Gods, whose nectar I drank again and again with heartfelt + joy.' + + Vondel did not share the enthusiasm of Huyghens and Hooft.] + + [Footnote 14: That is, many poems of his early years.] + + [Footnote 15: Tot verschiedene reizen meen ik U. E. + onderhouden te hebben met de gedachtenisse van Doctor Donne, + tegenwoordigh Deken van St Pauls tot Londen, ende, door dit + rijckelick beroep, volgens 't Engelsch gebruyck, in hooghen + ansien, in veel hooger door den rijckdom van sijn gadeloos + vernuft ende noch onvergelijckerer welsprekentheit op stoel. + Eertijts ten dienst van de grooten ten hove gevoedt, in de + werelt gewortelt, in de studien geslepen, in de dictkonst + vermaerdt, meer als yemand. Van die groene tacken hebben veel + weelderige vruchten onder de liefhebbers leggen meucken, diese + nu bynaer verrot van ouderdom uytdeylen, my synde voor den + besten slag van mispelen ter hand geraeckt by halve vijf en + twintig, door toedoen van eenighe mijne besondere Heeren ende + vrienden van die natie. Onder de onze hebb ick geene konnen + uytkiesen, diese voor U. E. behoorden medegedeelt te werden, + slaende deze dichter ganschelijck op U. E. manieren van invall + ende uitspraeck.] + + [Footnote 16: This is not the only manuscript in which this + poem appears among the _Elegies_ following immediately on that + entitled _The Picture_, 'Here take my picture, though I bid + farewell.' It is thus placed in _1633_. The adhesion of two + poems in a number of otherwise distinct manuscripts may mean, + I think, that they were written about the same time.] + + [Footnote 17: There are, however, grounds for the conjecture + besides the contents. The Westmoreland MS. was secured, Mr. + Gosse writes me, when the library of the Earls of Westmoreland + was disposed of, about the year 1892. 'The interest of this + library was that it had not been disturbed since the early + part of the seventeenth century. With the Westmoreland MS. + of Donne's Poems was attached a very fine copy of Donne's + _Pseudomartyr_, which contained, in what was certainly Donne's + handwriting, the words "Ex dono authoris: Row: Woodward" and + a motto in Spanish "De juegos el mejor es con la hoja". There + can be no doubt, I think, that these two books belonged to + Rowland Woodward and were given him by Donne.' But is it + likely that after 1617 Donne would give even to a friend a + manuscript containing the most reprehensible of his earlier + _Elegies_ and the _Epithalamion made at Lincolns Inn_? It + seems to me more probable that the manuscript contains two + distinct collections, made at different times. The one is + a transcript from an early collection, quite probably + Woodward's, containing Satires, Elegies, and one Epithalamion. + To this the Divine Poems have been added.] + + [Footnote 18: With the grouping of _1635_ I have adopted + generally its order within the groups, but the reader will see + quite easily what is the order of the _Songs_ in _1633_ and + in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, if he will turn to the Contents and, + beginning at _The Message_ (p. 43), will follow down to _A + Valediction: forbidding mourning_ (p. 49). He must then turn + back to the beginning and follow the list down till he comes + to _The Curse_ (p. 41), and then resume at _The Extasie_ (p. + 51). If the seven poems, _The Message_ to _A Valediction_: + _forbidding mourning_, were brought to the beginning, the + order of the _Songs and Sonets_ in _1635-69_ would be the same + as in _1633_. + + The editor of _1633_ began a process, which was carried on + in _1635_, of naming poems unnamed in the manuscripts, and + re-naming some that already had titles. The textual notes + will give full details regarding the names, and will show that + frequently a poem unnamed in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ remains unnamed + in _1633_.] + + [Footnote 19: There is one exception to this which I had + overlooked. In _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, _The Undertaking_ (p. 10) + comes later, following _The Extasie_.] + + [Footnote 20: When in 1614 Donne contemplated an edition of + his poems he wrote to Goodyere: 'By this occasion I am made a + Rhapsoder of mine own rags, and that cost me more diligence + to seek them, than it did to make them. This made me aske to + borrow that old book of you,' &c. _Letters_ (1651), p. 197.] + + [Footnote 21: Five are to the Countess of Bedford--'Reason + is', 'Honour is', 'You have refin'd', 'To have written then', + and 'This Twy-light'. One is to the Countess of Huntingdon, + 'Man to Gods image'; one to the Countess of Salisbury, 'Fair, + great and good'; and one to Lady Carey, 'Here where by all.'] + + [Footnote 22: In citing this collection I use _TC_ for the two + groups _TCC_, _TCD_.] + + [Footnote 23: Additional lines to the _Annuntiation and + Passion_, 'The greatest and the most conceald impostor', 'Now + why should Love a footeboys place despise', 'Believe not him + whom love hath made so wise', 'Pure link of bodies where + no lust controules', 'Whoso terms love a fire', _Upon his + scornefull Mistresse_ ('Cruel, since that thou dost not fear + the curse'), _The Hower Glass_ ('Doe but consider this small + Dust'), 'If I freely may discover', _Song_ ('Now you + have kill'd me with your scorn'), 'Absence, heare thou my + protestation', _Song_ ('Love bred of glances'), 'Love if a god + thou art', 'Greate Lord of Love how busy still thou art', 'To + sue for all thy Love and thy whole hart'.] + + [Footnote 24: 'Believe not him whom love hath made so wise', + _On the death of Mris Boulstred_ ('Stay view this stone'), + _Against Absence_ ('Absence, heare thou my protestation'), + 'Thou send'st me prose and rhyme', _Tempore Hen: 3_ ('The + state of Fraunce, as now it stands'), _A fragment_ ('Now why + shuld love a Footboyes place despise'), _To J. D. from Mr. H. + W._ ('Worthie Sir, Tis not a coate of gray,' see II. p. + 141), 'Love bred of glances twixt amorous eyes', _To a Watch + restored to its mystres_ ('Goe and count her better houres'), + 'Deare Love continue nyce and chast', 'Cruell, since thou + doest not feare the curse', _On the blessed virgin Marie_ ('In + that, ô Queene of Queenes').] + + [Footnote 25: Of 128 items in the volume 99 are by Donne, and + I have excluded some that might be claimed for him. The poems + certainly not by Donne are 'Wrong not deare Empresse of my + heart', 'Good folkes for gold or hire', 'Love bred of glances + twixt amorous eyes', 'Worthy Sir, Tis not a coat of gray' + (here marked 'J. D'.), 'Censure not sharply then' (marked 'B. + J.'), 'Whosoever seeks my love to know', 'Thou sendst me prose + and rimes' (see II. p. 166), 'An English lad long wooed + a lasse of Wales', 'Marcella now grown old hath broke her + glasse', 'Pretus of late had office borne in London', _To + his mistresse_ ('O love whose power and might'), _Her answer_ + ('Your letter I receaved'), _The Mar: B. to the Lady Fe. + Her._ ('Victorious beauty though your eyes')--a poem generally + attributed to the Earl of Pembroke, _A poem_ ('Absence heare + my protestation'), 'True love findes witt but hee whom witt + doth move', Earle of Pembroke 'If her disdain', Ben Ruddier + 'Till love breeds love', 'Good madam Fowler doe not truble + mee', 'Oh faithlesse world; and the most faithlesse part, A + womans hart', 'As unthrifts greeve in straw for their pawn'd + beds' (marked 'J. D.'), 'Why shuld not pilgrimes to thy body + come' (marked 'F. B.'), _On Mrs. Bulstreed_, 'Mee thinkes + death like one laughing lies', 'When this fly liv'd shee us'd + to play' (marked 'Cary'), _The Epitaph_ ('Underneath this + sable hearse'), a couple of long heroical epistles (with notes + appended) entitled _Sir Philip Sidney to the Lady Penelope + Rich_ and _The Lady Penelope Rich to Sir Philipe Sidney_. The + latter epistle after some lines gives way quite abruptly to a + different poem, a fragment of an elegy, which I have printed + in Appendix C, p. 463.] + + [Footnote 26: The exceptions are one poor epigram: + + Oh silly John surprised with joy + For Joy hath made thee silly + Joy to enjoy thy sweetest Jone + Jone whiter than the Lillie; + + and two elegies, generally assigned to F. Beaumont, 'I may + forget to eate' and 'As unthrifts greive in straw'.] + + [Footnote 27: The note may point to some connexion of the MS. + with the Harington family. The MS. contains an unusually large + number of poems addressed to the Countess of Bedford, and + ascribes, quite probably, the Elegy 'Death be not proud' to + the Countess herself.] + + [Footnote 28: The poems not by Donne are _A Satire: To Sr + Nicholas Smith_, 1602 ('Sleep next society'); Sir Thomas + Overbury's 'Each woman is a Breefe of Womankind' and his + epitaph 'The spann of my daies measurd, here I rest'; a poem + headed _Bash_, beginning 'I know not how it comes to pass'; + _Verses upon Bishop Fletcher who married a woman of France_ + ('If any aske what Tarquin ment to marrie'); _Fletcher Bishop + of London_ ('It was a question in Harroldrie'); 'Mistres + Aturney scorning long to brooke'; 'Wonder of Beautie, Goddesse + of my sence'; 'Faire eyes doe not thinke scorne to read + of Love'; two sonnets apparently by Sir Thomas Roe; six + consecutive poems by Sir John Roe (see pp. 401-6, 408-10); + 'Absence heare thou,'; _To the Countess of Rutland_ ('Oh may + my verses pleasing be'); _To Sicknesse_ ('Whie disease dost + thou molest'); 'A Taylor thought a man of upright dealing'; + 'Unto that sparkling wit, that spirit of fier'; 'There hath + beene one that strove gainst natures power.'] + + [Footnote 29: _Satyra Sexta_ ('Sleepe next Society'), _Elegia + Undecima_ ('True Love findes wit'), _Elegia Vicesima_ ('Behold + a wonder': see Grosart ii. 249), _Elegia Vicesima Secunda_ + ('As unthrifts mourne'), _Elegia vicesima septima_ ('Deare + Tom: Tell her'), _To Mr. Ben: Jonson_ 9º _Novembris 1603_ ('If + great men wronge me'), _To Mr. Ben: Jonson_ ('The state + and mens affairs'), 'Deare Love, continue nice and chaste', + 'Wherefore peepst thou envious Daye', 'Great and good, if she + deride me', _To the Blessed Virgin Marie_ ('In that ô Queene + of Queenes'), 'What if I come to my Mistresse bed', 'Thou + sentst to me a heart as sound', 'Believe your glasse', _A + Paradox of a Painted Face_ ('Not kisse! By Jove I will').] + + [Footnote 30: The poems not by Donne are not numerous, but + they are assigned to him without hesitation. They are 'As + unthrifts grieve in straw', 'Thou sentst me Prose', 'Dear + Love continue', 'Madam that flea', _The Houre Glass_ ('Doe + but consider this small dust'), _A Paradox of a Painted Face_ + ('Not kiss, by Jove'), 'If I freely may discover', 'Absence + heare thou', 'Love bred of glances'.] + + [Footnote 31: Note the readings I. 58 'The Infanta of London', + IV. 38 'He speaks no language'.] + + [Footnote 32: The other poems here ascribed to J. D. are _To + my Lo: of Denbrook_ (_sic._, i.e. Pembroke), 'Fye, Fye, you + sonnes of Pallas', _A letter written by Sr H. G. and J. + D. alternis vicibus_ ('Since every tree'), 'Why shuld not + Pillgryms to thy bodie come', 'O frutefull Garden and yet + never till'd', _Of a Lady in the Black Masque_. See Appendix + C, pp. 433-7.] + + [Footnote 33: 'The Heavens rejoice in motion', 'Tell her if + she to hired servants show', 'True love finds wit', 'Deare + Love continue nice and chaste', 'Shall I goe force an + Elegie?', 'Men write that Love and Reason disagree', 'Come + Fates: I feare you not', 'If her disdaine'. The authorship of + these is discussed later. + + A note on the first page in a modern hand says, 'The pieces + which I have extracted for the "Specimens" are, Page 91, 211, + 265.' What 'Specimens' are referred to I do not know: the + pieces are 'You nimble dreams', signed H. (i.e. John Hoskins); + 'Upon his mistresses inconstancy' ('Thou art prettie but + inconstant'); and _Cupid and the Clowne_. The manuscript was + purchased at Bishop Heber's sale in 1836.] + + [Footnote 34: I refer to it occasionally as _TCD_ (_II_), + and (once it has been made plain that this is the collection + referred to throughout) as simply _TCD_.] + + [Footnote 35: Since Mr. Pearsall-Smith transcribed + these poems, which I subsequently collated, the house at + Burley-on-the-Hill has been burned down and the manuscript + volume has perished.] + + [Footnote 36: _The Complete Poems of John Donne, D.D., Dean + of St. Paul's. For the First Time Fully Collected and Collated + With The Original and Early Editions And MSS. And Enlarged + With Hitherto Unprinted And Inedited Poems From MSS. &c.... + By The Rev. Alexander B. Grosart, &c. The Fuller Worthies' + Library_, 1872-3. Dr. Grosart's favourite manuscript was the + Stephens (_S_). When that failed him he used Addl. MS. 18643 + (_A18_), whose relation to the manuscripts in Trinity College, + Dublin and Cambridge (_TCD_, _TCC_) he did not suspect, + though he collated these. Some poems he printed from the + Hazlewood-Kingsburgh MS. or the Farmer-Chetham MS. The first + two are not good texts of Donne's poems, the last two are + miscellaneous collections. The three first _Satyres_ Dr. + Grosart printed from Harleian MS. 5110 (_H51_); and he used + other sources for the poems he ascribed to Donne. It cannot + be said that he always recorded accurately the readings of + the manuscript from which he printed. I have made no effort to + record all the differences between Grosart's text and my own. + + The description of the editions which Grosart gives at ii, p. + liii is amazingly inaccurate, considering that he claimed to + have collated 'all the early and later printed editions'. He + describes _1639_, _1649_, _1650_, and _1654_ as identical + with one another, and declares that the younger Donne is + responsible only for _1669_, which appeared after his death.] + + [Footnote 37: _The Poems of John Donne From The Text of The + Edition of 1633 Revised By James Russell Lowell With The + Various Readings of The Other Editions Of The Seventeenth + Century, And With A Preface, An Introduction, And Notes By + Charles Eliot Norton. New York._ 1895. In preparing the + text from Lowell's copy of _1633_, emended in pencil by him, + Professor Norton was assisted by Mrs. Burnett, the daughter + of Mr. Lowell. As I could not apportion the responsibility for + the text I have spoken throughout my textual notes and remarks + of 'the Grolier Club editor' (_Grolier_ for short). I + have accepted Professor Norton as the sole author of the + commentary. For instances where the punctuation has been + altered, and the meaning, in my opinion, obscured, I may refer + to the textual notes on _The Legacie_ (p. 20), _The Dreame_ + (p. 37), _A nocturnall upon S. Lucies day_ (p. 45). But I have + cited and discussed most of the cases in which I disagree with + the Grolier Club editors. It is for readers to judge whether + at times they may not be right, and I have gone astray. + The Grolier Club edition only came into my hands when I had + completed my first collation of the printed texts. Had I known + it sooner, or had the edition been more accessible, I should + probably not have ventured on the arduous task of editing + Donne. It is based on the best text, and the editors have been + happier than most in their interpretation and punctuation of + the more difficult passages. + + Professor Norton made no use of the manuscripts in preparing + the text, but he added in an appendix an account of the + manuscript which, following him, I have called _N_, and + he gave a list of variants which seemed to him possible + emendations. Later, in the _Child Memorial Volume_ of _Studies + and Notes in Philology and Literature_ (1896), he gave a + somewhat fuller description of _N_ and descriptions of _S_ + (the Stephens MS.) and _Cy_ (the Carnaby MS.). Of the readings + which Professor Norton noted, several have passed into + my edition on the authority of a wider collation of the + manuscripts.] + + [Footnote 38: _Poems of John Donne Edited By E. K. Chambers. + With An Introduction By George Saintsbury. London and New + York. 1896._ Of the editions Mr. Chambers says: 'Nor can it be + said that any one edition always gives the best text; even + for a single poem, sometimes one, sometimes another is to be + preferred, though, as a rule, the edition of _1633_ is the + most reliable, and the readings of _1669_ are in many cases a + return to it' (vol. i, p. xliv). A considerable portion of Mr. + Chambers' edition would seem to have been 'set up' from a copy + of the 1639 edition, the earlier and later readings being then + either incorporated or recorded. The result is that the _1633_ + or _1633-35_ readings have been more than once overlooked. + This applies especially to the _Epicedes_ and the _Divine + Poems_. + + As with the Grolier Club edition, so with Mr. Chambers' + edition, I have recorded and discussed the chief differences + between my text and his. I have worked with his edition + constantly beside me. I used it for my collations on account + of its convenient numbering of the lines. To Mr. Chambers' + commentary also I owe my first introduction to the wide field + of the manuscripts. His knowledge of seventeenth-century + literature and history, which even in 1896 was extensive, has + directed me in taking up most of the questions of canon and + authorship which I have investigated. It is easy to record + one's points of disagreement with a predecessor; it is more + difficult to estimate accurately how much one owes to his + labours. + + Mr. Chambers, too, has 'modernized the spelling and corrected + the exceptionally chaotic punctuation of the old editions'. + Of the latter changes he has, with one or two exceptions, + preserved no record, so that when, as is sometimes the case, + he has misunderstood the poet, it is impossible to get back to + the original text of which the stops as well as the words are + a part.] + + [Footnote 39: It is very unlikely that Donne had in his + possession when he died manuscript copies of his early poems. + (1) Walton makes no mention of them when enumerating the works + which Donne left behind in manuscript, including 'six score + sermons all written with his own hand; also an exact + and laborious treatise concerning self-murder, called + _Biathanatos'_, as well as elaborate notes on authors and + events. (2) In 1614, when Donne thought of publishing his + poems, he found it necessary to beg for copies from his + friends: 'By this occasion I am made a Rhapsoder of mine own + rags, and that cost me more diligence to seek them, then it + did to make them. This made me aske to borrow that old book + of you.' _To Sir H. G., Vigilia St. Tho. 1614._ (3) Jonson + and Walton both tell us that Donne, after taking Orders, would + have been glad to destroy his early poems. The sincerity of + this wish has been doubted because of what he says in a letter + regarding _Biathanatos_: 'I only forbid it the press and the + fire.' But _Biathanatos_ is a very different matter from + the poems. It is a grave and devout, if daring, treatise + in casuistry. No one can enter into Donne's mind from 1617 + onwards, as ascetic devotion became a more and more sincere + and consuming passion, and believe that he kept copies of + the early poems or paradoxes, prepared for the press like his + sermons or devotions.] + + [Footnote 40: _Contributions To The Textual Criticism of + The Divina Commedia, &c. By the Rev. Edward Moore, D.D., &c. + Cambridge, 1889._ The tests which Dr. Moore lays down for the + judgement, on internal grounds, of a reading are--I state them + shortly in my own words--(1) That is the best reading which + best explains the erroneous readings. I have sometimes + recorded a quite impossible reading of a manuscript because it + clearly came from one rather than another of two rivals, and + thus lends support to that reading despite its own aberration. + (2) Generally speaking, 'Difficilior lectio potior,' the more + difficult reading is the more likely to be the original. This + applies forcibly in the case of a subtle and difficult author + like Donne. The majority of the changes made in the later + editions arise from the tendency to make Donne's thought more + commonplace. Even in _1633_ errors have crept in. The obsolete + words 'lation' (p. 94, l. 47), 'crosse' (p. 43, l. 14) have + been altered; the old-fashioned and metaphorically used idiom + 'in Nature's gifts' has confused the editor's punctuation; + the subtle thought of the epistles has puzzled and misled. (3) + 'Three minor considerations may be added which are often very + important, when applicable, though they are from the nature of + the case less frequently available.' _Moore_. These are (_a_) + the consistency of the reading with sentiments expressed by + the author elsewhere. I have used the _Sermons_ and other + prose works to illustrate and check Donne's thought and + vocabulary throughout. (_b_) The relation of the reading + to the probable source of the poet's thought. A Scholastic + doctrine often lurks behind Donne's wit, ignorance of which + has led to corruption of the text. See _The Dreame_, p. 37, + ll. 7, 16; _To Sr Henry Wotton_, p. 180, ll. 17-18. (_c_) The + relation of a reading to historical fact. In the letter _To Sr + Henry Wotton_, p. 187, the editors, forgetting the facts, have + confused Cadiz with Calais, and the Azores with St. Michael's + Mount.] + + [Footnote 41: It is worth while to compare the kind of + mistakes in which a manuscript abounds with those which occur + in a printed edition. The tendency of the copyist was to write + on without paying much attention to the sense, dropping words + and lines, sometimes two consecutive half-lines or whole + stanzas, ignoring or confounding punctuation, mistaking words, + &c. He was, if a professional copyist or secretary, not very + apt to attempt emendation. The kind of errors he made were + easily detected when the proof was read over, or when the + manuscript was revised with a view to printing. Words or + half-lines could be restored, &c. But in such revision a new + and dangerous source of error comes into play, the tendency of + the editor to emend.] + + [Footnote 42: Take a few instances where the latest editor, + very naturally and explicably, securing at places a reading + more obvious and euphonious, has departed from _1633_ and + followed _1635_ or _1669_. I shall take them somewhat + at random and include a few that may seem still open to + discussion. In _The Undertaking_ (p. 10, l. 18), for 'Vertue + attir'd in woman see', _1633_, Mr. Chambers reads, with + _1635-69_, 'Vertue in woman see.' So: + + + Loves Vsury, p. 13, l. 5: + + let my body raigne _1633_ + let my body range _1635-69_, _Chambers_ + + Aire and Angels, p. 22, l. 19: + + Ev'ry thy hair _1633_ + Thy every hair _1650-69_, _Chambers_ + + The Curse, p. 41, ll. 3, 10: + + His only, and only his purse _1633-54_ + Him, only for his purse _1669_, _Chambers_ + + who hath made him such _1633_ + who hath made them such _1669_, _Chambers_ + + A Valediction, p. 50, l. 16: + + Those things which elemented it _1633_ + The thing which elemented it _1669_, _Chambers_ + + The Relique, p. 62, l. 13: + + mis-devotion _1633-54_ + mass-devotion _1669_, _Chambers_ + + Elegie II, p. 80, l. 6: + + is rough _1633_, _1669_ + is tough _1635-54_, _Chambers_ + + Elegie VI, p. 88, ll. 24, 26: + + and then chide _1633_ + and there chide _1635-69_, _Chambers_ + + her upmost brow _1633_ + her utmost brow _1635-69_, _Chambers (an oversight)_. + + Epithalamions, p. 129, l. 60: + + store, _1633_ + starres, _1635-69_, _Chambers_ + + Ibid., p. 133, l. 55: + + I am not then from Court _1633_ + And am I then from Court? _1635-69_, _Chambers_ + + Satyres, p. 169, ll. 37-41: + + The Iron Age _that_ was, when justice was sold, now + Injustice is sold deerer farre; allow + All demands, fees, and duties; gamsters, anon + The mony which you sweat, and sweare for, is gon + Into other hands: _1633_ + + The iron Age _that_ was, when justice was sold (now + Injustice is sold dearer) did allow + All claim'd fees and duties. Gamesters, anon + The mony which you sweat and swear for is gon + Into other hands. _1635-54_, _Chambers_ + (_no italics_; 'that' _a relative pronoun, I take it_) + + The Calme, p. 179, l. 30: + + our brimstone Bath _1633_ + a brimstone bath _1635-69_, _Chambers_ + + To Sr Henry Wotton, p. 180, l. 17: + + dung, and garlike _1633_ + dung, or garlike _1635-69_, _Chambers_ + + Ibid., p. 181, ll. 25, 26: + + The Country is a desert, where no good, + Gain'd, as habits, not borne, is understood. _1633_ + + The Country is a desert, where the good, + Gain'd inhabits not, borne, is not understood. + _1635-54_, _Chambers._ + + + In all these passages, and I could cite others, it seems to + me (I have stated my reasons fully in the notes) that if the + sense of the passage be carefully considered, or Donne's use + of words (e.g. 'mis-devotion'), or the tenor of his thought, + the reading of _1633_ is either clearly correct or has much + to be said for it. Now in all these cases the reading has the + support of all the manuscripts, or of the most and the best.] + + [Footnote 43: e.g. 'their nothing' p. 31, l. 53; 'reclaim'd' + p. 56, l. 25; 'sport' p. 56, l. 27.] + + [Footnote 44: The _1633_ text of these letters, which is + generally that of _A18_, _N_, _TC_, is better than I was at + one time disposed to think, though there are some indubitable + errors and perhaps some original variants. The crucial reading + is at p. 197, l. 58, where _1633_ and _A18_, _N_, _TC_ read + 'not naturally free', while _1635-69_ and _O'F_ read 'borne + naturally free', at first sight an easier and more natural + text, and adopted by both Chambers and Grosart. But + consideration of the passage, and of what Donne says + elsewhere, shows that the _1633_ reading is certainly right.] + + [Footnote 45: The _1650_ printer delighted in colons, which he + generally substituted for semicolons indiscriminately.] + + + + +CANON. + + +The authenticity of all the poems ascribed to Donne in the old +editions is a question which has never been systematically and fully +considered by his editors and critics. A number of poems not included +in these editions have been attributed to him by Simeon (1856), +Grosart (1873), and others on very insufficient grounds, whether of +external evidence or internal probability. Of the poems published in +_1633_, one, Basse's _An Epitaph upon Shakespeare_, was withdrawn at +once; another, the metrical _Psalme 137_, has been discredited and +Chambers drops it.[1] Of those which were added in _1635_, one _To Ben +Ionson. 6 Ian. 1603_, has been dropped by Grosart, the Grolier Club +edition, and Chambers on the strength of a statement made to Drummond +by Ben Jonson.[2] But the editors have accepted Jonson's statement +without apparently giving any thought to the question whether, if this +particular poem is by Roe, the same must not be true of its companion +pieces, _To Ben. Ionson. 9 Novembris, 1603_. and _To Sir Tho. Roe. +1603_. They are inserted together in _1635_, and are strikingly +similar in heading, in style, and in verse. Nor has any critic, so far +as I know, taken up the larger question raised by rejecting one of the +poems ascribed to Donne in _1635_, namely, are not all the poems +then added made thereby to some extent suspect, and if so can we +distinguish those which are from those which are not genuine? I +propose then to discuss, in the light afforded by a wider and more +connected survey of the seventeenth-century manuscript collections, +the authenticity of the poems ascribed to Donne in the old editions, +and to ask what, if any, poems may be added to those there published. + +For this discussion an invaluable starting-point is afforded by the +edition of 1633, the manuscript group _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and the +manuscript group _A18_, _N_, _TCC_, _TCD_. Taken together, and used to +check one another, these three collections provide us with a _corpus_ +of indubitable poems which may be used as a test by which to try other +claimants. Of course, it must be clearly understood that the only +proof which can be offered that Donne is the author of many poems is, +that they are ascribed to him in edition after edition and manuscript +after manuscript, and that they bear a strong family resemblance. +There is no edition issued by himself or in his lifetime.[3] + +Bearing this in mind we find that in the edition of 1633 there are +only two poems--Basse's _Epitaph on Shakespeare_ and the _Psalme 137_, +both already mentioned--for the genuineness of which there is not +strong evidence, internal and external. But these two poems are the +_only_ ones not contained in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ or in _A18_, _N_, _TC_. +In _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, on the other hand, there are no poems which are +not, on the same evidence, genuine. There are, however, some which +are not in _1633_, seven in all. But of these, five are the _Elegies_ +which, we have seen above, the editor of _1633_ was prohibited from +printing. The others are the _Lecture upon the Shadow_ (why omitted in +_1633_ I cannot say) and the lines 'My fortune and my choice'. There +are poems in _1633_ which are not in_ D_, _H49_, _Lec_. These, with +the exception of poems previously printed, as the _Anniversaries_ and +the _Elegie on Prince Henry_, are all in _A18_, _N_, _TC_. This last +collection does contain some twelve poems not by Donne, but of +these the majority are found only in _N_ and _TCD_, and they make no +pretence to be Donne's. Three are initialled 'J. R.' (in _TCD_), and +two of these, with some poems by Overbury and Beaumont, are not part +of the Donne collection but are added at the end. Another poem is +initialled 'R. Cor.' The only poems which are included among Donne's +poems as though by him are _The Paradox_ ('Whoso terms Love a fire') +and the Letter or Elegy, 'Madam soe may my verses pleasing be.' Of +these, the first is in all four manuscripts, the second only in _N_ +and _TCD_. Neither is in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, or _1633_. The last is by +Beaumont, and follows immediately a letter by Donne to the same lady, +the Countess of Bedford. Doubtless the two poems have come from some +collection in which they were transcribed together, ultimately from +a commonplace-book of the Countess herself. The former _may_ be by +Donne, but has probably adhered for a like reason to his paradox, 'No +lover saith' (p. 302), which immediately precedes it. + +We have thus three collections, each of which has kept its canon pure +or very nearly so, and in which any mistake by one is checked by the +absence of the poem in the other two. It cannot be by accident that +these collections are so free from the unauthentic poems which other +manuscripts associate with Donne's. Those who prepared them must +have known what they were about. Marriot must have had some help in +securing a text on the whole so accurate as that of _1633_, and in +avoiding spurious poems on the whole so well. When that guidance was +withdrawn he was only too willing to go a-gathering what would swell +the compass of his volume. If then a poem does not occur in any of +these collections it is not necessarily unauthentic, but as no such +poem has anything like the wide support of the manuscripts that these +have, it should present its credentials, and approve its authenticity +on internal grounds if external are not available. + +We start then with a strong presumption, coming as close to +demonstration as the circumstances of the case will permit, in favour +of the absolute genuineness of all the poems in _1633_ (a glance down +the list headed 'Source' in the 'Contents' will show what these are) +except the two mentioned, and of all the poems added in _1635_, or +later editions, which are also in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ and _A18_, _N_, +_TC_.[4] These last (to which I prefix the date of first publication) +are-- + + _1635._ A Lecture upon the Shadow. + _1635._ Elegie XI. The Bracelet. + _1635._ Elegie XVI. On his Mistris. + _1669._ Elegie XVIII. Love's Progresse. + _1669._ Elegie XIX. Going to Bed. + _1802._[5] Elegie XX. Love's Warr. + +(These are the five _Elegies_ suppressed in _1633_--at such long +intervals did they find their way into print.) + + _1635._ On himselfe. + +We may add to these, without lengthy investigation, the four _Holy +Sonnets_ added in _1635_:-- + + I. 'Thou hast made me.' + III. 'O might those sighs and tears.' + V. 'I am a little world.' + VIII. 'If faithfull soules.' + +For these (though in none of the three collections) we have, besides +internal probability, the evidence of _W_, clearly an unexceptionable +manuscript witness. Walton, too, vouches for the authenticity of the +_Hymne to God my God, in my sicknesse_, which indeed no one but Donne +could have written. + +This leaves for investigation, of poems inserted in _1635_, _1649_, +_1650_, or _1669_, the following:-- + + 1. Song. 'Soules joy, now I am gone.' + + 2. _Farewell to love._ + + 3. Song. 'Deare Love, continue nice and chaste.' + + 4. Sonnet. _The Token._ + + 5. 'He that cannot chuse but love.' + + 6. Elegie (XIII in _1635_). 'Come, Fates; I feare you not.' + + 7. Elegie XII (XIIII in _1635_). _His parting from her._ + + 'Since she must goe, and I must mourne.' + + 8. Elegie XIII (XV in _1635_). _Julia._ + + 'Harke newes, ô envy.' + + 9. Elegie XIV (XVI in _1635_). _A Tale of a Citizen and his + Wife._ 'I sing no harme.' + + 10. Elegie XVII. _Variety._ 'The heavens rejoice.' + + 11. Satyre (VI in _1635_, VII in _1669_). + + 'Men write that love and reason disagree.' + + 12. Satyre (VI in _1669_). + + 'Sleep, next society and true friendship.' + + 13. To the Countesse of Huntington. + + 'That unripe side of earth, that heavy clime.' + + 14. A Dialogue between Sr Henry Wotton and Mr. Donne. + + 'If her disdayne least change in you can move.' + + 15. To Ben Iohnson, 6. Jan. 1603. + + 'The state and mens affaires.' + + 16. To Ben Iohnson, 9. Novembris, 1603. + + 'If great men wrong me.' + + 17. To Sir Tho. Roe. 1603. + + Deare Thom: 'Tell her, if she to hired servants shew.' + + 18. Elegie on Mistresse Boulstred. + + 'Death be not proud.' + + 19. On the blessed Virgin Mary. + + 'In that, ô Queene of Queenes.' + + 20. Upon the translation of the Psalmes by Sir Philip Sydney + and the Countesse of Pembroke his Sister. + + 'Eternall God, (for whom who ever dare).' + + 21. Ode. + + 'Vengeance will sit.' + + 22. To Mr. Tilman after he had taken Orders. + + 'Thou, whose diviner soule hath caus'd thee now.' + + 23. On the Sacrament. + + 'He was the Word that spake it.' + +Of these twenty-three poems there is none which does not seem to me +fairly open to question, though of some I think Donne is certainly the +author. + +Seven of the twenty-three (3, 6, 11, 12, 15, 16, 17) I have gathered +together in my Appendix A, with two ('Shall I goe force' and 'True +love finds witt', the first of which[6] was printed in _Le Prince +d'Amour_, 1660, and reprinted by Simeon, 1856, and Grosart, 1872), as +the work not of Donne but of Sir John Roe. The reasons which have led +me to do so are not perhaps singly conclusive, but taken together they +form a converging and fairly convincing demonstration. The argument +starts from Ben Jonson's statement to Drummond of Hawthornden +regarding the Epistle at p. 408 (15 above): 'That Sir John Roe loved +him; and that when they two were ushered by my Lord Suffolk from a +Mask, Roe writt a moral Epistle to him, which began. That next to +playes the Court and the State were the best. God threatneth Kings, +Kings Lords [as] Lords do us.' (_Drummond's Conversations with +Jonson_), ed. Laing. + +Now this statement of Jonson's is confirmed by some at any rate of +the manuscripts which contain the poem (see textual notes) since these +append the initials 'J. R.' But all the manuscripts which contain the +one poem contain also the next, 'If great men wrong me,' and though +none have added the initials 'J. R.', _B_, in which it has been +separated from 'The state and mens affairs' by two other poems, +appends 'doubtfull author' (the whole collection being professedly one +of Donne's poems). The third poem, _To Sr Tho. Roe, 1603_ (p. 410), +is in the same way found in all the manuscripts (except two, which are +one, _H40_ and _RP31_) which contain the epistles to Jonson, generally +in their immediate proximity, and in _B_ initialled 'J. R.' In the +others the poem is unsigned, and in _L74_ a much later hand has added +'J. D.' + +Of the other poems, the first--the poem which was in _1669_ printed +as Donne's seventh _Satyre_, was dropped in _1719_ but restored by +Chalmers, Grosart, and Chambers--is said in _B_ to be 'By Sir John +Roe', and it is initialled 'J. R.' in _TCD_. Even an undiscriminating +manuscript like _O'F_ adds the note 'Quere, if Donnes or Sr Th: +Rowes', the more famous Sir Thomas Roe being substituted for his (in +1632) forgotten relative. Of the remaining five poems only two, 'Dear +Love, continue nice and chaste' (p. 412) and 'Shall I goe force an +Elegie?' (p. 410) are actually initialled in any of the manuscripts in +which I have found them. + +But the presence or absence of a name or initials is not a conclusive +argument. It depends on the character of the manuscript. That 'Sleep +next Society' is initialled 'J. R.' in so carefully prepared a +collection of Donne's poems as _TCD_ is valuable evidence, and the +initials in a collection so well vouched for as _HN_, Drummond's copy +of a collection of poems in the possession of Donne, can only be set +aside by a scepticism which makes all historical questions insoluble. +But no reliance can be placed upon the unsupported statement of any +other of the manuscripts in which some or all of these poems occur, +any more than on that of the 1635 and later editions. The best of +them (_H40_, _RP31_) are often silent, and the others are too often +mistaken to be implicitly trusted. If we are to get the truth from +them it must be by cross-examination. + +For the second proof on which my ascription of the poems to Roe +is based is the singular regularity with which they adhere to one +another. If a manuscript has one it generally has the rest in close +proximity. Thus _B_, after giving thirty-six poems by Donne, of which +only one is wrongly ascribed, continues with a number that are clearly +by other authors as well as Donne, and of ten sequent poems five are +'Sleep next Society,' 'The State and mens affairs,' 'True love finds +witt,' 'If great men wrong mee,' 'Dear Thom: Tell her if she.' A +fragment of 'Men say that love and reason disagree' comes rather +later. _H40_ and _RP31_ give in immediate sequence 'The State and mens +affairs,' 'If great men wrong me,' 'True Love finds witt,' 'Shall +I goe force an elegie,' 'Come Fates; I fear you not.' _L74_, a +collection not only of poems by Donne but of the work of other wits of +the day, transcribes in immediate sequence 'Deare Love continue,' 'The +State and mens affairs,' 'If great men wrong mee,' 'Shall I goe force +an elegie,' 'Tell her if shee,' 'True love finds witt,' 'Come Fates, +I fear you not.' Lastly _A10_, a quite miscellaneous collection, gives +in immediate or very close sequence '[Dear Thom:] Tell her if she,' +'True love finds witt,' 'Dear Love continue nice and chaste,' 'Shall I +goe force an elegie,' 'Men write that love and reason disagree.' 'Come +Fates; I fear you not' follows after a considerable interval. + +It cannot be by an entire accident that these poems thus recur in +manuscripts which have so far as we can see no common origin.[7] And +as one is ascribed to Roe on indisputable (and) three on very +strong evidence, it is a fair inference, if borne out by a general +resemblance of thought, and style, and verse, that they are all by +Roe. + +To my mind they have a strong family resemblance, and very little +resemblance to Donne's work. They are witty, but not with the subtle, +brilliant, metaphysical wit of Donne; they are obscure at times, but +not as Donne's poetry is, by too swift and subtle transitions, and +ingeniously applied erudition; there are in them none of Donne's +peculiar scholastic doctrines of angelic knowledge, of the microcosm, +of soul and body, or of his chemical and medical allusions; they are +coarse and licentious, but not as Donne's poems are, with a kind of +witty depravity, Italian in origin, and reminding one of Ovid and +Aretino, but like Jonson's poetry with the coarseness of the tavern +and the camp. On both Jonson's and Roe's work rests the trail of what +was probably the most licentious and depraving school in Europe, the +professional armies serving in the Low Countries. + +For a brief account of Roe's life will explain some features of his +poetry, especially the vivid picture of life in London in the Satire, +'Sleep next Society,' which is strikingly different in tone, and in +the aspects of that life which are presented, from anything in Donne's +_Satyres_. Roe has been hitherto a mere name appearing in the notes +to Jonson's and to Donne's poems. No critic has taken the trouble to +identify him. Gifford suggested or stated that he was the son of Sir +Thomas Roe, who as Mayor of London was knighted in 1569. Mr. Chambers +accepts this and when referring to Jonson, _Epigram 98_, on Roe the +ambassador, he adds, 'there are others in the same collection to his +uncles Sir John Roe and William Roe.' Who this uncle was they do not +tell us, but Hunter in the _Chorus Vatum_ notes that, if Gifford's +conjecture be sound, then he must be John Roe of Clapham in +Bedfordshire, the eldest son of the Lord Mayor. + +It is a quaint picture we thus get of the famous ambassador's uncle +(he was older than 'Dear Thom's' father)--a kind of Sir Toby Belch, +taking the pleasures of the town with his nephew, and writing a satire +which might make a young man blush to read. But in fact John Roe of +Clapham was never Sir John, and he was dead twelve years before +1603, when these poems were written.[8] Sir John Roe the poet was the +cousin, not the uncle, of the ambassador. He was the eldest son of +William Rowe (or Roe) of Higham Hill, near Walthamstow, in the county +of Essex.[9] William Roe was the third son of the first Lord Mayor +of the name Roe.[10] He had two sons, John and William, the latter +of whom is probably the person addressed in Jonson's _Epigrammes_, +cxxviii. John was born, according to a statement in Morant's _History +of Essex_ (1768), on the fifth of May, 1581. This harmonizes with the +fact that when the elder William Roe died in 1596 John was still a +minor and thereby a cause of anxiety to his father, who in his will, +proved in 1596, begs his wife and executors to 'be suiters for his +wardeshipp, that his utter spoyle (as much as in them is) maie be +prevented'. This probably refers to the chance of a courtier being +made ward and despoiling the lad. The following year he matriculated +at Queen's College, Oxford.[11] How long he stayed there is not known, +probably not long. The career he chose was that of a soldier, and his +first service was in Ireland. If he went there with Essex in 1599 he +is perhaps one of that general's many knights. But he may have gone +thither later, for he evidently found a patron in Mountjoy. In 1605 +that nobleman, then Earl of Devonshire, wrote to Sir Ralph Winwood, +Ambassador to the United Provinces, first to recommend Roe to him as +one wishing to follow the wars and therein to serve the States; and +then to thank him for his readiness to befriend Sir John Roe. He adds +that he will be ever ready to serve the States to requite any favour +Roe shall receive.[12] By 1608 he was dead, for a list of captains +discharged in Ireland since 1603 gives the following: 'Born in England +and dead in 1608--Sir John Roe.'[13] + +Such in brief outline is the life of the man who in 1603, possibly +between his Irish and Low Country campaigns, appears in London as +one, with his more famous cousin Thomas, of the band of wits and poets +whose leader was Jonson, whose most brilliant star was Donne. Jonson's +epigrams and conversations enable us to fill in some of the colours +wanting in the above outline. The most interesting of these shows Roe +to have been in Russia as well as Ireland and the Low Countries, and +tells us that he was, like 'Natta the new knight' in his _Satyre_, a +duellist: + + +XXXII. + +ON SIR IOHN ROE. + + What two brave perills of the private sword + Could not effect, not all the furies doe, + That selfe-devided _Belgia_ did afford; + What not the envie of the seas reach'd too, + The cold of _Mosco_, and fat _Irish_ ayre, + His often change of clime (though not of mind) + What could not worke; at home in his repaire + Was his blest fate, but our hard lot to find. + Which shewes, where ever death doth please t' appeare, + Seas, serenes, swords, shot, sicknesse, all are there. + +In his conversations with Drummond Jonson as usual gave more intimate +and less complimentary details: 'Sir John Roe was an infinite spender, +and used to say, when he had no more to spend he could die. He died +in his (i.e. Jonson's) arms of the pest, and he furnished his charges +20lb., which was given him back,' doubtless by his brother William. +Morant states that 'Sir John the eldest son, having no issue, sold +this Manor (i.e. Higham-hill) to his father-in-law Sir Reginald +Argall, of whom it was purchased by the second son--Sir William Rowe'. + +Such a career is much more likely than Donne's to have produced the +satire 'Sleep, next Society', with its lurid picture of cashiered +captains, taverns, stews, duellists, hard drinkers, and parasites. +It is much more like a scene out of _Bartholomew Fair_ than any of +Donne's five _Satyres_. Nor was Donne likely at any time to have +written of James I as Roe does. He moved in higher circles, and was +more politic. But Roe had ability. 'Deare Love, continue nice and +chaste' is not quite in the taste of to-day, but it is a good example +of the paradoxical, metaphysical lyric; and there are both feeling +and wit in 'Come, Fates; I feare you not', unlike as it is to Donne's +subtle, erudite, intenser strain. + +Returning to the list of poems open to question on pp. cxxviii-ix we +have sixteen left to consider. Of some of these there is very little +to say. + +Nos. 1 and 14 are most probably by the Earl of Pembroke, and the Earl +of Pembroke collaborating with Sir Benjamin Rudyard. Both were wits +and poets of Donne's circle. The first song, + + 'Soules joy, now I am gone' + +is ascribed to Donne only in _1635-69_, and is there inaccurately +printed. It is assigned to Pembroke in the younger Donne's edition +of Pembroke and Ruddier's _Poems_ (1660), a bad witness, but also +by Lansdowne MS. 777, which Mr. Chambers justly calls 'a very good +authority'.[14] The latter, however, believes the poem to be Donne's +because the central idea--the inseparableness of souls--is his, and so +is the contemptuous tone of + + Fooles have no meanes to meet, + But by their feet. + +But both the contemptuous tone and the Platonic thought were growing +common. We get it again in Lovelace's + + If to be absent were to be + Away from thee. + +The thought is Donne's, but not the airy note, the easy style, or +the tripping prosody. Donne never writes of absence in this cheerful, +confident strain. He consoles himself at times with the doctrine of +inseparable souls, but the note of pain is never absent. He cannot +cheat his passionate heart and senses with metaphysical subtleties. + +The song _Farewell to love_, the second in the list of poems added +in _1635_, is found only in _O'F_ and _S96_. There is therefore no +weighty external evidence for assigning it to Donne, but no one can +read it without feeling that it is his. The cynical yet passionate +strain of wit, the condensed style, and the metaphysical turn given to +the argument, are all in his manner. As printed in _1635_ the point +of the third stanza is obscured. As I have ventured to amend it, an +Aristotelian doctrine is referred to in a way that only Donne would +have done in quite such a setting. + +The three _Elegies_, XII, XIII, and XIV (7, 8, 9 in the list), must +also be assigned to Donne, unless some more suitable candidate can be +advanced on really convincing grounds. The first of the three, _His +parting from her_, is so fine a poem that it is difficult to think any +unknown poet could have written it. In sincerity and poetic quality it +is one of the finest of the _Elegies_,[15] and in this sincerer +note, the absence of witty paradox, it differs from poems like _The +Bracelet_ and _The Perfume_ and resembles the fine elegy called _His +Picture_ and two other pieces that stand somewhat apart from the +general tenor of the _Elegies_, namely, the famous elegy _On his +Mistris_, in which he dissuades her from travelling with him as a +page: + + By our first strange and fatal interview, + +and that rather enigmatical poem _The Expostulation_, which found its +way into Jonson's _Underwoods_: + + To make the doubt clear that no woman's true, + Was it my fate to prove it strong in you? + +All of these poems bear the imprint of some actual experience, and to +this cause we may perhaps trace the comparative rareness with which +_His parting from her_ is found in manuscripts, and that it finally +appeared in a mutilated form. The poet may have given copies only to +a few friends and desired that it should not be circulated. In the +Second Collection of poems in _TCD_ it is signed at the close, 'Sir +Franc: Wryothlesse.' Who is intended by this I do not know. The +ascriptions in this collection are many of them purely fanciful. +Still, that the poem is Donne's rests on internal evidence alone. + +Of the other two elegies, _Julia_, which is found in only two +manuscripts, _B_ and _O'F_, is quite the kind of thing Donne might +have amused himself by writing in the scurrilous style of Horace's +invectives against Canidia, frequently imitated by Mantuan and other +Humanists. The chief difficulty with regard to the second, _A Tale of +a Citizen and his Wife_, is to find Donne writing in this vein at +so late a period as 1609 or 1610, the date implied in several of the +allusions. He was already the author of religious poems, including +probably _La Corona_. In 1610 he wrote his _Litanie_, and, as +Professor Norton points out, in the same letter in which he tells of +the writing of the latter he refers to some poem of a lighter nature, +the name of which is lost through a mutilation of the letter, and +says, 'Even at this time when (I humbly thank God) I ask and have his +comfort of sadder meditations I do not condemn in myself that I +have given my wit such evaporations as those, if they be free from +profaneness, or obscene provocations.' Whether this would cover the +elegy in question is a point on which perhaps our age and Donne's +would not decide alike. Donne's nature was a complex one. Jack Donne +and the grave and reverend divine existed side by side for not a +little time, and even in the sermons Donne's wit is once or twice +rather coarser than our generation would relish in the pulpit. But +once more we must add that it is possible Donne has in this case +been made responsible for what is another's. Every one wrote this +occasional poetry, and sometimes wrote it well. + +There is no more difficult poem to understand or to assign to or from +Donne than the long letter headed _To the Countesse of Huntington_, 13 +on the list, which, for the time being, I have placed in the Appendix +B. On internal grounds there is more to be said for ascribing it to +Donne than any other single poem in this collection. Nevertheless I +have resolved to let it stand, that it may challenge the attention it +deserves.[16] The reasons which led me to doubt Donne's authorship are +these: + +(1) The poem was not included in the 1633 edition, nor is it found in +either of the groups _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ and _A18_, _N_, _TCC_, _TCD_. +It was added in _1635_ with four other spurious poems, the dialogue +ascribed to Donne and Wotton but assigned by the great majority of +manuscripts to the Earl of Pembroke and Sir Benjamin Rudyard, the two +epistles to Ben Jonson, and the Elegy addressed to Sir Thomas Roe, +which we have assigned, for reasons given above, to Sir John Roe. The +poem is found in only two manuscript collections, viz. _P_ and the +second, miscellaneous collection of seventeenth-century poems in +_TCD_. In both of these it is headed _Sr Walter Ashton_ (or _Aston_) +_to the Countesse of Huntingtone_, and no reference whatsoever is made +to Donne. I do not attach much importance to this title. Imaginary +headings were quite common in the case of poems circulating in +manuscript. Poems are inscribed as having been written by the Earl of +Essex or Sir Walter Raleigh the night before he died, or as found in +the pocket of Chidiock Tichbourne. Editors have occasionally taken +these too seriously. Drayton's _Heroicall Epistles_ made it a fashion +to write such letters in the case of any notorious love affair or +intrigue. The manuscript _P_ contains a long imaginary letter from Sir +Philip Sidney to Lady Mary Rich and a fragment of her reply. In +the same manuscript the poem, probably by the Earl of Pembroke, +'Victorious beauty though your eyes,' is headed _The Mar: B to the +Lady Fe: Her._, i.e. the Marquis of Buckingham to--I am not sure what +lady is intended. The only thing which the title given to the letter +in question suggests is that it was not an actual letter to the +Countess but an imaginary one. + +(2) Of Donne's relations with Elizabeth Stanley, who in 1603 became +the Countess of Huntingdon, his biographers have not been able to tell +us very much. He must have met her at the house of Sir Thomas Egerton +when her mother, the dowager Countess of Derby, married that statesman +in 1600. Donne says: + + I was your Prophet in your yonger dayes, + And now your Chaplaine, God in you to praise. + + (p. 203, ll. 69-70.) + +Donne's friend, Sir Henry Goodyere, seems to have had relations with +her either directly or through her first cousin, the Countess of +Bedford, for Donne writes to him from Mitcham, 'I remember that +about this time you purpose a journey to fetch, or meet the Lady +_Huntington_.' This fact lends support to the view of Mr. Chambers +and Mr. Gosse that she is 'the Countesse' referred to in the following +extract from a letter to Goodyere, which has an important bearing on +the poem under consideration. Very unfortunately it is not dated, and +Mr. Chambers and Mr. Gosse differ widely as to the year in which it +may have been written. The latter places it in April, 1615, when +Donne was on the eve of taking Orders, and was approaching his noble +patronesses for help in clearing himself of debt. But Mr. Chambers +points to the closing reference to 'a Christning at _Peckam_', and +dates the letter 1605-6, when Donne was at Peckham after leaving +Pyrford and before settling at Mitcham. I am not sure that this is +conclusive, for in Donne's unsettled life before 1615 Mrs. Donne might +at any time have gone for her lying-in or for a christening festival +to the house of her sister Jane, Lady Grimes, at Peckham. But the tone +of the letter, melancholy and reflective, is that of the letters to +Goodyere written at Mitcham, and the general theme of the letter, a +comparison of the different Churches, is that of other letters of +the same period. The one in question (_Letters_ 1651, p. 100; +Gosse, _Life_, ii. 77) seems to be almost a continuation of another +(_Letters_, 1651, p. 26; Gosse, _Life_, i. 225). Whatever be its date, +this is what Donne says: 'For the other part of your Letter, spent +in the praise of the Countesse, I am always very apt to beleeve it of +her, and can never beleeve it so well, and so reasonably, as now, when +it is averred by you; but for the expressing it to her, in that sort +as you seeme to counsaile, I have these two reasons to decline it. +That that knowledge which she hath of me, was in the beginning of +a graver course then of a Poet, into which (that I may also keep my +dignity) I would not seeme to relapse. The Spanish proverb informes +me, that he is a fool which cannot make one Sonnet, and he is mad +which makes two. The other strong reason is my integrity to the other +Countesse' (i.e. probably the Countess of Bedford. The words which +follow seem to imply a more recent acquaintance than is compatible +with so late a date as 1615), 'of whose worthinesse though I swallowed +your words, yet I have had since an explicit faith, and now a +knowledge: and for her delight (since she descends to them) I had +reserved not only all the verses which I should make, but all the +thoughts of womens worthinesse. But because I hope she will not +disdain, that I should write well of her Picture, I have obeyed you +thus far as to write; but intreat you by your friendship, that by this +occasion of versifying, I be not traduced, nor esteemed light in that +Tribe, and that house where I have lived. If those reasons which moved +you to bid me write be not constant in you still, or if you meant +not that I should write verses; or if these verses be too bad, or too +good, over or under her understanding, and not fit; I pray receive +them as a companion and supplement of this Letter to you,' &c. If this +was written in 1615 it is incompatible with the fact (supposing the +poem under consideration to be by Donne) that he had already written +to the Countess of Huntingdon a letter in a very thinly disguised tone +of amatory compliment. If, however, it was written, as is probable, +earlier, the reference may be to this very poem. Perhaps Goodyere +thought it 'over or under' the Countess's understanding and did not +present it. + +(3) Certainly, looking at the poem itself, one has difficulty in +declaring it to be, or not to be, Donne's work. Its metaphysical wit +and strain of high-flown, rarefied compliment suggest that only he +could have written it; in parts, on the other hand, the tone does not +seem to me to be his. It is certainly very different from that of the +other letters to noble ladies. It carries one back to the date of the +_Elegies_. If Donne's, it is a further striking proof how much of the +tone of a lover even a married poet could assume in addressing a noble +patroness. Would Donne at any time of his life write to the Countess +of Huntingdon in the vein of p. 418, ll. 21-36, or the next paragraph, +ll. 37-76? One could imagine the Earl of Pembroke, or some one on +a level of equality socially with the Countess, writing so; not a +dependent addressing a patroness. The only points of style and verse +which might serve as clues are (1) the peculiar use of 'young', +e.g. l. 84 'youngest flatteries', l. 13 'younger formes'. With which +compare in the _Letter_ to Wotton, here added, at p. 188: + + Ere sicknesses attack, yong death is best. + +(2) A recurring pattern of line to which Sir Walter Raleigh drew my +attention: + + 35. Who first looked sad, griev'd, pin'd, and shew'd his pain. + 61. Love is wise here, keeps home, gives reason sway. + 88. You are the straight line, thing prais'd, attribute. + 113. Such may have eye and hand, may sigh, may speak. + +I have not found this pattern elsewhere, and indeed the versification +throughout seems to me unlike that of Donne. Donne's decasyllabic +couplets have two quite distinctive patterns. The one is that of the +_Satyres_. In these the logical or rhetorical scheme runs right across +the metrical scheme--that is, the sense overflows from line to line, +and the pauses come regularly inside the line. A good example is the +paragraph beginning at p. 156, l. 65. + + Graccus loves all as one, &c. + +In the _Elegies_ and in the _Letters_ the structure is not so +irregular and unmusical, but is periodic or paragraphic, i.e. the +lines do not fall into couplets but into larger groups knit together +by a single sentence or some closely connected sentences, the full +meaning or emphasis being well sustained to the close. Good examples +are _Elegie I._ ll. 1 to 16, _Elegie IV._ ll. 13 to 26, _Elegie V._ l. +5 to the end, _Elegie VIII._ ll. 1 to 34. Excellent examples are also +the letter _To the Countesse of Salisbury_ and the _Hymn to the Saints +and the Marquesse Hamylton_. Each of these is composed of three or +four paragraphs at the most. Now in the poem under consideration +there are two, or three at the most, paragraphs which suggest Donne's +manner, viz. ll. 1 to 10, ll. 11 to 16, and ll. 37 to 46. But the rest +of the poem is almost monotonously regular in its couplet structure. +To my mind the poem is not unlike what Rudyard might have written. +Indeed a fine piece of verse by Rudyard, belonging to the dialogue +between him and the Earl of Pembroke on Love and Reason, is attributed +to Donne in several manuscripts. The question is an open one, but had +I realized in time the weakness of the positive external evidence I +should not have moved the poem. I have been able to improve the text +materially. + +With regard to the _Elegie on Mistris Boulstred_ (18 on the list) I +cannot expect readers to accept at once the conjecture I have ventured +to put forward regarding the authorship, for I have changed my own +mind regarding it. Two Elegies, both perhaps on Mris. Boulstred, Donne +certainly did write, viz. + + Death I recant, and say, unsaid by mee + What ere hath slip'd, that might diminish thee; + +and another, entitled _Death_, beginning + + Language thou art too narrow, and too weake + To ease us now; great sorrow cannot speake. + +Both of these are attributed to Donne by quite a number of manuscripts +and are very characteristic of his poetry in this kind, highly charged +with ingenious wit and extravagant eulogy. It is worth noting that in +the Hawthornden MS. the second bears no title (it is signed 'J. D.'), +and that it is not included in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. It is certainly +Donne's; it is not quite certain that it was written on Mris. +Boulstred. Indeed, as I have pointed out elsewhere, the reference to +Judith in a verse letter which seems to have been sent to Lady Bedford +with the poem, and the tenor of the poem, suggest that Lady Markham +is the subject of the elegy. Jonson, in speaking of Mris. Boulstred, +says, 'whose Epitaph Done made,' which points to a single poem; but he +may have been speaking loosely, or be loosely reported. + +In contrast to these two elegies that beginning 'Death be not proud' +is found in only five manuscripts, _B_, _H40_, _O'F_, _P_, _RP31_. +Of these _H40_ and _RP31_ are really one, and in them the poem is not +ascribed to Donne. In two others, _O'F_ and _P_, the poem is given in +a very interesting and suggestive manner, viz. as a continuation of +'Death I recant'. What this suggests is the fairly obvious fact that +the second poem is to some extent a reply to the first. 'Death I +recant' is answered by 'Death be not proud'. If _O'F_ and _P_ are +right in their arrangement, then Donne answers himself. Beginning in +one mood, he closes in another; from a mood which is almost rebellious +he passes to one of Christian resignation. This was the view I put +forward in a note to the Cambridge _History of Literature_ (iv. 216). +I had hardly, however, sent off my proofs before I felt that there +was more than one objection to this view. There is in the first +place nothing to show that 'Death I recant' is not a poem complete +in itself; there is no preparation for the recantation. In the second +place, 'Death be not proud' is as a poem slighter in texture, vaguer +in thought, in feeling more sentimental and pious, than Donne's own +_Epicedes_. Whoever wrote it had a warmer feeling for Mris. Boulstred +than underlies Donne's rather frigid hyperboles. This suggested to me +that the poem was indeed an answer to 'Death I recant', but by another +person, another member of Lady Bedford's entourage. In this mood I +came on the ascription in _H40_, viz. 'By C. L. of B.' This indicated +no one whom I knew; but in _RP31_ it appeared as 'By L. C. of B.,' +i.e. Lucy, Countess of Bedford. We know that the Countess did write +verses, for Donne refers to them. In a letter which Mr. Gosse dates +1609 (Gosse's _Life_, &c., i. 217; _Letters_, 1651, p. 67) he speaks +of some verses written to himself: 'They must needs be an excellent +exercise of your wit, which speak so well of so ill.' That the +Countess of Bedford could have written 'Death be not proud', we cannot +prove in the absence of other examples of her work; that if she could +she did, is very likely. She had probably asked Donne for some verses +on the death of her friend. He replied with 'Death I recant'. The +tone, which if not pagan is certainly not Christian, while it is +untouched by any real feeling for the subject of the elegy, displeased +her, and she replied in lines at once more ardent and more resigned. +At any rate, whether by Lady Bedford or not, the poem is not like +Donne's work, and the external evidence is against its being his. _B_ +attributes it to 'F. B.', i.e. Francis Beaumont. It is right, on the +other hand, to point out that Donne opens one of the _Holy Sonnets_ +with the exclamation used here: + + Death be not proud! + +I have left the question of authorship an open one. Personally I +cannot bring myself to think that it is Donne's. + +The sonnet _On the Blessed Virgin Mary_ (19 on the list), 'In that +O Queene of Queenes, thy birth was free,' is included among Donne's +poems in _1635_ and in _B_, _O'F_, _S_, _S96_. There is little doubt +that it is not Donne's but Henry Constable's. It is found in a series +of Spiritual Sonnets by H. C., in Harl. MS. 7553, f. 41, which were +first published by T. Park in _Heliconia_, ii. 1815, and unless all +of these are to be given to Donne this cannot. It is not in his style, +and Donne more than once denies the Immaculate Conception in the +full Catholic sense of the doctrine. Nothing could more expressly +contradict this sonnet than the lines in the _Second Anniversarie_: + + Where thou shalt see the blessed Mother-maid + Joy in not being that, which men have said. + Where she is exalted more for being good, + Then for her interest of Mother-hood. + +Of the next three poems (20, 21, 22 on the list), the second, the +_Ode_ beginning 'Vengeance will sit above our faults', seems to me +very doubtful, although on second thoughts I have re-transferred +it from the Appendix to the place among the _Divine Poems_ which +it occupies in _1635_. Against its authenticity are the following +considerations: (1) It is not at all in the style of Donne's other +specifically religious poems. The elevated, stoical tone is more like +Jonson's occasional religious pieces than Donne's personal, tormented, +Scholastic _Divine Poems_. (2) Of the manuscripts in which it appears, +_B_, _Cy_, _H40_, _RP31_, _O'F_, _P_, _S_, the best, _RP31_, assigns +it, not to Donne, but to 'Sir Edward Herbert', i.e. Lord Herbert of +Cherbury.[17] Mr. Chambers, indeed, inadvertently stated that in this +manuscript 'it is said to have been written to George Herbert'. The +name 'Sr Edw. Herbert' is written beside the poem, and that in such +cases is meant to indicate the author of the poem. It seems to me +quite possible that it was written by Lord Herbert, but until more +evidence be forthcoming I have let it stand, because (1) the letters +'I. D.' printed after the poem show that the poem must have been +so initialled in the manuscript from which it was printed, and (2) +because, though not in the style of Donne's later religious poems, it +is somewhat in the style of the philosophical, stoical letter which +Donne addressed to Sir Edward Herbert at the siege of Juliers in 1610. +The poem was possibly composed at the same time. (3) The thought of +the last verse, our ignorance of ourselves, recurs in Donne's poems +and prose. Compare _Negative Love_ (p. 66): + + If any who deciphers best, + What we know not, our selves, + +and the passage quoted in the note to this poem. + +The poem _Upon the translation of the Psalmes by Sir Philip Sydney, +and the Countesse of Pembroke his Sister_, if by Donne, was probably +written late in his life and never widely circulated. It occurred +to me that the author might be John Davies of Hereford, who was +a dependent of the Countess and her two sons, and who made a +calligraphic copy of the _Psalms_ of Sidney and his sister, from +which they were printed by Singer in 1823. But Professor Saintsbury +considers, I think justly, that the 'wit' of the opening lines, + + Eternall God (for whom who ever dare + Seeke new expressions, doe the Circle square, + And thrust into strait corners of poore wit + Thee who art cornerlesse and infinite), + +is above Davies' level, and indeed the whole poem is. The lines _To +Mr. Tilman after he had taken orders_ (22 on the list) were also +probably privately communicated to the person to whom they were +addressed. The best argument for their genuineness is that Walton +seems to quote from them when he describes Donne's preaching. + + For they doe + As Angels out of clouds, from Pulpits speake, + +must have suggested 'always preaching to himself, like an angel from a +cloud, but in none'. This does not, however, carry us very far. Walton +had seen the editions of 1635 and 1639 before he wrote these lines in +1640. + +The verse _On the Sacrament_ (23 on the list) is probably assigned to +Donne by a pure conjecture. It is very frequently attributed to Queen +Elizabeth. + +Of the two poems added in _1649_ the lines _Upon Mr. Thomas Coryats +Crudities_ are of course Donne's. They appeared with his name in his +lifetime, and Donne is one of the friends mentioned by Coryat in his +letters from India. _The Token_ (4 on the list) may or may not be +Donne's. It is found in several, but no very good, manuscripts. +Its wit is quite in Donne's style, though not absolutely beyond the +compass of another. The poems which the younger Donne added in _1650_ +are in much the same position. 'He that cannot chose but love' (5 +on the list) is a trifle, whoever wrote it. 'The heavens rejoice in +motion' (10 on the list) is in a much stronger strain of paradox, and +if not Donne's is by an ambitious and witty disciple. If genuine, it +is strange that it did not find its way into more collections. It is +found in _A10_, where a few of Donne's poems are given with others by +Roe, Hoskins, and other wits of his circle. It is also, however, given +in _JC_, a manuscript containing in its first part few poems that are +not demonstrably genuine. As things stand, the balance of evidence is +in favour of Donne's authorship. + +Besides the _Elegies XVIII_ and _XIX_, which are Donne's, as we have +seen, and the _Satyre_ 'Sleep next Society', which is not Donne's, the +edition of 1669 prefixed to the song _Breake of Day_ a fresh stanza: + + Stay, O sweet, and do not rise. + +It appears in the same position in _S96_, but is given as a separate +poem in _A25_, _C_, _O'F_, and _P_. It certainly has no connexion with +Donne's poem, for the metre is entirely different and the strain of +the poetry less metaphysical. + +The separate stanza was a favourite one in Song-Books of the +seventeenth century. It was printed apparently for the first time in +1612, in _The First Set of Madrigals and Motets of five Parts: apt for +Viols and Voices. Newly composed by Orlando Gibbons_. Here it begins + + Ah, deare hart why doe you rise? + +In the same year it was printed in _A Pilgrimes Solace. Wherein is +contained Musicall Harmonie of 3, 4 and 5 parts, to be sung and plaid +with the Lute and Viols. By John Dowland._ The stanza begins + + Sweet stay awhile, why will you rise? + +Mr. Chambers conjectures that the affixing of Dowland's initials to +the verse in some collection led to Donne being credited with it, +which is quite likely; but we are not sure that Dowland wrote it, and +the common theme appears to have drawn the poems together. In _The +Academy of Complements, Wherein Ladies, Gentlewomen, Schollers, +and Strangers may accomodate their Courtly practice with gentile +Ceremonies, Complemental amorous high expressions, and Formes of +speaking or writing of Letters most in fashion_ (1650) the verse is +connected with a variation of the first stanza of Donne's poem so as +to make a consistent song: + + Lie still, my dear, why dost thou rise? + The light that shines comes from thine eyes. + The day breaks not, it is my heart, + Because that you and I must part. + Stay or else my joys will die, + And perish in their infancy. + 'Tis time, 'tis day, what if it be? + Wilt thou therefore arise from me? + Did we lie down because of night, + And shall we rise for fear of light? + No, since in darkness we came hither, + In spight of light we'll lye together. + Oh! let me dye on thy sweet breast + Far sweeter than the Phœnix nest. + +It was probably some such combination as this which suggested to the +editor of _1669_ to prefix the stanza to Donne's poem. The poem in +_The Academy of Compliments_ was repeated in _Wits Interpreter, the +English Parnassus, a sure guide to those Admirable Accomplishments +that compleat our English Gentry in the most acceptable Qualifications +of Discourse or Writing_ (1655). But the first stanza is given again +in this collection as a separate poem. + +The translation of the _Psalme 137_, which was inserted in _1633_ +and never withdrawn (as the _Epitaph on Shakespeare_ was) is pretty +certainly not by Donne. The only manuscript which ascribes it to him +is _A25_ followed by _C_. On the other hand it is assigned to Francis +Davison, editor of the _Poetical Rhapsody_, in _RP61_ (Bodleian +Library). In one manuscript, Addl. MS. 27407, the poem is accompanied +with a letter, unsigned and undirected, which speaks of this as one +out of several translations made by the author. The handwriting and +style of the letter are not Donne's, but the letter explains why this +one Psalm is found floating around by itself. It was, the translator +says, a freer paraphrase than the others. Apparently it proved a +favourite. + +When one turns from the poems attributed to Donne in the old editions +to those which some of the more recent editors have added, one +launches into a sea which I have no intention of attempting to +navigate in its entirety. Both Sir John Simeon and Dr. Grosart were +disposed to cry 'Eureka' too readily, and assigned to Donne a number +of poems culled from various manuscripts for the genuineness of which +there is no evidence external or internal. I shall confine my remarks +to the few poems I have myself incorporated for the first time in an +edition of Donne's poems; to the Song 'Absence hear my protestation', +which it is now the fashion to ascribe to Donne absolutely, letting +evidence 'go hang'; and to the four poems which Mr. Chambers printed +from _A25_. I have added some more in my Appendix C, because they are +interesting [Greek: adespota] illustrative of the influence in +seventeenth-century poetry of Donne's realistic passion and his +paradoxical wit. + +Of the poems which appear here for the first time in a collected +edition, it is not necessary to say much of those which are taken from +_W_, the Westmoreland MS. now in the possession of Mr. Gosse, who with +the greatest and most spontaneous kindness has permitted me to print +them all. These include two Epigrams, four additional Letters, and +three Holy Sonnets. The Epigrams, the Holy Sonnets, and two of the +Letters have been already printed by Mr. Gosse in his _Life of John +Donne_, 1899. There can be no doubt of their genuineness. They enlarge +a series of Letters and a series of Sonnets which appear in _1633_ and +in all the best manuscript collections. In their arrangement I have +followed _W_ in preference to _1633_, which is based on _A18_, _N_, +_TC_. Of the letter taken from the Burley MS. there may be greater +doubt in some minds. To me it seems unquestionably Donne's (aut Donne +aut Diabolus), an addition to the series of letters which he wrote +to Sir Henry Wotton between the return of the Islands Expedition and +Essex's return from Ireland. The Burley MS. is a commonplace-book +of Wotton's and includes poems which we know as Donne's, e.g. 'Come, +Madam, come'; some of his Paradoxes with a covering letter; other +letters which from their substance and style seem to be Donne's; and a +number of poems, including this which alone of all the doubtful poems +in the manuscript is initialled 'J. D.' The manuscript contains work +by Donne. Does this come under that head? Only internal evidence can +decide. Of the other poems in the manuscript, most of which I print in +Appendix C, none are certainly Donne's. + +'Absence heare my protestation' was printed in Donne's lifetime +in Davison's _A Poetical Rhapsody_ (1602, 1608, 1621), but with no +reference to Donne's authorship, although his name was yearly growing +a more popular hostel for wandering, unclaimed poems.[18] It was not +printed in any edition of his poems from _1633_ to _1719_. It is not +found in either of the most trustworthy manuscript collections, _D_, +_H49_, _Lec_, or _A18_, _N_, _TC_. It _is_ found in _B_, _Cy_, _L74_, +_O'F_, _P_, _S96_, but none of these can be counted an authority. In +1711 it was for the first time ascribed to Donne in _The Grove_, +a miscellaneous collection of poems, on the authority of 'an old +Manuscript of Sir John Cotton's of Stratton in Huntington-Shire'. +On the other hand, in one well authenticated manuscript, _HN_, it is +transcribed by William Drummond of Hawthornden from what he describes +as a collection of poems 'belonging to John Don' (not '_by_ Donne'), +and, with another poem, is initialled 'J. H.' That other poem called + + _His Melancholy._ + + Love is a foolish melancholy, &c., + +is by a Manchester manuscript (Farmer-Chetham MS., ed. Grosart, +_Chetham Society Publications_, lxxxix, xc) assigned to 'Mr. Hoskins', +and in another manuscript (_A10_) it is signed 'H' with the left leg +of H so written as to suggest JH run together. Clearly at any rate +the _onus probandi_ lies with those who say the poem is by Donne. +Internally it has never seemed to me so since I came to know Donne +well. The metaphysical, subtle strain is like Donne, as it is in +_Soules Joy_, but here as there (though there is more feeling in +_Absence_, the closing line has a very Donne-like note of sudden +anguish, 'and so miss her') the tone is airier, the prosody more +tripping. The stressed syllables are less weighted emotionally and +vocally. Compare + + Sweetest love, I do not goe, + For wearinesse of thee + Nor in hope the world can show + A fitter Love for me; + +or + + Draw not up seas to drowne me in thy spheare, + Weepe me not dead, in thine armes, but forbeare + To teach the sea, what it may doe too soone; + +with the more tripping measure, in which one touches the stressed +syllables as with tiptoe, of + + By absence this good means I gaine, + That I can catch her + Where none can watch her, + In some close corner of my braine. + +There are more of Hoskins' poems extant, but the manuscript volume of +poems which he left behind ('bigger than those of Dr. Donne') was lost +in 1653. + +Four poems were first printed as Donne's by Mr. Chambers (op. cit., +Appendix B). They are all found in Addl. MS. 25707 (_A25_), and, so +far as I know, there only. I have placed them first in Appendix C, +as the only pieces in that Appendix which are at all likely to be by +Donne. _A25_ is a manuscript written in a number of different hands, +some six within the portion that includes poems by Donne. The relative +age of these it would be impossible to assign with any confidence. +What looks the oldest (I may call it A) is used only for three poems, +viz. Donne's _Elegye_: 'What [_sic_] that in Color it was like thy +haire,' his _Obsequies Upon the Lord Harrington yt last died_, and the +_Elegie of Loves progresse_. It is in Elizabethan secretary's hand, +and seems to me identical with the writing in which the same poems are +copied in C, the Cambridge University Library MS. A second hand, B, +inserts the larger number of the poems unquestionably by Donne in +close succession, but a third hand, C, transcribes several by Donne +along with poems by other wits, as Francis Beaumont. A fourth hand, +D, seems to be the latest because it is the handwriting in which the +Index was made out, and the poems inserted in this hand are inserted +in odd spaces left by the other writers. Now of the poems in question, +one, _A letter written by S^{r} H: G: and J. D. alternis vicibus_, +is copied by D, and the same hand adds immediately _An Elegie on the +Death of my never enough Lamented master King Charles the First_, by +Henry Skipwith. The poem attributed to Donne was therefore not entered +here till after 1649. But of course it may have come from an older +source, and it has quite the appearance of being genuine. Whoever made +the collection would seem to have had access to some of Goodyere's +work, for this poem is almost immediately preceded by an _Epithalamion +of the Princess Mariage_, by S^{r} H. G., and a little earlier the +_Good Friday_ poem by Donne is headed _Mr J. Dun goeing from Sir H. G. +on good friday sent him back this Meditacon on the waye_. That reads +like a note by Goodyere himself. If this be what happened, the copyist +may have ascribed to Donne some of Goodyere's own verses. Certainly +there is nothing in the other three poems, 'O Fruitful garden,' +'Fie, fie, you sons of Pallas,' 'Why chose she black' (all in the +handwriting C) which would warrant our ascribing them to Donne. Later +in the collection a coarse poem, 'Why should not Pilgrims to thy body +come,' in a fifth hand, is signed J. D., but _P_ assigns it to F. B., +and it is more in Beaumont's style. Poems by and on Beaumont occupy a +considerable space in _A25_. He is a quite possible candidate for the +authorship of some of the poems assigned to Donne in the hand C. + +Mr. Hazlitt attributes to Donne (_General Index to Hazlitt's Handbook, +&c._, p. 228) a Funeral Elegie on the death of Philip Stanhope, who +died at Christ Church in 1625. I have not been able to find the volume +in which it appears; but, as it is said to be by John Donne _Alumnus_, +the author must be the younger Donne. + + + [Footnote 1: Mr. Chambers has reprinted a good many of these, + but only in an Appendix and under the title of _Doubtful + Poems_. He has added a few more from _A25_, from _Coryats + Crudities_, and from some manuscripts in the Bodleian Library. + If printed at all it is a pity that these poems were not + reproduced more correctly. Textually the appendices are much + the worst part of Mr. Chambers' edition. In most cases he has, + I presume, taken the poems over as they stand from Simeon and + Grosart.] + + [Footnote 2: All three editors have also dropped the song + 'Deare Love continue nice and chaste', David Laing having + pointed out (_Archaeologia Scotica_, iv. 73-6) that this poem + occurs in the Hawthornden MSS, with the signature 'J. R.' + Chambers also rejects the sonnet _On the Blessed Virgin Mary_, + probably by Henry Constable, and all three editors exclude the + lines _On the Sacrament_.] + + [Footnote 3: I have given with each poem a list of the + editions and manuscripts (known to me) in which it is + contained. A glance at these will show the weight of the + external evidence. Of internal evidence every man must be + judge for himself.] + + [Footnote 4: To these must of course be added poems already + published in Donne's name. See II. lvi.] + + [Footnote 5: In F. G. Waldron's _A Collection of Miscellaneous + Poetry_. 1802.] + + [Footnote 6: Chambers includes it in his Appendix A, _Doubtful + Poems_, but seems to lean to the view that it is by Roe. The + second is printed as Donne's by Grosart and as presumably + Donne's by Chambers.] + + [Footnote 7: In _O'F_ and _S_, where they also occur, they + are more dispersed; but these manuscripts have, like _1635_, + adopted a classification of the poems they contain which + involves their distribution as songs, elegies, letters + and satires. _A10_ is the most significant witness. This + manuscript contains very few poems by Donne. Why should it + select just this suspicious group?] + + [Footnote 8: Among the marriage licences granted by the Bishop + of London in 1601 (_Harleian Society Publications_) is the + following: 'Henry Sackford the younger, of the Charter House, + Gent; 27, father dead, and Sarah Rowe of St Johns in St John's + Street, co. Middlesex, Maiden, dau. of John Rowe of Clapham, + Beds, Esq. decd (i.e. deceas'd) about 9 years since,' &c.] + + [Footnote 9: See the genealogies given in the _Harleian + Society Publications_, vol. xiii, 1878, from the _Visitation + of Essex_ 1612 (pp. 282-3) and the _Visitation of Essex_ 1634 + (p. 479).] + + [Footnote 10: The oldest was the John Rowe of Clapham, Beds. + The second, Henry, was also Mayor of London and was knighted + in 1603. The fourth, Robert, was the father of the + ambassador, and died while his son was a child. There were two + daughters--Mary, who married Thomas Randall, and Elizabeth, + who married William Garret of Dorney, co. Bucks. The son of + the latter couple was Donne's intimate friend George Gerrard + or Garrard.] + + [Footnote 11: Row, John, of Essex. arm. matric. 14 Oct., 1597, + aged 16. (Joseph Foster, _Alumni Oxonienses_, iii, 1284). The + Provost of Queen's has kindly informed me that in the College + books his name is entered simply as 'Rowe' and as having + entered 'Ter. Mich. 1597'. He tells me further that in Andrew + Clark's edition of the University Matriculation Registers it + is stated that the date of his matriculation was between Oct. + 14 and Dec. 2, 1597. There can be no doubt, I think, that + this is our Roe. There are not likely to have been two in the + County of Essex with the right to be called 'armiger'. Had his + father still lived he would have been entered as 'fil. gen.' + or 'fil. arm.'] + + [Footnote 12: _Hist. MSS. Com._: _Buccleugh MSS._ (Montague + House), vol. i, pp. 56, 58. The letters are dated May 13, Nov. + 7.] + + [Footnote 13: _Calendar of State Papers._ Ireland, 1606-8, + p. 538. I owe this and the last reference to Mr. Murray L. R. + Beavan, University Assistant in History, Aberdeen University.] + + [Footnote 14: Other poems by Pembroke are found in the + manuscript collections of Donne's poems. A scholarly edition + of the poems of Pembroke and Rudyard would be a boon. Many + ascribed to them by the younger Donne in his edition of 1660 + could be removed and others added from manuscript sources.] + + [Footnote 15: It is one of the worst printed in _1635_ and + _1669_ (where it first appeared in full), and has admitted + of many emendations from the manuscripts. Grosart has already + introduced some from the Hazlewood-Kingsborough MS., but he + left some gross errors. In the lines, + + That I may grow enamoured on your mind, + When my own thoughts I there reflected find, + + all the three modern editions are content still to read, + + When my own thoughts I there neglected find + + --a strange reason for being enamoured. Some difficult and + perhaps corrupt lines still remain.] + + [Footnote 16: In forming this Appendix it was not my intention + to remove these poems dogmatically from under the aegis of + Donne's name. I wished rather to separate them from those + which are indubitably his and facilitate comparison. Further + evidence may show that I have erred as to one or other. This + letter is the only one about which I feel any doubt myself. I + have taken as much trouble with their text as with the rest of + the poems.] + + [Footnote 17: _H40_ has no ascription. In the poem + just discussed the ascription made correctly, at least + intelligibly, in _RP31_, was transposed in _H40_. This must be + the later collection. See II. p. cxiv.] + + [Footnote 18: _Absence_ is printed, again unsigned, in _Wit + Restored in severall Select Poems not formerly published_. + (1658.)] + + + + + * * * * * + + + + +COMMENTARY. + + +[Sidenote: _Metaphysical Poetry._] + +Donne is a 'metaphysical' poet. The term was perhaps first applied +by Dryden, from whom Johnson borrowed it: 'He' (Donne) 'affects the +metaphysics, not only in his satires, but in his amorous verses, where +nature only should reign; and perplexes the minds of the fair sex with +the speculations of philosophy, where he should engage their hearts, +and entertain them with the softness of love.' _Essay on Satire_. 'The +metaphysical poets were men of learning, and to show their learning +was their whole endeavour.' Johnson, _Life of Cowley_. The parade of +learning, and a philosophical or abstract treatment of love had been +a strain in mediaeval poetry from the outset, manifesting itself +most fully in the Tuscan poets of the 'dolce stil nuovo', but never +altogether absent from mediaeval love-poetry. The Italian poet Testi +(1593-1646), describing his choice of classical in preference to +Italian models (he is thinking specially of Marino), says: 'poichè +lasciando quei concetti metafisici ed ideali di cui sono piene le +poesie italiane, mi sono provato di spiegare cose più domestiche, e +di maneggiarle con effetti più famigliari a imitazione d'Ovidio, di +Tibullo, di Properzio, e degli altri migliori.' Donne's love-poetry is +often classical in spirit; his conceits are the 'concetti metafisici' +of mediaeval poetry given a character due to his own individuality and +the scientific interests of his age. + +A metaphysical poet in the full sense of the word is a poet who finds +his inspiration in learning; not in the world as his own and common +sense reveal it, but in the world as science and philosophy report of +it. The two greatest metaphysical poets of Europe are Lucretius and +Dante. What the philosophy of Epicurus was to Lucretius, that of +Thomas Aquinas was to Dante. Their poetry is the product of their +learning, transfigured by the imagination, and it is not to be +understood without some study of their thought and knowledge. + +Donne is not a metaphysical poet of the compass of Lucretius and +Dante. He sets forth in his poetry no ordered system of the universe. +The ordered system which Dante had set forth was breaking in pieces +while Donne lived, under the criticism of Copernicus, Galileo, and +others, and no poet was so conscious as Donne of the effect on +the imagination of that disintegration. In the two _Anniversaries_ +mystical religion is made an escape from scientific scepticism. +Moreover, Donne's use of metaphysics is often frivolous and flippant, +at best simply poetical. But he is a learned poet, and he is a +philosophical poet, and without some attention to the philosophy +and science underlying his conceits and his graver thought it is +impossible to understand or appreciate either aright. Failure to do so +has led occasionally to the corruption of his text. + +[Sidenote: _Donne's Learning._] + +Walton tells us that Donne's learning, in his eleventh year when he +went to Oxford, 'made one then give this censure of him, "That this +age had brought forth another Picus Mirandula; of whom story says that +he was rather born than made wise by study."' 'In the most unsettled +days of his youth', the same authority reports, 'his bed was not able +to detain him beyond the hour of four in the morning; and it was no +common business that drew him out of his chamber till past ten; all +which time was employed in study; though he took great liberty after +it.' 'He left the resultances of 1,400 authors, most of them abridged +and analysed with his own hand.' The lists of authors prefixed to +his prose treatises and the allusions and definite references in the +sermons corroborate Walton's statement regarding the range of Donne's +theological and controversial reading. + +[Sidenote: _Classical Literature._] + +Confining attention here to Donne's poetry, and the spontaneous +evidence of learning which it affords, one would gather that his +reading was less literary and poetic in character than was Milton's +during the years spent at Horton. It is clear that he knew the +classical poets, but there are few specific allusions. Ovid, Horace, +and Juvenal one can trace, not any other with certainty, nor in his +sermons do references to Virgil, Horace, or other poets abound. + +[Sidenote: _Italian._] + +Like Milton, Donne had doubtless read the Italian romances. One +reference to Angelica and an incident in the _Orlando Furioso_ +occur in the _Satyres_, and from the same source as well as from an +unpublished letter we learn that he had read Dante. Aretino is the +only other Italian to whom he makes explicit reference. + +[Sidenote: _French._] + +One of Régnier's satires opens in a manner resembling the fourth of +Donne's, and in a letter written from France apparently in 1612 he +refers to 'a book of French Satires', which Mr. Gosse conjectures to +be Régnier's. The resemblance may be accidental, for Donne's _Satyres_ +were written before the publication of Régnier's (1608, 1613), and +Donne makes no explicit mention of him or any other French poet. +We learn, however, from his letters that he had read Montaigne and +Rabelais; and it is improbable that he did not share the general +interest of his contemporaries in the poetry of the _Pléiade_. The +one poet to whom recent criticism has pointed as the inspiration +of Donne's metaphysical verse is the Protestant poet Du Bartas. Mr. +Alfred Horatio Upham (_The French Influence in English Literature._ +New York, 1908), and following him Sir Sidney Lee (_The French +Renaissance in England._ Oxford, 1910), have insisted strongly on the +importance of this influence. The latter goes so far as to say that +'Donne clothed elegies, eclogues, divine poems, epicedes, obsequies, +satires, in a garb barely distinguishable from the style of Du Bartas +and Sylvester', and that the metaphysical style in English poetry is a +heritage from Du Bartas. + +I confess this seems to me a somewhat exaggerated statement. When +I turn from Donne's passionate and subtle songs and elegies to +Sylvester's hum-drum and yet 'conceited' work, I find their styles +eminently distinguishable. Mr. Upham indeed allows that Donne's +genius makes 'vital and impressive' what in the original is 'vapid +and commonplace'. He pleads for no more than an 'element of French +suggestion'. + +Of the most characteristic features of Du Bartas's rhetoric, his +affected antitheses, his studied alliterative effects, and especially +his double-epithets 'aime-carnage', 'charme-souci', 'blesse-honneur', +Sylvester's 'forbidden-Bit-lost-glory', 'the Act-simply-pure', &c., +Mr. Upham admits that Donne makes sparing use. Donne uses a fair +number of compounds but the majority of these are nouns and verbs. Of +the epithets only one or two are of the sentence-compressing +character which the French poet cultivated. The most like is +'full-on-both-side-written rolls'. The real link between Du Bartas and +Donne is that they are metaphysical poets. Following Lucretius, whom +he often translates, the Frenchman set himself to give a scientific +account of the creation of the universe as outlined in _Genesis_. He +describes with the utmost minuteness of detail, and necessarily uses +similes better fitted to elucidate and illustrate than to give poetic +pleasure, drawn from the most everyday sources as well as arts and +sciences. It was part of the programme of the _Pléiade_ thus to annex +the vocabulary of learning and the crafts. Now Donne may have read Du +Bartas in the original, or he may have seen some parts of Sylvester's +translation (it did not appear till 1598), as it was in preparation, +though to a Catholic, as Donne was, the poem would not have the +attraction it had for Protestant poets in England, Holland, and +Germany. The bent of his own mind was to metaphysics, to erudition, +and also to figures realistic and surprising rather than beautiful. +It would be rash to deny that he may have found in Du Bartas a style +which he preferred to the Italianate picturesqueness of sonneteers and +idyllists, and been encouraged to follow his bent. That he borrowed +his style from Du Bartas is _non proven_: and there are in his work +strains of feeling, thought, and learning which cannot be traced +to the French poet. Two poets more essentially unlike it would be +difficult to imagine. There are very few passages where one can trace +or conjecture echoes or borrowings (see note, II. p. 193). I agree +indeed with Mr. Upham that the poems which most strongly suggest +that Donne had been reading Du Bartas are the First and Second +_Anniversaries_, which Sir Sidney Lee inadvertently calls early +poems. Here at least he is often dealing with the same themes. One +can illustrate his thought from Du Bartas. Perhaps it was the latter's +poem which suggested the use of marginal notes, giving the argument of +the poem. + +[Sidenote: _Spanish._] + +We know from Donne's explicit statement that his library was full both +of Spanish poets and Spanish theologians, and there has been some talk +of Spanish influence in his poetry. But no one has adduced evidence. +Gongora is out of the question, for Gongora did not begin to cultivate +the extravagant conceits of his later poetry till he came under the +influence of Carillo's posthumous poems in 1611 (Fitzmaurice Kelly: +_Spanish Literature_, 283-5); nor is there much resemblance between +his high-flown Marinism and Donne's metaphysical subtleties. It is +possible that Spanish mysticism and religious eloquence have left +traces in Donne's _Divine Poems_ and sermons. The subject awaits +investigation. + +[Sidenote: _Scholastic Philosophy._] + +A commentator on Donne is, therefore, not called on to trace literary +echoes in his poetry as Bishop Newton and others have done in Milton's +poems. It is reading of another kind, though a kind also traceable +in Milton, that he has to note. Donne was steeped in Scholastic +Philosophy and Theology. Often under his most playful conceits lurk +Scholastic definitions and distinctions. The question of the influence +of Plato on the poets of the Renaissance has been discussed of recent +years, but generally without a sufficient preliminary inquiry as +to the Scholastic inheritance of these poets. Doctrines that derive +ultimately, it may be, from Plato and Aristotle were familiar to Donne +and others in the first place from Aquinas and the theology of the +Schools, and, as Professor Picavet has insisted (_Esquisse d'une +histoire générale et comparée des philosophies médiévales._ Paris, +1907), they entered the Scholastic Philosophy through Plotinus and +were modified in the passage.[1] The present editor is in no way a +specialist in Scholasticism, and such notes and extracts as are given +here concern passages where some inquiry was necessary to fix the text +and to elucidate the meaning. They are intended simply to do this +as far as possible, and to suggest the direction which further +investigation must follow. An expert will doubtless note many +allusions that have escaped notice. Whenever possible I have +endeavoured to start from Donne's own sermons and prose works. + + + [Footnote 1: The influence of Scholastic Philosophy and + Theology in English poetry deserves attention. When Milton + states that + + They also serve who only stand and wait, + + he has probably in mind the opinion of Dionysius the + Areopagite (adopted by Aquinas), that the four highest + orders of angels (Dominations, Thrones, Cherubs, and + Seraphim) never leave God's presence to bear messages.] + + +[Sidenote: _The Fathers, &c._] + +Donne is as familiar with the Fathers as with the Schoolmen, +especially Tertullian and Augustine, and of them too he makes use +in poems neither serious nor edifying. His work with Morton had +familiarized him with the whole range of Catholic controversy from +Bellarmine to Spanish and German Jesuit pamphleteers and casuists. +_The Progresse of the Soule_ reveals his acquaintance with Jewish +apocryphal legends. + +[Sidenote: _Law._] + +But Donne's studies were not confined to Divinity. When a Law-student +he was 'diverted by the worst voluptuousness, which is an hydroptic +immoderate desire of humane learning and languages'; but his legal +studies have left their mark in his _Songs and Sonets_. Of Medicine he +had made an extensive study, and the poems abound in allusions to both +the orthodox Galenist doctrines and the new Paracelsian medicine with +its chemical drugs and homoeopathic cures.[2] In Physics he knows, +like Milton, the older doctrines, the elements, their concentric +arrangement, the origin of winds and meteors, &c., and at the same +time is acutely interested in the speculations of the newer science, +of Copernicus and Galileo, and the disintegrating effect of their +doctrines on the traditional views. + + + [Footnote 2: In the _Letters to Severall Persons of Honour, &c._ + (1651, 1654), pp. 14-15, Donne gives a short sketch of the history + of medical doctrines from Hippocrates through Galen to Paracelsus, + but declares that the new principles are attributed to the latter + 'too much to his honour'.] + + +[Sidenote: _Travels._] + +A special feature of Donne's imagery is the use of images drawn from +the voyages and discoveries of the age. Sir Walter Raleigh has not +included Donne among the poets whom he discusses in considering the +influence of the Voyages on Poetry and Imagination (_The English +Voyages of the Sixteenth Century._ Glasgow, 1906, iii), but perhaps +none took a more curious interest. His mistress is 'my America, +my Newfoundland', his East and West Indies; he sees, at least in +imagination, + + a Tenarif, or higher Hill + Rise so high like a Rocke, that one might thinke + The floating Moone would shipwracke there, and sinke; + +he sails to heaven, the Pacific Ocean, the Fortunate Islands, by the +North-West Passage, or through the Straits of Magellan. + +In attempting to illustrate these and other aspects of Donne's +erudition as displayed in his poetry it has been my endeavour not so +much to trace them to their remote sources as to discover the form +in which he was familiar with a doctrine or a theory. Next to his own +works, therefore, I have had recourse to contemporary or but slightly +later works, as Burton's _Anatomy of Melancholy_ and Browne's +_Pseudodoxia Epidemica_. I have made constant use of the _Summa +Theologiae_ of St. Thomas Aquinas, using the edition in Migne's +_Patrologiae Cursus Completus_ (1845). By Professor Picavet my +attention was called to Bouillet's translation of Plotinus's _Enneads_ +with ample notes on the analogies to and developments of Neo-Platonic +thought in the Schoolmen. I have also used Zeller's _Philosophie der +Griechen_, on Plotinus, and Harnack's _History of Dogma_. Throughout, +my effort has been rather to justify, elucidate, and suggest, than to +accumulate parallels. + +*** In the following notes the _LXXX Sermons &c._ (1640), _Fifty +Sermons &c._ (1649), and _XXVI Sermons &c._ (1669/70) are referred to +thus:--80. 19. 189, i.e. the _LXXX Sermons_, the nineteenth sermon, +page 189. References to page and line simply of the poems are to the +first volume of this edition. References to the second are given thus, +II. p. 249. + + + + +THE PRINTER TO &c. + +See _Text and Canon of Donne's Poems_, p. lix. + +PAGE =1=, ll. 17-18. _it would have come to us from beyond the Seas_: +e.g. from Holland. + +ll. 19-20. _My charge and pains in procuring of it_: A significant +statement as to the source of the edition. + +PAGE =3=. _Hexastichon Bibliopolae._ + +l. 1. _his last preach'd, and printed Booke_, i.e. _Deaths Duell or +a Consolation to the Soule against the dying Life and living Death +of the body. Delivered in a sermon at Whitehall, before the Kings +Majesty in the beginning of Lent 1630, &c. ... Being his last Sermon +and called by his Majesties household the Doctors owne Funerall +Sermon. 1632, 1633._ + +This has for frontispiece a bust of Donne in his shroud, engraved by +Martin Dr[oeshout] from the drawing from which Nicholas Stone cut the +figure on Donne's tomb (Gosse's _Life, &c._ ii. 288). Walton's account +of the manner in which this picture was prepared is well known. See +II. p. 249. + +PAGE =4=. _William, Lord Craven, &c._ This is the younger Donne's +dedication. See _Text and Canon, &c._, p. lxx. + +William Craven (1606-1697) entered the service of Maurice, Prince of +Nassau in 1623. He served later, 1631, under Gustavus Adolphus; and +became a devoted adherent of Elizabeth of Bohemia and the cause of the +Palatine house. He lost his estates in the Rebellion, but after the +Restoration was created successively Baron Craven of Hampsted-Marsham, +Viscount Craven of Uffington, and Earl of Craven. He was an early +member of the Royal Society. + +Of the younger John Donne, D.C.L., whose life was dissolute and +poetry indecent, perhaps the most pleasing relic is the following poem +addressed to his father. It is found in _O'F_ and has been printed by +Mr. Warwick Bond: + +A LETTER. + + No want of duty did my mind possesse, + I through a dearth of words could not expresse + That w^{ch} I feare I doe too soone pursue + W^{ch} is to pay my duty due to you. + For, through the weaknesse of my witt, this way + I shall diminish what I hope to pay. + And this consider, T'was the sonne of May + And not Apollo that did rule the day. + Had it bin hee then somthing would have rose; + In gratefull verse or else in thankfull prose + I would have told you (father) by my hand + That I yo^r sonne am prouder of yo^r band + Then others of theyr freedome, And to pay + Thinke it good service to kneele downe and pray. + + Yo^r obedient sonne + JO. DONNE. + +PAGES =5, 6=. The three poems by Jonson were printed in the sheets +hastily added by the younger Donne in 1650 to the edition of Donne's +poems prepared for the press in 1649. See _Text and Canon, &c._ +They were taken from Jonson's _Epigrams_ (1616), where they are Nos. +xxiii., xciv., and xcvi. Of Donne as a poet Jonson uttered three +memorable criticisms in his _Conversations with Drummond_ (ed. Laing, +Shakespeare Society, 1842): + +'He esteemeth John Done the first poet in the world for some things.' + +'That Done for not keeping of accent deserved hanging.' + +'That Done himself, for not being understood, would perish.' + + + + +SONGS AND SONETS. + +Of all Donne's poems these are the most difficult to date with any +definiteness. Jonson, Drummond notes, 'affirmeth Done to have written +all his best pieces ere he was twenty-five years old,' that would be +before 1598, the year in which Donne became secretary to Sir Thomas +Egerton. This harmonizes fairly well with such indications of date as +are discoverable in the _Elegies_, poems similar in theme and tone +to the _Songs and Sonets_. Mr. Chambers pushes the more daring and +cynical of these poems in both these groups further back. He says, +'All Donne's Love-poems ... seem to me to fall into two divisions. +There is one, marked by cynicism, ethical laxity and a somewhat +deliberate profession of inconstancy. This I believe to be his +earliest style, and ascribe the poems marked by it to the period +before 1596. About that date he became acquainted with Anne More, whom +he evidently loved devotedly and sincerely ever after. And therefore +from 1596 onwards I place the second division, with its emphasis of +the spiritual, and deep insight into the real things of love.' This is +a little too early. Anne More was only twelve years old in 1596, and +it is unlikely that she and Donne were known to each other before +1598. Their affection probably ripened later. It almost seems from +Donne's letters to his friends as though about 1599 he was proffering +at least courtly adoration to some other lady. + +Moreover, it is to conceive somewhat inadequately of Donne's complex +nature to make too sharp a temporal division between his gayer, more +cynical effusions and his graver, even religious pieces. The truth +about Donne is well stated by Professor Norton: 'Donne's "better +angel" and his "worser spirit" seem to have kept up a continual +contest, now the one, now the other, gaining the mastery in his + + Poor soul, the centre of his sinful earth.' + +The 'evaporations' which he allowed his wit from time to time till he +took orders showed always a certain 'ethical laxity' and 'cynicism' of +outlook on men and women. The _Elegie XIV_ (if it be Donne's, and +Mr. Chambers does not question its authenticity), the lines _Upon Mr. +Thomas Coryats Crudities_, the two frankly pagan _Epithalamia_ on the +Princess Elizabeth and the Countess of Somerset, to say nothing of +_Ignatius his Conclave_, were all written long after his marriage and +when he was already the author of moral epistles and 'divine poems'. +Even Professor Norton's statement exaggerates the 'contest' a little. +These things were evaporations of wit, and even a serious man in +the seventeenth century allowed to his wit satyric gambols which +disconcert our staider and more fastidious taste. I am quite at one +with Mr. Chambers in accepting his marriage as a turning-point in the +history of Donne's life and mind. But it would be rash to affirm that +_none_ of his wittier lyrics were written after this date. + +Donne's 'songs and sonets' seem to me to fall into three rather than +two classes, though there is a good deal of overlapping. Donne's wit +is always touched with passion; his passion is always witty. In the +first class I would place those which are frankly 'evaporations' +of more or less cynical wit, the poems in which he parades his own +inconstancy or enlarges on the weaknesses of women, poems such as 'Goe +and catche', _Womans constancy_, _The Indifferent_, _Loves Vsury_, +_The Legacie_, _Communitie_, _Confined Love_, _Loves Alchymie_, _The +Flea_, _The Message_, _Witchcraft by a picture_, _The Apparition_, +_Loves Deitie_, _Loves diet_, _The Will_, _A Jeat Ring sent_, +_Negative love_, _Farewell to love_. In another group the wit in +Donne, whether gaily or passionately cynical, is subordinate to the +lover, pure and simple, singing, at times with amazing simplicity and +intensity of feeling, the joys of love and the sorrow of parting. Such +are _The good-morrow_, _The Sunne Rising_, _The Canonization_, _Lovers +infiniteness_, 'Sweetest love, I do not goe,' _A Feaver_, _Aire and +Angells_ (touched with cynical humour at the close), _Breake of day_, +_The Anniversarie_, _A Valediction: of the booke_, _Loves growth_, +_The Dreame_, _A Valediction: of weeping_, _The Baite_, _A +Valediction: forbidding mourning_, _The Extasie_, _The Prohibition_, +_The Expiration_, _Lecture upon the Shadow_. It would, of course, be +rash to say that all such poems were addressed to his wife. Some, like +_The Baite_, are purely literary in origin; others present the obverse +side of the passion portrayed in the first group, its happier moments. +But one must believe that those in which ardour is combined with +elevation and delicacy of feeling were addressed to Anne More before +and after their marriage. + +In the third and smallest group, which includes, however, such fine +examples of his subtler moods as _The Funerall_, _The Blossome_, _The +Primrose_, Donne adopts the tone (as sincerely as was generally the +case) of the Petrarchian lover whose mistress's coldness has slain him +or provokes his passionate protestations. Some of these must, I think, +have been written after Donne's marriage. The titles one or two bear +connect them with Mrs. Herbert and the Countess of Bedford. The two +most enigmatical poems in the _Songs and Sonets_ are _Twicknam Garden_ +and _A nocturnall upon S. Lucies day_. Yet the very names 'Twicknam +Garden' and 'S. Lucies day' suggest a reference to the Countess of +Bedford. It is possible that the last was written when Lady Bedford +was ill in December, 1612? 'My Lady Bedford last night about one of +the clock was suddenly, and has continued ever since, speechless, +and is past all hopes though yet alive,' writes the Earl of Dorset on +November 23, 1612. It is probable that on December 13 she was still in +a critical condition, supposing the illness to have been that common +complaint of an age of bad drains, namely typhoid fever, and Donne +may have written in anticipation of her death. But the suggestion is +hazardous. The third verse speaks a stronger language than that of +Petrarchian adoration. Still it is difficult for us to estimate aright +all that was allowed to a 'servant' under the accepted convention. +It is noteworthy that the poem is not included in any known MS. +collection made before 1630. The Countess died in 1627. + + +PAGE =7=. THE GOOD-MORROW. + +The MSS. point to two distinct recensions of this poem. The one which +is given in the group of MSS. _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and in _1633_, reads, +3. countrey pleasures childishly 4. snorted 14. one world 17. better. +The other, which is the most common in the MSS., reads, 3. childish +pleasures seelily 4. slumbred 14. our world 17. fitter. The edition of +1635 shows a contamination of the two due to the fact that the printer +'set up' from _1633_, and he or the editor corrected from a MS. +collection, probably _A18_, _N_, _TC_. In _TCD_ the second recension +is given in the collection of Donne's poems in the first part of the +MS.; in the second part, a miscellaneous collection of poems, the poem +is given again, but according to the other version. It does not seem +to me possible to decide absolutely the relative authority of the two +versions, but to my mind that of 1633 and _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ seems the +more racy and characteristic. It probably represents the first +version of the poem, whether Donne or another be responsible for the +alterations. The only point of importance to be decided is whether +'better' or 'fitter' expresses more exactly what the poet meant to +say. The 1635 editor preferred 'fitter', thinking probably that +the idea of exact correspondence is emphasized, 'where find two +hemispheres that fit one another more exactly?' But this is not, +I think, what Donne meant. The mutual fittingness of the lovers is +implied already in the idea that each is a whole world to the other. +Gazing in each other's eyes each beholds a hemisphere of this world. +The whole cannot, of course, be reflected. And where could either find +a _better_ hemisphere, one in which there is as here neither 'sharpe +North' nor 'declining West', neither coldness nor alteration. + +l. 13. _Let Maps to other._ The edition may have dropped the 's', +which occurs in most of the MSS., but the plural without 's' is common +even till a later period: 'These, as his other, were naughty things.' +Bunyan, _The Life and Death of Mr. Badman_, p. 106 (Cambridge English +Classics). 'And other of such vinegar aspect That they'll not show +their teeth in way of smile.' Shakespeare, _Merchant of Venice_, I. i. +54. + +ll. 20-1. _If our two loves be one, &c._ If our two loves are _one_, +dissolution is impossible; and the same is true if, though _two_, +they are always alike. What is simple--as God or the soul--cannot +be dissolved; nor compounds, e.g. the Heavenly bodies, between whose +elements there is no contrariety. 'Impossibile autem est quod forma +separetur a se ipsa. Unde impossibile est, quod forma subsistens +desinat esse. Dato etiam, quod anima esset ex materia et +forma composita, ut quidam dicunt, adhuc oporteret ponere eam +incorruptibilem. Non enim invenitur corruptio nisi ubi invenitur +contrarietas; generationes enim et corruptiones ex contrariis et in +contraria sunt' &c., Aquinas, _Summa_ I. Quaest. lxxv, Art. 6. The +body, being composed of contrary elements, has not this essential +immortality: 'In Heaven we doe not say, that our bodies shall devest +their mortality, so, as that naturally they could not dye; for they +shall have a composition still; and every compounded thing may perish; +but they shall be so assured, and with such a preservation, as they +shall alwaies know they shall never dye.' _Sermons_ 80. 19. 189. + + +PAGE =8=. SONG. + +The first two stanzas of this song are printed in the 1653 edition of +the Poems of Francis Beaumont, with the title _A Raritie_. It is +set to music in Eg. MS. 2013, f. 58. Mr. Chambers points out that +Habington's poem, _Against them who lay Unchastity to the Sex of +Women_ (_Castara_, ed. Elton, p. 231), evidently refers to this poem: + + They meet but with unwholesome springs + And summers which infectious are: + They hear but when the meremaid sings, + And only see the falling starre: + Who ever dare + Affirme no woman chaste and faire. + + Goe cure your feavers; and you'le say + The Dog-dayes scorch not all the yeare: + In copper mines no longer stay, + But travel to the west, and there + The right ones see, + And grant all gold's not alchimie. + +A poem modelled on Donne's appears in Harleian MS. 6057, and in _The +Treasury of Music. By Mr. Lawes and others._ (1669) + + Goe catch a star that's falling from the sky, + Cause an immortal creature for to die; + Stop with thy hand the current of the seas, + Post ore the earth to the Antipodes; + Cause times return and call back yesterday, + Cloake January with the month of May; + Weigh out an ounce of flame, blow back the winde: + And then find faith within a womans minde. + + JOHN DUNNE. + +l. 2. _Get with child a mandrake root._ 'Many Mola's and false +conceptions there are of _Mandrakes_, the first from great Antiquity, +conceiveth the Root thereof resembleth the shape of Man.... Now +whatever encourageth the first invention, there have not been wanting +many ways of its promotion. The first a Catachrestical and far derived +similitude it holds with Man; that is, in a bifurcation or division of +the Root into two parts, which some are content to call Thighs.' Sir +Thomas Browne's _Vulgar Errors_ (1686), ii. 6, p. 72. Compare also +_The Progresse of the Soule_, st. xv, p. 300. + + +PAGE =10=. THE UNDERTAKING. + +l. 2. _the Worthies._ The nine worthies usually named are Joshua, +David, Judas Maccabaeus, Hector, Alexander, Julius Caesar, Arthur, +Charlemagne, and Godfrey of Bouillon, but they varied. Guy of Warwick +is mentioned by Gerard Legh, _Accedens of Armorye_. Nash mentions +Solomon and Gideon; and Shakespeare introduces Hercules and Pompey +in _Love's Labour's Lost_. _All the Worthies_ therefore covers a +wide field. The Worthies figured largely in decorative designs and +pageants. On a target taken at the siege of Ostend 'was enammeled +in gold the seven [_sic_] Worthies, worth seven or eight hundred +guilders'. Vere's _Commentaries_ (1657), p. 174. + +l. 6. _The skill of specular stone._ Compare _To the Countesse of +Bedford_, p. 219, ll. 28-30: + + You teach (though wee learne not) a thing unknowne + To our late times, the use of specular stone, + Through which all things within without were shown. + +Grosart (ii. 48-9) and Professor Norton (Grolier, i. 217) take +'specular' as meaning simply 'translucent', and the latter quotes +Holinshed's _Chronicle_, ii. ch. 10: 'I find obscure mention of the +specular stone also to have been found and applied to this use' (i.e. +glazing windows) 'in England, but in such doubtful sort as I dare +not affirm for certain.' This is the 'pierre spéculaire' or 'pierre à +miroir' which Cotgrave describes as 'A light, white, and transparent +stone, easily cleft into thinne flakes, and used by th' Arabians +(among whom it growes) instead of glasse; anight it represents the +Moon, and even increases or decreases, as the Moon doth'. But surely +Donne refers to crystal-gazing. Paracelsus has a paragraph in the +_Coelum Philosophorum_: + + 'How to conjure the Crystal so that all Things may + be seen in it. + +'To conjure is nothing else than to observe anything rightly, to know +and to understand what it is. The crystal is a figure of the air. +Whatever appears in the air, movable or immovable, the same appears +also in the speculum or crystal as a wave. For the air, the water, and +the crystal, so far as vision is concerned, are one, like a mirror +in which an inverted copy of an object is seen.' The old name for +crystal-gazers was 'specularii'. Mr. Chambers suggests very probably +that there is a reference to Dr. Dee's magic mirrors or 'show stone', +but one would like to explain the reference to the cutting of the +stone on the one hand, and its being no longer to be found on the +other. + +l. 16. _Loves but their oldest clothes._ The 'her' of _B_ is a +tempting reading in view of the 'woman' which follows, but 'their' +is the common version and the poet's mind passes rapidly to and fro +between the abstract and its concrete embodiments. The proleptic use +of the pronoun is striking in either case. + +Compare _To Mrs. M. H._, p. 217, ll. 31-2. + +l. 18. _Vertue attir'd in woman see._ The reading of the 1633 +edition, which is that of the best manuscripts, has more of Donne's +characteristic hyperbole than the metrically more regular 'Vertue in +woman see'. 'If you can see the Idea of Vertue attired in the visible +form of woman and love that.' + + +PAGE =11=. THE SUNNE RISING. + +Compare Ovid, _Amores_, I. 13. + + Iam super oceanum venit a seniore marito, + Flava pruinoso quae vehit axe diem. + Quo properas, Aurora? + . . . + Quo properas, ingrata viris, ingrata puellis? + . . . + Tu pueros somno fraudas, tradisque magistris, + Ut subeant tenerae verbera saeva manus. + +A comparison of Ovid's simple and natural images and reflections with +Donne's passionate but ingenious hyperboles will show exactly what +Testi meant by his contrast of the homely imagery of classical and the +metaphysical manner of Italian love poetry. + +l. 17. _both th' India's of spice and Myne._ A distinction that Donne +is never tired of. 'The use of the word mine specifically for mines +of gold, silver, or precious stone is, I believe, peculiar to Donne.' +Coleridge, quoted by Norton. The O.E.D. does not contradict this, for +the word had a wider connotation. Compare _Loves exchange_, p. 35, ll. +34-35: + + and make more + Mynes in the earth, then Quarries were before. + +And _The Progresse of the Soule_, p. 295, l. 17: + + thy Western land of Myne. + +And for the two Indias: 'As hee that hath a plentifull fortune in +Europe, cares not much though there be no land of perfumes in the +East, nor of gold, in the West-Indies.' _Sermons_ 50. 15. 123. And +'Sir. Your way into Spain was eastward, and that is the way to the +land of perfumes and spices; their way hither is westward, and that +is the way to the land of gold and of mines,' &c. _To Sir Robert Ker._ +Gosse's _Life, &c._, ii. 191. + +l. 24. _All wealth alchimie_: i.e. imposture or 'glittering dross' +(O.E.D.). 'Though the show of it were glorious, the substance of it +was dross, and nothing but alchymy and cozenage.' Harrington, _Orlando +Furioso_ (1591). See also poem cited II. p. 11. + + +PAGE =12=. THE INDIFFERENT. + +l. 7. _dry corke._ Cork was a favourite metaphor for what was dry +and withered. To our taste it is hardly congruous with love or tragic +poetry, perhaps because of its associations. 'Bind fast his corky +arms,' says Cornwall, speaking of Gloucester (_King Lear_, III. vii. +31), but Shakespeare seems to have taken the epithet from Harsnett's +_Declaration of Egregious Popishe Impostures, &c._ (1603): 'It would +pose all the cunning exorcists ... to teach an old corkie woman to +writhe, tumble, curvet,' c. 5, p. 23. + + +PAGE =13=. LOVES USURY. + +l. 5. _My body raigne._ Grosart and Chambers substitute 'range', from +_1635-69_. Perhaps they are right; but I feel doubtful. All the best +MSS. read 'raigne.' Donne contrasts the reign of love and the reign of +lust on the body, and frankly declares for the latter. A lover might +range, 'I can love both fair and brown,' but no lover could + + mistake by the way + The maid, and tell the lady of that delay. + +Adonis, with graver rhetoric, states the other side of Donne's +paradoxical thesis: + + Love comforteth like sunshine after rain, + But Lust's effect is tempest after sun; + Love's gentle spring doth always fresh remain, + Lust's winter comes ere summer half be done; + Love surfeits not, Lust like a glutton dies; + Love is all truth, Lust full of forged lies. + Shakespeare, _Venus and Adonis_, v. cxxxiv. + +ll. 13-16. Chambers and Grosart have adopted, with some modification +of punctuation, the reading of the 1633-54 editions, and the lines are +frequently quoted as printed by Chambers: + + Only let me love none; no, not the sport + From country-grass to confitures of court, + Or city's quelque-choses; let not report + My mind transport. + +I confess I find it difficult to attach any exact meaning to them. +Are there any instances of 'sport' thus used apparently for 'sportive +lady'? The difficulty seems to me to have arisen from the accidental +dropping in the 1633 edition of the semicolon after 'sport', which the +1669 editor rightly restored. What Donne means by 'the sport' is clear +enough from other passages, e.g. 'the short scorn of a bridegroom's +play' (_Loves Alchimie_), 'as she would man should despise the sport' +(_Farewell to Love_). The prayer that report _may_ ('let', not 'let +not') carry his roving fancy from one to another, is in keeping +with the whole tenor of the poem. The Grolier Club edition has the +punctuation I have given, which I had adopted before I saw that +edition. I find it difficult to attach any meaning to 'let not +report'. + + +PAGE =14=. THE CANONIZATION. + +l. 7. _Or the Kings reall, or his stamped face Contemplate._ Donne's +conceits reappear in his sermons in a different setting. 'Beloved in +Christ Jesus, the heart of your gracious God is set upon you; and we +his servants have told you so, and brought you thus neare him, into +his Court, into his house, into the Church, but yet we cannot get +you to see his face, to come to that tendernesse of conscience as to +remember and consider that all your most secret actions are done in +his sight and his presence; Caesars face, and Caesars inscription you +can see: The face of the Prince in his coyne you can rise before the +Sun to see, and sit up till mid-night to see; but if you do not see +the face of God upon every piece of that mony too, all that mony is +counterfeit; If Christ have not brought that fish to the hook, that +brings the mony in the mouth (as he did to _Peter_) that mony is ill +fished for.' _Sermons_ 80. 12. 122. + +l. 15. 'Man' is the reading of every MS. except _Lec_, which here +as in several other little details appears to resemble _1633_ more +closely than either of the other MSS., _D_, _H49_. It is quite +possible that 'man' is correct--a vivid and concrete touch, but in +view of the 'men' which follows 'more' is preferable. The two words +are frequently interchanged in the MSS. + +ll. 24-5. The punctuation of these lines is that of _D_, _H49_, +_Lec_, though I adopted it independently as required by the sense. The +editions put a full stop after each line. Chambers alters the first +(l. 24) to a semicolon and connects + + So, to one neutral thing both sexes fit. + +with the two preceding lines. To me it seems the line _must_ go with +what follows, and that 'so' (which should have no comma) is not an +illative conjunction but a subordinate conjunction of effect. 'Both +sexes fit _so_ entirely into one neutral thing that we die and rise +the same,' &c. The Grolier Club editor, like Chambers, connects the +line with what has gone before, but drops the comma after 'so', making +it an adverb of degree. + +ll. 37-45. _And thus invoke us, &c._ Grosart and Chambers have +disguised and altered the sense of this stanza. Grosart, indeed, by +printing 'Who did the whole world's extract', has made it completely +unintelligible. Chambers's version gives a meaning, but a wrong one. +He prints the last six lines thus: + + Who did the whole worlds soul contract, and drove + Into the glasses of your eyes; + So made such mirrors, and such spies, + That they did all to you epitomize-- + Countries, towns, courts beg from above + A pattern of your love. + +These harsh constructions are not Donne's. The object of 'drove' is +not the 'world's soul', but 'Countries, towns, courts'; and 'beg' is +not in the indicative but the imperative mood. For clearness' sake +I have bracketed ll. 42-3 and printed 'love!' otherwise leaving the +punctuation unchanged. + +Donne as usual is pedantically accurate in the details of his +metaphor. The canonized lovers are invoked as saints, i.e. _their +prayers are requested_. They are asked to beg from above a pattern of +their love for those below. Of prayers to saints Donne speaks in one +of his _Letters_, p. 181: 'I see not how I can admit that circuit of +sending them' (i.e. letters) 'to you to be sent hither; that seems a +kinde of praying to Saints, to whom God must tell first, that such a +man prays to them to pray to him.' + +l. 40. The 'contract' of the printed editions is doubtless correct, +despite the preference of the MSS. for 'extract'. This goes in several +MSS. with other errors which show confusion. _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ read +'and drawe', a bad rhyme; and _A18_, _N_, _TCC_ (the verse is lost in +_TCD_) drop 'soule', reading 'the world extract'. The reading +'extract' is due to what Dr. Moore calls 'the extraordinary +short-sightedness of the copyists in respect of a construction. Their +vision seems often to be bounded by a single line.' To 'extract the +soul' of things is a not uncommon phrase with Donne. Here it does not +suit the thought which is coming so well as 'contract': 'As the spirit +and soule of the whole booke of Psalmes is contracted into this +psalme, so is the spirit and soule of this whole psalme contracted +into this verse.' _Sermons_ 80. 66. 663. (Psal. lxiii. 7. _Because +thou hast beene my helpe, Therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I +rejoice._) + +l. 45. _A patterne of your love._ The 'of our love' of 1633 _might_ +mean 'for our love', but it is clear from the manner in which +this stanza is given in _D_ that the copyist has misunderstood the +construction--'our love' follows from the assumption that 'Countries, +Townes, Courts' is the subject to 'Beg'. The colon and the capital +letter would not make such a view impossible, as they might be given a +merely emphasizing value; or if regarded as imperative the 'Beg' might +be taken as in the third person: 'Countries, Townes, Courts--let them +beg,' &c. Compare: + + The God of Souldiers: + With the consent of supreame Jove, informe + Thy thoughts with Noblenesse. + Shakespeare, _Cor._ V. iii. 70-2 (Simpson, _Shakespearian + Punctuation_, p. 98). + +But clearly here 'Beg' is in the second person plural, predicate to +'You whom reverend love', and 'your love' is the right reading. + + +PAGE =16=. THE TRIPLE FOOLE. + +He is trebly a fool because (1) he loves, (2) he expresses his love in +verse, (3) he thereby enables some one to set the verse to music and +by singing it to re-awaken the passion which composition had lulled to +sleep. + + +PAGE =17=. LOVERS INFINITENESS. + +This song, which is one of the obviously authentic lyrics which is +not included in the _A18_, _N_, _TC_ collection, would seem to have +undergone some revision after its first issue. The version given in +_A25_, from which _Cy_ is copied, would seem to be the original, +at least the readings of ll. 25-6 and ll. 29-30 do not look like +corruptions. The reading 'beget' at l. 25 gives a better rhyme to +'yet' than 'admit'. In l. 29 _A25_ has obviously interchanged 'thine' +and 'mine'. The slightly different version of _JC_ gives the correct +order. The generally careful _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ group has an unusually +faulty text of this poem. Among other mistakes it reads (with _S96_) +'Thee' for 'them' in l. 32. + +'Lovers Infiniteness' is a strange title. It is not found in any +of the MSS., and possibly should be 'Loves Infiniteness'. Yet the +'Lovers' suits the closing thought: + + so we shall + Be one, and one anothers All. + +For a poem in obvious imitation of this, see _Appendix C_, p. 439. + +ll. 1-11. The rhetoric and rhythm of Donne's elaborate stanzas depends +a good deal on their right punctuation. Mine is an attempt to correct +that of _1633_ without modernizing. The full stop after 'fall' is +obviously an error, and so is, I think, the comma after 'spent'. The +first six lines state in a rapid succession of clauses all that the +poet has done to gain his lady's love. A new thought begins with 'Yet +no more', &c. + +l. 9. _generall_ is the reading of two MSS. which are practically one. +I have recorded it because (1) ll. 29-30 (see textual note) would seem +to suggest that their version of the poem is an early one (revised by +Donne), and this may be an early reading; (2) because in l. 20 this +epithet is used as though repeated, 'thy gift being generall.' It +would be not unlike Donne to quibble with the word, making it mean +first a gift made generally to all, and secondly a gift general in its +content, not limited or defined in any way. The whole poem is a piece +of legal quibbling not unlike Shakespeare's 87th Sonnet: + + Farewell! thou art too dear for my possessing, + And like enough thou know'st thy estimate: + The charter of thy worth gives thee releasing; + My bonds in thee are all determinate, &c. + + +PAGE =18=. SONG. + +_Sweetest love, &c._ Of the music to this and 'Send home my long +stray'd eyes' I can discover no trace. _The Baite_ was doubtless sung +to the same air as Marlowe's 'Come live with me'. See II. p. 57. + +ll. 6-8. I have retained the text of _1633_, which has the support of +all the MSS. That of _1635-54_ is an attempt to accommodate the lines, +by a little padding, to the rhythm of the corresponding lines in the +other stanzas. + + +PAGE =20=. THE LEGACIE. + +ll. 9-16. I HEARD ME SAY, _&c._ The construction of this verse has +proved rather a difficulty to editors. I give it as printed by +Chambers and by the Grolier Club editor. Chambers's modernized version +runs: + + I heard me say, 'Tell her anon, + That myself', that is you not I, + 'Did kill me', and when I felt me die, + I bid me send my heart, when I was gone; + But I alas! could there find none; + When I had ripp'd and search'd where hearts should lie, + It killed me again, that I who still was true + In life, in my last will should cozen you. + +The Grolier Club version has no inverted commas, and runs: + + I heard me say, Tell her anon, + That myself, that's you not I, + Did kill me; and when I felt me die, + I bid me send my heart, when I was gone; + But I alas! could there find none. + When I had ripped me and searched where hearts did lie, + It killed me again that I, who still was true + In life, in my last will should cozen you. + +In my own version the only departure which I have made from the +punctuation of the 1633 version is the substitution of a semicolon for +a comma after 'lye' (l. 14). If inverted commas are to be used at all +it seems to me they would need to be extended to 'gone' (l. 12) or +to 'lie' (l. 14). As Donne is addressing the lady throughout it is +difficult to distinguish what he says to her now from what he said on +the occasion imagined. + +But the point in which both Chambers and the Grolier Club editor seem +to me in error is in connecting l. 14, _When I had ripp'd, &c._, with +what follows instead of with the immediately preceding line. There +is no justification for changing the comma after 'none' either to a +semicolon or a full stop. The meaning of ll. 13-14 is, 'But alas! when +I had ripp'd me and search'd where hearts did (i.e. used to) lie, I +could there find none.' It is so that the Dutch translator understands +the lines: + + Maer, oh, ick vond er geen, al scheurd ick mijn geraemt, + En socht door d'oude plaets die 't Hert is toegeraemt. + +The last two lines are a comment on the whole incident, the making of +the will and the poet's inability to implement it. + +l. 20. _It was intire to none_: i.e. 'It was tied to no one lover.' +The word 'entire' in this sense is still found on public-house signs, +and misled the American Pinkerton in Stevenson's _The Wrecker_. +Compare: 'But this evening I will spie upon the B[ishop] and give you +an account to-morrow morning of his disposition; when, if he cannot be +intire to you, since you are gone so farre downwards in your favours +to me, be pleased to pursue your humiliation so farre as to chuse your +day, and either to suffer the solitude of this place, or to change it, +by such company, as shall waite upon you.' _Letters_, p. 315 (To ... +Sir Robert Karre). This seems to mean, 'if the Bishop cannot fulfill, +be faithful to, his engagement to you, come and dine here.' + +ll. 21-24. These lines are also printed or punctuated in a misleading +fashion by Chambers and the Grolier Club editor. The former, following +_1669_, but altering the punctuation, prints: + + As good as could be made by art + It seemed, and therefore for our loss be sad. + I meant to send that heart instead of mine, + But O! no man could hold it, for 'twas thine. + +The 'for our loss be sad' comes in very strangely before the end, nor +is the force of 'and therefore' very clear. + +The Grolier Club editor, following the words of _1633_, but altering +the punctuation, reads: + + As good as could be made by art + It seemed, and therefore for our losses sad; + I meant to send this heart instead of mine + But oh! no man could hold it, for twas thine. + +Apparently the heart was sad for our losses because it was no better +than might be made by art. The confusion arises from deserting +the punctuation of _1633_. 'For our losses sad' is an adjectival +qualification of 'I'. 'I, sad to have lost my heart, which by legacy +was yours, resolved as a _pis aller_ to send this, which seemed as +good as could be made by art. But to send it was impossible, for no +man could hold it. It was thine.' + +Huyghens translates: + + Soo meenden ick 't verlies dat ick vergelden most + Te boeten met dit Hert, en doen 't u toebehooren: + Maer, oh, 't en kost niet zijn, 't was uw al lang te voren. + +But this does not appear to be quite accurate. Huyghens appears to +think that Donne could not give his heart to the lady, because it +was hers already. What he really says is, that no one could keep this +heart of hers, which had taken the place of his own in his bosom, +because, being hers, it was too volatile. + + +PAGE =21=. A FEAVER. + +ll. 13-14. _O wrangling schooles, that search what fire + Shall burne this world._ + +'I cannot but marvel from what _Sibyl_ or Oracle they' (the Ancients) +'stole the prophecy of the world's destruction by fire, or whence +Lucan learned to say, + + Communis mundo superest rogus, ossibus astra + Misturus. + + There yet remaines to th'World one common fire + Wherein our Bones with Stars shall make one pyre. + +I believe the World grows near its end, yet is neither old nor +decayed, nor will ever perish upon the ruines of its own Principles. +As the work of Creation was above nature, so is its adversary +annihilation; without which the World hath not its end, but its +mutation. Now what force should be able to consume it thus far, +without the breath of God, which is the truest consuming flame, my +Philosophy cannot inform me.' Browne's _Religio Medici_, sect. 45. + + +PAGE =22=. AIRE AND ANGELS. + +l. 19. _Ev'ry thy haire._ This, the reading of _1633-39_ and the MSS., +is, I think, preferable to the amended 'Thy every hair', &c., of +the 1650-69 editions (which Chambers adopts, ascribing it to _1669_ +alone), though the difference is slight. 'Every thy hair' has the +force of 'Thy every hair' with the additional suggestion of 'even +thy least hair' derived from the construction with a superlative +adjective. 'Every the least remembrance.' J. King, _Sermons_ 28. +'Every, the most complex, web of thought may be reduced to simple +syllogisms.' Sir W. Hamilton. See note to _The Funerall_, l. 3. + + ll. 23-4. _Then as an Angell face and wings + Of aire, not pure as it, yet pure doth weare._ + +St. Thomas (_Summa Theol._ I. li. 2) discusses the nature of the body +assumed by Angels when they appear to men, seeing that naturally they +are incorporeal. There being four elements, this body must consist of +one of these, but 'Angeli non assumunt corpora de terrâ vel aquâ: quia +non subito disparerent. Neque iterum de igne: quia comburerent ea +quae contingerent. Neque iterum ex aere: quia aer infigurabilis est +et incolorabilis'. To this Aquinas replies, 'Quod licet aer in sua +raritate manens non retineat figuram neque colorem: quando tamen +condensatur, et figurari et colorari potest: sicut patet in nubibus. +Et sic Angeli assumunt corpora ex aere, condensando ipsum virtute +divina, quantum necesse est ad corporis assumendi formationem.' + +Tasso, familiar like Donne with Catholic doctrine, thus clothes his +angels: + + Così parlògli, e Gabriel s' accinse + Veloce ad eseguir l' imposte cose. + _La sua forma invisibil d'aria cinse, + Ed al senso mortal la sottopose_: + Umane membra, aspetto uman si finse, + Ma di celeste maestà il compose. + Tra giovane e fanciullo età confine + Prese, ed ornò di raggi il biondo crine. + _Gerus. Lib._ I. 13. + +Fairfax translates the relevant lines: + + In form of airy members fair imbared, + His spirits pure were subject to our sight. + +Milton's language is vague and inconsistent, but his angels are +indubitably corporeal. When Satan is wounded, + + the ethereal substance closed, + Not long divisible; and from the gash + A stream of nectarous humour issuing flowed + Sanguine, such as celestial Spirits may bleed. + . . . . . . . . . . + Yet soon he healed; for Spirits that live throughout + Vital in every part, (not as frail man + In entrails, heart or head, liver or reins,) + Cannot but by annihilating die; + Nor in their liquid texture mortal wound + Receive, _no more than can the fluid air_. + All heart they live, all head, all eye, all ear, + All intellect, all sense; _and as they please, + They limb themselves, and colour, shape, or size + Assume, as likes them best, condense or rare_. + +The lines italicized indicate that Milton is familiar with the +doctrine of the schools, and is giving it a turn of his own. Milton's +angels, apparently, do not _assume_ a body of air but, remaining in +their own ethereal substance, assume what form and colour they choose. +Raphael, thus having passed through the air like a bird, + + to his proper shape returns + A Seraph winged, &c. + +Nash says, speaking of Satan, 'Lucifer (before his fall) an Archangel, +was a cleere body, compact of the purest and brightest of the ayre, +but after his fall hee was vayled with a grosser substance, and tooke +a new forme of darke and thicke ayre, which he still reteyneth.' +_Pierce Penniless_ (Grosart), ii. 102. The popular mind had difficulty +in appreciating the scholastic doctrine of the purely spiritual nature +of angels who do not possess but only assume bodies; who do not occupy +any point in space but are _virtually_ present as operating at that +point. 'Per applicationem igitur virtutis angelicae ad aliquem locum +qualitercumque dicitur Angelus esse in loco corporeo.' The popular +mind gave them thin bodies and wondered how many could stand on a +needle. + +The Scholastic doctrine of Angelic bodies was an inheritance from the +Neo-Platonic doctrine of the bodies of demons, the beings intermediary +between gods and men. According to Plotinus these could assume a body +of air or of fire, but the generally entertained view of the school +was, that their bodies were of air. Apuleius was the author of a +definition of demons which was transmitted through the Middle Ages: +'Daemones sunt genere animalia, ingenio rationalia, animo passiva, +corpore aeria, tempore aeterna.' See also Dante, _Purgatorio_, xv. The +aerial or aetherial body is a tenet of mysticism. It has been defended +by such different thinkers as Leibnitz and Charles Bonnet. See +Bouillet's note to Plotinus's _Enneads_, I. 454. + + +PAGE =23=. BREAKE OF DAY. + +This poem is obviously addressed by a woman to her lover, not _vice +versa_, though the fact has eluded some of the copyists, who have +tried to change the pronouns. It is strange to find the subtle and +erudite Donne in his quest of realism falling into line with the +popular song-writer. Mr. Chambers has pointed out in his learned and +delightful essay on the mediaeval lyric (_Early English Lyrics_, 1907) +that the popular as opposed to the courtly love-song was frequently +put into the mouth of the woman. One has only to turn to Burns and +the Scotch lyrists to find the same thing true. This song, indeed, is +clearly descended from the popular _aube_, or lyric dialogue of lovers +parting at daybreak. The dialogue suggestion is heightened by the +punctuation of l. 3 in some MSS. + + Why should we rise? Because 'tis light? + +ll. 13-18. _Must businesse thee from hence remove, &c._ 'It is a good +definition of ill-love, that St. Chrysostom gives, that it is _Animae +vacantis passio_, a passion of an empty soul, of an idle mind. +For fill a man with business, and he hath no room for such love.' +_Sermons_ 26. 384. + + +PAGE =24=. THE ANNIVERSARIE. + +l. 3. _The Sun itselfe, which makes times, as they passe_: i.e. which +makes times and seasons as they pass. + + Before the Sunne, the which fram'd daies, was fram'd. + _The Second Anniversary_, l. 23. + +The construction is somewhat of an anacoluthon, the sun alone being +given the predicate, 'Is elder by a year,' which has to be supplied +with all the other subjects in the first two lines. Chambers, +inadvertently or from some copy of _1633_, reads 'time', and this +makes 'they' refer back to 'Kings, favourites', &c. This does not +improve the construction. + +l. 22. _But wee no more, then all the rest._ The 'wee' of every MS. +which I have consulted seems to me certainly the correct reading. +The 'now' of all the printed editions is due to the editor of _1633_ +imagining that he got thereby the right antithesis to 'then'. But he +was too hasty, for the antithesis is between 'then' when we are in +heaven, and now while we are 'here upon earth'. In heaven indeed we +shall be 'throughly blest', but _all_ in heaven are equally happy, +whereas here on earth, + + we'are kings and none but we + Can be such kings, nor of such subjects be. + +The 'none but we' is the extreme antithesis to 'But we no more than +all the rest'. + +The Scholastic Philosophy held, not indeed that all in heaven are +equally blest, but that all are equally content. Basing themselves on +the verse, 'In domo Patris mei mansiones multae sunt,' John xiv. 2, +they argued that the blessed have in varying degree according to their +merit, the essential happiness of Heaven which is the vision of God: + + Only who have enjoy'd + The sight of God, in fulnesse, can think it; + For it is both the object and the wit. + This is essential joy, where neither hee + Can suffer diminution, nor wee; + 'Tis such a full, and such a filling good; + Had th'Angells once look'd on him they had stood. + _The Second Anniversary_, ll. 140-6 (p. 264). + +But though not all equally dowered with the virtue and the wisdom to +understand God, all are content, for each is full to his measure, and +each is happy in the happiness of the other: 'Solet etiam quaeri an in +gaudio dispares sint, sicut in claritate cognitionis differunt. De hoc +August. ait in lib. de Civ. Dei: Multae mansiones in una domo erunt, +scilicet, variae praemiorum dignitates: sed ubi Deus erit omnia in +omnibus, erit etiam in dispari claritate par gaudium; ut quod habebunt +singuli, commune sit omnibus, quia etiam gloria capitis omnium erit +per vinculum charitatis. Ex his datur intelligi quod par gaudium omnes +habebunt, etsi disparem cognitionis claritatem, quia per charitatem +quae in singulis erit perfecta, tantum quisque gaudebit de bono +alterius, quantum gauderet si in se ipso haberet. Sed si par erit +cunctorum gaudium, videtur quod par sit omnium beatitudo; quod constat +omnino non esse. Ad quod dici potest quod beatitudo par esset si ita +esset par gaudium, ut etiam par esset cognitio; sed quia hoc non erit, +non faciet paritas gaudii paritatem beatitudinis. Potest etiam +sic accipi par gaudium, ut non referatur paritas ad intensionem +affectionis gaudentium, sed ad universitatem rerum de quibus +laetabitur: quia de omni re unde gaudebit unus, gaudebunt omnes.' +Petri Lombardi ... _Sententiarum_ Lib. IV, Distinct. xlix. 4. Compare +Aquinas, _Summa, Supplement._ Quaest. xciii. + +All in heaven are perfectly happy in the place assigned to them, is +Piccardo's answer to Dante (_Paradiso_, iii. 70-88): 'So that our +being thus, from threshold unto threshold throughout the realm, is a +joy to all the realm, as to the King, who draweth our wills to what he +willeth: and his will is our peace.' + +ll. 23-4. The variants in these lines show that _1633_ has in this +poem followed not _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ but _A18_, _N_, _TC_. + + +PAGE =25=. A VALEDICTION: OF MY NAME IN THE WINDOW. + +I have adopted from the title of this poem in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ the +correct manner of entitling all these poems. In the printed editions +the titles run straight on, _A Valediction of my name, in the window_. +This has led in the case of the next of these poems, _A Valediction +of the booke_, to the mistake expressed in the title of _1633_, +_Valediction to his Booke_, and repeated by Grosart, that the latter +was a dedication, 'formed the concluding poem of the missing edition +of his poems.' This is a complete mistake. _Valediction_ is the +general title of a poem bidding farewell. _Of the Booke_, _Of teares_, +&c., indicate the particular themes. This is clearly brought out in +_O'F_, where they are brought together and numbered. _Valediction 2. +of Teares_, &c. + +PAGE =26=, l. 28. _The Rafters of my body, bone._ Compare: 'First, +_Ossa_, bones, We know in the naturall and ordinary acceptation, what +they are; They are these Beames, and Timbers, and Rafters of these +Tabernacles, these Temples of the Holy Ghost, these bodies of ours.' +_Sermons_ 80. 51. 516. + +PAGE =27=, ll. 31-2. _Till my returne, repaire + And recompact my scattered body so._ + +This verse is rightly printed in the 1633 edition. In that of 1635 it +went wrong; and the errors were transmitted through all the subsequent +editions, and have been retained by Grosart and Chambers, but +corrected in the Grolier Club edition. The full stop after 'so' was +changed to a comma on the natural but mistaken assumption that 'so' +pointed forward to the immediately following 'as'. In fact, 'so' +refers _back_ to the preceding verse. Donne has described how from his +anatomy or skeleton, i.e. his name scratched in the glass, the lady +may repair and recompact his whole frame, and he opens the new verse +by bidding her do so. Compare: 'In this chapter ... we have Job's +Anatomy, Jobs Sceleton, the ruins to which he was reduced.... Job felt +the hand of destruction upon him, and he felt the hand of preservation +too; and it was all one hand: This is God's Method ... even God's +demolitions are super-edifications, his Anatomies, his dissections +are so many recompactings, so many resurrections; God winds us off the +Skein, that he may weave us up into the whole peece, and he cuts us +out of the whole peece into peeces, that he may make us up into a +whole garment.' _Sermons_ 80. 43. 127-9. Again, 'It is a divorce +and no super-induction, it is a separating, and no redintegration.' +_Sermons_ 80. 55. 552. With the third line, 'As all the virtuous +powers,' Donne begins a new comparison which is completed in the next +stanza. Therefore the sixth stanza closes rightly in the 1633 text +with a colon. The full stop of the later editions, which Chambers +adopts, is obviously wrong. Grosart has a semicolon, but as he retains +the comma at 'so' and puts a semicolon at the end of the previous +stanza, the sense becomes very obscure. + + +PAGE =28=. TWICKNAM GARDEN. + +l. 1. _surrounded with tears_: i.e. overflowed with tears, the root +idea of 'surrounded'. The Dutch poet translates: + + Van suchten hytgedort, van tranen overvloeyt. + +Compare: 'The traditional doctrines in the Roman Church, which are +so many, as that they overflow even the water of life, the Scriptures +themselves, and suppresse and surround them.' _Sermons_ 80. 59. 599. + +With this whole poem compare: 'Sir, Because I am in a place and season +where I see every thing bud forth, I must do so too, and vent some of +my meditations to you.... The pleasantnesse of the season displeases +me. Everything refreshes, and I wither, and I grow older and not +better, my strength diminishes and my load growes, and being to pass +more and more stormes, I finde that I have not onely cast out all my +ballast, which nature and time gives, Reason and discretion, and so +am as empty and light as Vanity can make me, but I have overfraught +myself with vice, and so am ridd(l)ingly subject to two contrary +wracks, Sinking and Oversetting,' &c. _Letters_ (1651), pp. 78-9 (_To +Sir Henry Goodyere_). + +l. 15. _Indure, nor yet leave loving._ This is at first sight a +strange reading, and I was disposed to think that _1635-69_, which +has the support of several MSS. (none of very high textual authority), +must be right. It is strange to hear the Petrarchian lover (Donne is +probably addressing the Countess of Bedford) speak of 'leaving loving' +as though it were in his power. The reading 'nor leave this garden' +suits what follows: 'Not to be mocked by the garden and yet to linger +here in the vicinity of her I love let me become,' &c. + +It is remarkable that _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and _H40_ omit this half +line. If the same omission was in the MS. from which _1633_ printed, +the present reading might be an editor's emendation. But it is older +than that, for it was the reading of the MS. from which the Dutch poet +Huyghens translated, and he has tried by his rhymes to produce the +effect of the alliteration: + + Maer, om my noch te decken + Voor sulcken ongeval, en niet te min de Min + Te voeren in mijn zin, + Komt Min, en laet my hier yet ongevoelicks wezen. + +Donne means, I suppose, 'Not to be mocked by the garden, and yet to be +ever the faithful lover.' Compare _Loves Deitie_, l. 24. 'Love might +make me leave loving.' The remainder of the verse may have been +suggested by Jonson's + + Slow, slow, fresh Fount, keep time with my salt Tears. + + _Cynthias Revels_ (1600). + +l. 17. I have ventured to adopt 'groane' for 'grow' ('grone' and +'growe' are almost indistinguishable) from _A18_, _N_, _TC_; _D_, +_H49_, _Lec_; and _H40_. It is surely much more in Donne's style than +the colourless and pointless 'growe'. It is, too, in closer touch with +the next line. If 'growing' is all we are to have predicated of the +mandrake, then it should be sufficient for the fountain to 'stand', or +'flow'. The chief difficulty in accepting the MS. reading is that +the mandrake is most often said to shriek, sometimes to howl, not to +groan: + + I prethee yet remember + Millions are now in graves, which at last day + Like mandrakes shall rise shreeking. + Webster, _The White Devil_, V. vi. 64. + +On the other hand the lover most often groans: + + Thy face hath not the power to make love grone. + Shakespeare, _Sonnets_, 131. 6. + + Beshrew that heart that makes my heart to groane. + Shakespeare, _Sonnets_, 133. 1. + + _Ros._ I would be glad to see it. (_i.e._ _his heart_) + + _Bir._ I would you heard it groan. + _Love's Labour's Lost._ + +In a metaphor where two objects are identified such a transference of +attributes is quite permissible. Moreover, although 'shriek' is the +more common word, 'groan' is used of the mandrake: + + Would curses kill, as doth the mandrake's groan, + I would invent as bitter searching terms, &c. + _2 Hen. VI_, III. ii. 310. + +In the _Elegie upon ... Prince Henry_ (p. 269, ll. 53-4) Donne writes: + + though such a life wee have + As but so many mandrakes on his grave. + +i.e. a life of groans. + + +PAGE =29=. A VALEDICTION: OF THE BOOKE. + +l. 3. _Esloygne._ Chambers alters to 'eloign', but Donne's is a good +English form. + + From worldly care himself he did esloyne. + Spenser, _F. Q._ I. iv. 20. + +The two forms seem to have run parallel from the outset, but that with +'s' disappears after the seventeenth century. + +PAGE =30=, l. 7. _Her who from Pindar could allure._ Corinna, who +five times defeated Pindar at Thebes. Aelian, _Var. Hist._ xiii. 25, +referred to by Professor Norton. He quotes also from Pausanias, ix. +22. + +l. 8. _And her, through whose help Lucan is not lame._ His wife, Polla +Argentaria, who 'assisted her husband in correcting the three first +books of his _Pharsalia_'. Lemprière. The source of this tradition +I cannot discover. The only reference indicated by Schanz is to +Apollinaris Sidonius (Epist. 2, 10, 6, p. 46), who includes her among +a list of women who aided and inspired their husbands: 'saepe versum +... complevit ... Argentaria cum Lucano.' + +l. 9. _And her, whose booke (they say) Homer did finde, and name._ I +owe my understanding of this line to Professor Norton, who refers +to the _Myriobiblon_ or _Bibliotheca_ of Photius, of which the first +edition was published at Augsburg in 1601. There Photius, in an +abstract of a work by Ptolemy Hephaestion of Alexandria, states that +Musaeus' daughter Helena wrote on the war of Troy, and that from her +work Homer took the subject of his poem. But another account refers to +Phantasia of Memphis, the daughter of Nicarchus, whose work Homer +got from a sacred scribe named Pharis at Memphis. This last source +is mentioned by Lemprière, who knows nothing of the other. Probably, +therefore, it is the better known tradition. + +ll. 21-2. I have interchanged the old semicolon at the end of l. 21 +and the comma at the end of l. 22. I take the first three lines of the +stanza to form an absolute clause: 'This book once written, in +cipher or new-made idiom, we are thereby (in these letters) the only +instruments for Loves clergy--their Missal and Breviary.' I presume +this is how it is understood by Chambers and the Grolier Club editor, +who place a semicolon at the end of each line. It seems to me that +with so heavy a pause after l. 21 a full stop would be better at the +end of l. 22. + +l. 25. _Vandals and Goths inundate us._ This, the reading of quite a +number of independent MSS., seems to me greatly preferable to that of +the printed texts: + + Vandals and the Goths invade us. + +The agreement of the printed texts does not carry much weight, for +any examination of the variants in this poem will reveal that they are +errors due to misunderstanding, e.g. l. 20, 'tome,' 'to me,' 'tomb' +show that each edition has been printed from the last, preserving, +or conjecturally amending, its blunders. If therefore the 1633 editor +mistook 'inũdate' for 'invade', that is sufficient. Besides the +metrical harshness of the line there seems to be no reason why the +epithet 'ravenous' should be applied to the Vandals and not extended +to the Goths. The metaphor of inundation is used by Donne in the +sermons: 'The Torrents, and Inundations, which invasive Armies pour +upon Nations, we are fain to call by the name of Law, _The Law of +Armes_.' _Sermons_ 26. 3. 36. Milton too uses it: + + A multitude like which the populous North + Poured never from her frozen loins, to pass + Rhene or the Danaw, where her barbarous sons + Came like a deluge on the South, and spread + Beneath Gibraltar to the Libyan sands. + _Paradise Lost_, i. 351-4. + +Probably both Donne and Milton had in mind Isaiah's description of the +Assyrian invasion, where in the Vulgate the word is that used here: +'Propter hoc ecce Dominus adducet super eos aquas fluminis fortes et +multas, regem Assyriorum, et omnem gloriam eius; et ascendet super +omnes rivos eius, et fluet super universas ripas eius; et ibit per +Iudam, _inundans_, et transiens usque ad collum veniet.' Isaiah viii. +7-8. + +Donne uses the word exactly as here in the _Essays in Divinity_: 'To +which foreign sojourning ... many have assimilated and compared the +Roman Church's straying into France and being impounded in Avignon +seventy years; and so long also lasted the inundation of the Goths in +Italy.' Ed. Jessop (1855), p. 155. + +PAGE =31=, ll. 37-54. These verses are somewhat difficult but very +characteristic. 'In these our letters, wherein is contained the +whole mystery of love, Lawyers will find by what titles we hold our +mistresses, what dues we are bound to pay as to feudal superiors. They +will find also how, claiming prerogative or privilege they devour +or confiscate the estates for which we have paid due service, by +transferring what we owe to love, to womankind. The service which we +pay expecting love in return, they claim as due to their womanhood, +and deserving of no recompense, no return of love. Even when going +beyond the strict fee they demand subsidies they will forsake a lover +who thinks he has thereby secured them, and will plead "honour" or +"conscience".' + +'Statesmen will learn here the secret of their art. Love and +statesmanship both alike depend upon what we might call the art of +"bluffing". Neither will bear too curious examination. The statesman +and the lover must impose for the moment, disguising weakness or +inspiring fear in those who descry it.' + +l. 53. _In this thy booke, such will their nothing see._ After some +hesitation I have adopted the 1635-54 reading in preference to that of +1633 and 1669, 'there something.' I do so because (1) the MSS. support +it. Their uncertainty as to 'their' and 'there' is of no importance; +(2) 'there' is a weak repetition of 'in this thy book', an emphatic +enough indication of place; (3) 'their nothing' is both the more +difficult reading and the more characteristic of Donne. The art of a +statesman is a 'nothing'. He uses the word in the same way of his own +Paradoxes and Problems when sending some of them to Sir Henry Wotton, +and with the same emphatic stress on the first syllable: 'having +this advantage to escape from being called ill things that they are +nothings' (An unpublished letter, quoted in the _Cambridge History of +Literature_, vol. iv, p. 218). The word was pronounced with a fully +rounded 'no'. Compare _Negative Love_, l. 16. + +With the sentiment compare: 'And as our Alchymists can finde their +whole art and worke of Alchymy, not only in Virgil and Ovid, but in +Moses and Solomon; so these men can find such a transmutation +into golde, such a foundation of profit, in extorting a sense for +Purgatory, or other profitable Doctrines, out of any Scripture.' +_Sermons_ 80. 78. 791. + +'Un personnage de grande dignité, me voulant approuver par authorité +cette queste de la pierre philosophale où il est tout plongé, +m'allegua dernièrement cinq ou six passages de la Bible, sur +lesquels il disoit s'estre premièrement fondé pour la descharge de sa +conscience (car il est de profession ecclesiastique); et, à la verité, +l'invention n'en estoit pas seulement plaisante, mais encore bien +proprement accommodée à la défence de cette belle science.' Montaigne, +_Apologie de Raimond Sebond_ (_Les Essais_, ii. 12). + +PAGE =32=, ll. 59-61. _To take a latitude, &c._ The latitude of a spot +may always be found by measuring the distance from the zenith of a +star whose altitude, i.e. distance from the equator, is known. The +words 'At their brightest' are only used to point the antithesis with +the 'dark eclipses' used to measure longitude. + + ll. 61-3. _but to conclude + Of longitudes, what other way have wee, + But to marke when, and where the dark eclipses bee_. + +This method of estimating longitude was, it is said, first discovered +by noting that an eclipse which took place during the battle of Arbela +was observed at Alexandria an hour later. If the time at which an +instantaneous phenomenon such as an eclipse of the moon begins at +Greenwich (or whatever be the first meridian) is known, and the +time of its beginning at whatever place a ship is be then noted, the +difference gives the longitude. The eclipses of the moons in Saturn +have been used for the purpose. The method is not, however, a +practically useful one. Owing to the penumbra it is difficult to +observe the exact moment at which an eclipse of the moon begins. In +certain positions of Saturn her satellites are not visible. Another +method used was to note the lunar distances of certain stars, but the +most common and practical method is by the use of well adjusted and +carefully corrected chronometers giving Greenwich time. + +The comparison in the last five lines rests on a purely verbal basis. +'Longitude' means literally 'length', 'latitude', 'breadth'. Therefore +longitude is compared with the duration of love, 'how long this love +will be.' There is no real appropriateness. + + +PAGE =33=. LOVES GROWTH. + +ll. 7-8. _But if this medicine, &c._ 'The quintessence then is a +certain matter extracted from all things which Nature has produced, +and from everything which has life corporeally in itself, a matter +most subtly purged of all impurities and mortality, and separated from +all the elements. From this it is evident that the quintessence is, +so to say, a nature, a force, a virtue, and a medicine, once shut +up within things but now free from any domicile and from all outward +incorporation. The same is also the colour, the life, the properties +of things.... Now the fact _that this quintessence cures all diseases_ +does not arise from temperature, but from an innate property, namely +its great cleanliness and purity, by which, after a wonderful manner, +it alters the body into its own purity, and entirely changes it.... +When therefore the quintessence is separated from that which is not +the quintessence, as the soul from its body, and itself is taken into +the body, what infirmity is able to withstand this so noble, pure, +and powerful nature, or to take away our life save death, which being +predestined separates our soul and body, as we teach in our treatise +on Life and Death. But by whatsoever method it takes place, the +quintessence should not be extracted by the mixture or the addition +of incongruous matters; but the element of the quintessence must be +extracted from a separated body, and in like manner by that separated +body which is extracted.' Paracelsus, _The Fourth Book of the +Archidoxies. Concerning the Quintessence_. + +The O.E.D. quotes the first sentence of this passage to illustrate its +first sense of the word--'the "fifth essence" of ancient and mediaeval +philosophy, supposed to be the substance of which the heavenly bodies +were composed, and to be actually latent in all things, the extraction +of it ... being one of the great objects of Alchemy.' But Paracelsus +expressly denies 'that the quintessence exists as a fifth element +beyond the other four'; and as he goes on to discuss the different +quintessences of different things (each thing having in its +constitution the four elements, though one may be predominant) it +would seem that he is using the word rather in the second sense given +in the O.E.D.--'The most essential part of any substance, extracted by +natural or artificial processes.' Probably the two meanings ran into +each other. There was a real and an ideal quintessence of things. +A specific sense given to the word in older Chemistry is a definite +alcoholic tincture obtained by digestion at a gentle heat. This is +probably the 'soule of simples' (p. 186, l. 26), unless that also is +the quintessence in Paracelsus's full sense of the word. + + ll. 17-20. _As, in the firmament, + Starres by the Sunne are not inlarg'd, but showne. + Gentle love deeds, as blossomes on a bough, + From loves awakened root do bud out now_. + +_P_ reads here: + + As in the firmament + Starres by the sunne are not enlarg'd but showne + Greater; Loves deeds, &c. + +This certainly makes the verse clearer. As it stands l. 18 is +rather an enigma. The stars are not revealed by the sun, but hidden. +Grosart's note is equally enigmatical: 'a curious phrase meaning that +the stars that show in daylight are not enlarged, but showne to be +brighter than their invisible neighbours, and to be comparatively +brighter than they appear to be when all are seen together in +the darkness of the night.' _P_ is so carelessly written that an +occasional good reading may be an old one because there is no evidence +of any editing. The copyist seems to have written on without paying +any attention to the sense of what he set down. Still, 'Gentle' is the +reading of all the other MSS. and editions, and I do not think it is +necessary or desirable to change it. But _P_'s emendation shows what +Donne meant. By 'showne' he does not mean 'revealed'--an adjectival +predicate 'larger' or 'greater' must be supplied from the verb +'enlarg'd'. 'The stars at sunrise are not really made larger, but they +are made to seem larger.' It is a characteristically elliptical and +careless wording of a characteristically acute and vivid image. Mr. +Wells has used the same phenomenon with effect: + +'He peered upwards. "Look!" he said. + +"What?" I asked. + +"In the sky. Already. On the blackness--a little touch of blue. +See! _The stars seem larger._ And the little ones and all those dim +nebulosities we saw in empty space--they are hidden." + +Swiftly, steadily the day approached us.' _The first Men in the Moon._ +(Chap. vii. Sunrise on the Moon.) + +A similar phenomenon is noted by Donne: 'A Torch in a misty night, +seemeth greater then in a clear.' _Sermons_ 50. 36. 326. + + +PAGE =34=. LOVES EXCHANGE. + +l. 11. _A non obstante_: a privilege, a waiving of any law in favour +of an individual: 'Who shall give any other interpretation, any +modification, any _Non obstante_ upon his law in my behalf, when he +comes to judge me according to that law which himself hath made.' +_Sermons_ 50. 12. 97. 'A _Non obstante_ and priviledge to doe a sinne +before hand.' Ibid. 50. 35. 313. + +l. 14. _minion_: i.e. 'one specially favoured or beloved; a dearest +friend' &c. O.E.D. Not used in a contemptuous sense. '_John_ the +Minion of _Christ_ upon earth, and survivor of the Apostles, (whose +books rather seem fallen from Heaven, and writ with the hand which +ingraved the stone Tables, then a mans work)' &c. _Sermons_ 50. 33. +309. + +ll. 29 f. Dryden borrows: + + Great God of Love, why hast thou made + A Face that can all Hearts command, + That all Religions can invade, + And change the Laws of ev'ry Land? + _A Song to a fair Young Lady Going out of Town in + the Spring._ + + +PAGE =36=. CONFINED LOVE. + +Compare with this the poem _Loves Freedome_ in Beaumont's _Poems_ +(1652), sig. E. 6: + + Why should man be only ty'd + To a foolish Female thing, + When all Creatures else beside, + Birds and Beasts, change every Spring? + Who would then to one be bound, + When so many may be found? + +The third verse runs: + + Would you think him wise that now + Still one sort of meat doth eat, + When both Sea and Land allow + Sundry sorts of other meat? + Who would then, &c. + +Poems on such themes were doubtless exercises of wit at which more +than one author tried his hand in rivalry with his fellows. + +l. 16. _And not to seeke new lands, or not to deale withall._ I have, +after some consideration, adhered to the _1633_ reading. Chambers has +adopted that of the later editions, taking the line to mean that a man +builds ships in order to seek new lands and to deal or trade with all +lands. But ships cannot trade with inland countries. The form 'withal' +is the regular one for 'with' when it follows the noun it governs. +'We build ships not to let them lie in harbours but to seek new lands +with, and to trade with.' The MS. evidence is not of much assistance, +because it is not clear in all cases what 'w^{th} all' stands for. The +words were sometimes separated even when the simple preposition +was intended. 'People, such as I have dealt with all in their +marchaundyse.' Berners' _Froissart_, I. cclxvii. 395 (O.E.D.). But +_D_, _H49_, _Lec_ read 'w^{th} All', supporting Chambers. + +For the sentiment compare: + + A stately builded ship well rig'd and tall + The Ocean maketh more majesticall: + Why vowest thou to live in Sestos here, + Who on Loves seas more glorious would appeare. + Marlowe, _Hero and Leander_: _First Sestiad_ 219-222. + +For 'deale withall' compare: + + For ye have much adoe to deale withal. + Spenser's _Faerie Queene_, VI. i. 10. + + +PAGE =37=. THE DREAME. + + ll. 1-10. _Deare love, for nothing lesse then thee + Would I have broke this happy dreame, + It was a theame + For reason, much too strong for phantasie, + Therefore thou wak'dst me wisely; yet + My Dreame thou brok'st not, but continued'st it, + Thou art so truth, that thoughts of thee suffice, + To make dreames truths; and fables histories; + Enter these armes, &c._ + +I have left the punctuation of the first stanza unaltered. The sense +is clear and any modernization alters the rhetoric. Chambers places a +semicolon after 'dreame' and a full stop after 'phantasie'. The +last is certainly wrong, for the statement 'It was a theme', &c. is +connected not with what precedes, but with what follows, 'Therefore +thou waked'st me wisely.' In like manner Chambers's full stop +after 'but continued'st it' breaks the close connexion with the two +following lines, which are really an adverbial clause of explanation +or reason. 'My dream thou brokest not, but continued'st it,' for 'Thou +art so truth', &c. A full stop might more justifiably be placed after +'histories', but the semicolon is more in Donne's manner. + +l. 7. _Thou art so truth._ The evidence of the MSS. shows that both +'truth' and 'true' were current versions and explains the alteration +of _1635-69_. But 'truth' is both the more difficult reading and +the more subtle expression of Donne's thought; 'true' is the obvious +emendation of less metaphysical copyists and editors. Donne's 'Love' +is not true as opposed to false only; she is 'truth' as opposed +to dreams or phantasms or aught that partakes of unreality. She is +essentially truth as God is: 'Respondeo dicendum quod ... veritas +invenitur in intellectu, secundum quod apprehendit rem ut est; et +in re, secundum quod habet esse conformabile intellectui. Hoc autem +maxime invenitur in Deo. Nam esse eius non solum est conforme suo +intelligere; et suum intelligere est mensura et causa omnis alterius +esse, et omnis alterius intellectus; et ipse est suum esse et +intelligere. Unde sequitur quod non solum in ipso sit veritas, sed +quod ipse sit ipsa summa et prima veritas. _Summa_ I. vi. 5. + +To deify the object of your love was a common topic of love-poetry; +Donne does so with all the subtleties of scholastic theology at his +finger-ends. In this single poem he attributes to the lady addressed +two attributes of Deity, (1) the identity of being and essence, (2) +the power of reading the thoughts directly. + +The Dutch poet keeps this point: + + de Waerheyt is so ghy, en + Ghy zijt de Waerheyt so. + + ll. 11-12. _As lightning, or a Tapers light + Thine eyes, and not thy noise wak'd mee._ + +'A sodain light brought into a room doth awaken some men; but yet a +noise does it better.' _Sermons_ 50. 38. 344. + +'A candle wakes some men as well as a noise.' _Sermons_ 80. 61. 617. + + ll. 15-16. _But when I saw thou sawest my heart, + And knew'st my thoughts, beyond an Angels art._ + +Modern editors, by removing the comma after 'thoughts', have altered +the sense of these lines. It is not that she could read his thoughts +better than an angel, but that she could read them at all, a power +which is not granted to Angels. + +St. Thomas (_Summa Theol._ Quaest. lvii. Art. 4) discusses 'Utrum +angeli cognoscant cogitationes cordium', and concludes, 'Cognoscunt +Angeli cordium cogitationes in suis effectibus: ut autem in se ipsis +sunt, Deo tantum sunt naturaliter cognitae.' Angels may read our +thoughts by subtler signs than our words and acts, or even those +changes of countenance and pulsation which we note in each other, +'quanto subtilius huiusmodi immutationes occultas corporales +perpendunt.' But to know them as they are in the intellect and will +belongs only to God, to whom only the freedom of the human will is +subject, and a man's thoughts are subject to his will. 'Manifestum +est autem, quod ex sola voluntate dependet, quod aliquis actu aliqua +consideret; quia cum aliquis habet habitum scientiae, vel species +intelligibiles in eo existentes, utitur eis cum vult. Et ideo dicit +Apostolus I Corinth. secundo: quod _quae sunt hominis, nemo novit nisi +spiritus hominis qui in ipso est_.' + +Donne recurs to this theme very frequently: 'Let the Schoole dispute +infinitely (for he that will not content himself with means of +salvation till all Schoole points be reconciled, will come too late); +let Scotus and his Heard think, That Angels, and separate souls have a +naturall power to understand thoughts ... And let Aquinas present his +arguments to the contrary, That those spirits have no naturall power +to know thoughts; we seek no farther, but that Jesus Christ himself +thought it argument enough to convince the Scribes and Pharisees, +and prove himself God, by knowing their thoughts. _Eadem Maiestate +et potentia_ sayes _S. Hierome_, Since you see I proceed as God, in +knowing your thoughts, why beleeve you not that I may forgive his sins +as God too?' _Sermons_ 80. 11. 111; and compare also _Sermons_ 80. 9. +92. + +This point is also preserved in the Dutch version: + + Maer als ick u sagh sien wat om mijn hertje lagh + En weten wat ick docht (dat Engel noyt en sagh). + +M. Legouis in a recent French version has left it ambiguous: + + Mais quand j'ai vu que tu voyais mon coeur + Et savais mes pensées au dela du savoir d'un ange. + +The MS. reading, 14 'but an Angel', heightens the antithesis. + + ll. 27-8. _Perchance as torches which must ready bee + Men light and put out._ + +'If it' (i.e. a torch) 'have _never_ been _lighted_, it does not +easily take light, but it must be _bruised_ and _beaten_ first; if +it have been lighted and put out, though it cannot take fire _of it +self_, yet it does easily conceive fire, if it be presented within any +convenient distance.' _Sermons_ 50. 36. 332. + + +PAGE =38=. A VALEDICTION: OF WEEPING. + +ll. 1-9. I have changed the comma at l. 6 to a semicolon, as the first +image, that of the coins, closes here. Chambers places a full stop +at l. 4 'worth', and apparently connects the next two lines with what +follows--wrongly, I think. Finishing the figure of the coins, coined, +stamped, and given their value by her, Donne passes on to a couple of +new images. 'The tears are fruits of much grief; but they are symbols +of more to come. For, as your image perishes in each tear that falls, +so shall we perish, be nothing, when between us rolls the "salt, +estranging sea".' + +It is, I suppose, by an inadvertence that Chambers has left 'divers' +unchanged to 'diverse'. I cannot think there is any reference to 'a +diver in the pearly seas'. Grolier and the Dutch poet divide as here: + + Laet voor uw aengesicht mijn trouwe tranen vallen, + Want van dat aengensicht ontfangen sy uw' munt, + En rijsen tot de waerd dies' uwe stempel gunt + Bevrucht van uw' gedaent: vrucht van veel' ongevallen, + Maer teekenen van meer, daer ghy valt met den traen, + Die van u swanger was, en beyde wy ontdaen + Verdwijnen, soo wy op verscheiden oever staen. + + +PAGE =39=. LOVES ALCHYMIE. + +l. 7. _th'Elixar_: i.e. 'the Elixir Vitae', which heals all disease +and indefinitely prolongs life. It is sometimes identified with the +philosopher's stone, which transmutes metals to gold. In speaking of +quintessences (see note, II. p. 30) Paracelsus declares that there are +certain quintessences superior to those of gold, marchasite, precious +stones, &c., 'of more importance than that they should be called a +quintessence. It should be rather spoken of as a certain secret and +mystery ... Among these arcana we here put forward four. Of these +arcana the first is the mercury of life, the second is the primal +matter, the third is the Philosopher's Stone, and the fourth the +tincture. But although these arcana are rather angelical than human to +speak of we shall not shrink from them.' From the description he gives +they all seem to operate more or less alike, purging metals and other +bodies from disease. + +ll. 7-10. _And as no chymique yet, &c._ 'My Lord Chancellor gave me +so noble and so ready a dispatch, accompanied with so fatherly advice +that I am now, like an alchemist, delighted with discoveries by the +way, though I attain not mine end.' To ... Sir H. G., Gosse's _Life, +&c._, ii. 49. + + ll. 23-4. _at their best + Sweetnesse and wit, they'are but Mummy, possest._ + +The punctuation of these lines in _1633-54_ is ambiguous, and Chambers +has altered it wrongly to + + Sweetness and wit they are, but Mummy possest. + +The MSS. generally support the punctuation which I have adopted, which +is that of the Grolier Club edition. + + +PAGE =40=. THE FLEA. + +I have restored this poem to the place it occupied in _1633_. In +_1635_ it was placed first of all the _Songs and Sonets_. A strange +choice to our mind, but apparently the poem was greatly admired as +a masterpiece of wit. It is the first of the pieces translated by +Huyghens: + +De Vloy. + + Slaet acht op deze Vloy, en leert wat overleggen, + Hoe slechten ding het is dat ghy my kont ontzeggen, &c., + +and was selected for special commendation by some of his +correspondents. Coleridge comments upon it in verse: + + Be proud as Spaniards. Leap for pride, ye Fleas! + In natures _minim_ realm ye're now grandees. + Skip-jacks no more, nor civiller skip-johns; + Thrice-honored Fleas! I greet you all as _Dons_. + In Phoebus' archives registered are ye, + And this your patent of nobility. + +It will be noticed that there are two versions of Donne's poem. + + +PAGE =41=. THE CURSE. + +l. 3. _His only, and only his purse._ This, the reading of all the +editions except the last, and of the MSS., is obviously right. What +is to dispose 'some dull heart to love' is his _only_ purse and _his_ +alone, no one's but his purse. Chambers adopts the _1669_ conjecture, +'Him only for his purse,' but in that case there is no subject to 'may +dispose', or if 'some dull heart' be subject then 'itself' must be +supplied--a harsh construction. 'Dispose' is not used intransitively +in this sense. + +l. 27. _Mynes._ I have adopted the plural from the MSS. It brings it +into line with the other objects mentioned. + + +PAGE =43=. THE MESSAGE. + +l. 11. _But if it be taught by thine._ It seems incredible that Donne +should have written 'which if it' &c. immediately after the 'which' +of the preceding line. I had thought that the _1633_ printer had +accidentally repeated from the line above, but the evidence of the +MSS. points to the mistake (if it is a mistake) being older than that. +'Which' was in the MS. used by the printer. If 'But' is not Donne's +own reading or emendation it ought to be, and I am loath to injure a +charming poem by pedantic adherence to authority in so small a point. +_De minimis non curat lex_; but art cares very much indeed. _JC_ and +_P_ read 'Yet since it hath learn'd by thine'. + + ll. 14 f. _And crosse both + Word and oath, &c._ + +The 'crosse' of all the MSS. is pretty certainly what Donne wrote. An +editor would change to 'break' hardly the other way. To 'crosse' is, +of course, to 'cancel'. Compare Jonson's _Poetaster_, Act II, Scene i: + + Faith, sir, your mercer's Book + Will tell you with more patience, then I can + (For I am crost, and so's not that I thinke.) + +and + + Examine well thy beauty with my truth, + And cross my cares, ere greater sums arise. + Daniel, _Delia_, i. + + +PAGE =44=. A NOCTURNALL, &c. + +l. 12. _For I am every dead thing._ I have not thought it right to +alter the _1633_ 'every' to the 'very' of _1635-69_. 'Every' has some +MS. support, and it is the more difficult reading, though of course 'a +very' might easily enough be misread. But I rather think that 'every' +expresses what Donne means. He is 'every dead thing' because he is the +quintessence of all negations--'absence, darkness, death: things which +are not', and more than that, 'the first nothing.' + +ll. 14-18. _For his art did expresse ... things which are not._ This +is a difficult stanza in a difficult poem. I have after considerable +hesitation adopted the punctuation of _1719_, which is followed by all +the modern editors. This makes 'dull privations' and 'lean emptinesse' +expansions of 'nothingnesse'. This is the simpler construction. I am +not sure, however, that the punctuation of the earlier editions and of +the MSS. may not be correct. In that case 'From dull privations' goes +with 'he ruined me'. Milton speaks of 'ruining from Heaven'. 'From me, +who was nothing', says Donne, 'Love extracted the very quintessence +of nothingness--made me more nothing than I already was. My state was +already one of "dull privation" and "lean emptiness", and Love reduced +it still further, making me once more the non-entity I was before +I was created.' Only Donne could be guilty of such refined and +extravagant subtlety. But probably this is to refine too much. There +is no example of 'ruining' as an active verb used in this fashion. +A feature of the MS. collection from which this poem was probably +printed is the omission of stops at the end of the line. In the next +verse Donne pushes the annihilation further. Made nothing by Love, +by the death of her he loves he is made the elixir (i.e. the +quintessence) not now of ordinary nothing, but of 'the first nothing', +the nothing which preceded God's first act of creation. The poem turns +upon the thought of degrees in nothingness. + +For 'elixir' as identical with 'quintessence' see Oxf. Eng. Dict., +_Elixir_, † iii. b, and the quotation there, 'A distill'd +quintessence, a pure elixar of mischief, pestilent alike to all.' +Milton, _Church Govt._ + +Of the 'first Nothing' Donne speaks in the _Essays in Divinity_ +(Jessop, 1855), pp. 80-1, but in a rather different strain: 'To speak +truth freely there was no such Nothing as this' (the nothing which a +man might wish to be) 'before the beginning: for he that hath refined +all the old definitions hath put this ingredient _Creabile_ (which +cannot be absolutely nothing) into his definition of creation; and +that Nothing which was, we cannot desire; for man's will is not larger +than God's power: and since Nothing was not a pre-existent matter, nor +mother of this all, but only a limitation when any thing began to be; +how impossible it is to return to that first point of time, since God +(if it imply contradiction) cannot reduce yesterday? Of this we +will say no more; for this Nothing being no creature; is more +incomprehensible than all the rest.' + +ll. 31-2. The Grolier Club edition reads: + + I should prefer + If I were any beast; some end, some means; + +which is to me unintelligible. 'If I were a beast, I should prefer +some end, some means' refers to the Aristotelian and Schools doctrine +of the soul. The soul of man is rational and self-conscious; of beasts +perceptive and moving, therefore able to select ends and means; the +vegetative soul of plants selects what it can feed on and rejects what +it cannot, and so far detests and loves. Even stones, which have no +souls, attract and repel. But even of stones Donne says: 'We are not +sure that stones have not life; stones may have life; neither (to +speak humanely) is it unreasonably thought by them, that thought the +whole world to be inanimated by one soule, and to be one intire living +creature; and in that respect does S. Augustine prefer a fly before +the Sun, because a fly hath life, and the Sun hath not.' _Sermons_ 80. +7. 69-70. + +l. 35. _If I an ordinary nothing were._ 'A shadow is nothing, yet, if +the rising or falling sun shines out and there be no shadow, I will +pronounce there is no body in that place neither. Ceremonies are +nothing; but where there are no ceremonies, order, and obedience, and +at last (and quickly) religion itself will vanish.' _Sermons_ (quoted +in _Selections from Donne_, 1840). + +l. 41. _Enjoy your summer all_; This is Grosart's punctuation. The old +editions have a comma. Chambers, obviously quite wrongly, retains the +comma, and closes the sentence in the next line. The clause 'Since she +enjoys her long night's festival' explains 43 'Let me prepare towards +her', &c., _not_ 41 'Enjoy your summer all'. + + +PAGE =47=. THE APPARITION. + +ll. 1-13. The Grolier Club editor places a full stop, Chambers a +colon, after 'shrinke', for the comma of the old editions. Chambers's +division is better than the first, which interrupts the steady run of +the thought to the climax, + + A verier ghost than I. + +The original punctuation preserves the rapid, crowded march of the +clauses. + +l. 10. This line throws light on the character of the _1669_ text. +The correct reading of _1633_ was spoiled in _1635_ by accidentally +dropping 'will', and this error continued through _1639-54_. The 1669 +editor, detecting the metrical fault, made the line decasyllabic by +interpolating 'a' and 'even'. + + +PAGE =48=. THE BROKEN HEART. + +l. 8. _A flaske of powder burne a day._ The 'flash' of later editions +is probably a conjectural emendation, for 'flaske' (_1633_ and many +MSS.) makes good sense; and the metaphor of a burning flask of powder +seems to suit exactly the later lines which describe what happened to +the heart which love inflamed + + but Love, alas, + At one first blow did shiver it as glasse. + +Shakespeare uses the same simile in a different connexion: + + Thy wit, that ornament to shape and love, + Mis-shapen in the conduct of them both: + Like powder in a skilless soldiers flaske, + Is set a fire by thine own ignorance, + And thou dismembred with thine owne defence. + _Romeo and Juliet_, III. iii. 130. + +l. 14. _and never chawes_: 'chaw' is the form Donne generally uses: +'Implicite beleevers, ignorant beleevers, the adversary may swallow; +but the understanding beleever, he must chaw, and pick bones, before +he come to assimilate him, and make him like himself.' _Sermons_ 80. +18. 178. + + +PAGE =49=. A VALEDICTION: FORBIDDING MOURNING. + +This poem is quoted by Walton after his account of the vision which +Donne had of his wife in France, in 1612: 'I forbear the readers +farther trouble as to the relation and what concerns it, and will +conclude mine with commending to his view a copy of verses given by +Mr. Donne to his wife at the time that he then parted from her: and +I beg leave to tell, that I have heard some critics, learned both in +languages and poetry, say, that none of the Greek or Latin poets did +ever equal them.' The critics probably included Wotton,--perhaps also +Hales, whose criticism of Shakespeare shows the same readiness to find +our own poets as good as the Ancients. + +The song, 'Sweetest love I do not go,' was probably written at the +same time. It is almost identical in tone. They are certainly the +tenderest of Donne's love poems, perhaps the only ones to which the +epithet 'tender' can be applied. The _Valediction: of weeping_ is more +passionate. + +An early translation of this poem into Greek verse is found in a +volume in the Bodleian Library. + +ll. 9-12. _Moving of th'earth, &c._ 'The "trepidation" was the +precession of the equinoxes, supposed, according to the Ptolemaic +astronomy, to be caused by the movements of the Ninth or Crystalline +Sphere.' Chambers. + + First you see fixt in this huge mirrour blew, + Of trembling lights, a number numberlesse: + Fixt they are nam'd, but with a name untrue, + For they all moove and in a Daunce expresse + That great long yeare, that doth contain no lesse + Then threescore hundreds of those yeares in all, + Which the sunne makes with his course naturall. + + What if to you those sparks disordered seem + As if by chaunce they had beene scattered there? + The gods a solemne measure doe it deeme, + And see a iust proportion every where, + And know the points whence first their movings were; + To which first points when all returne againe, + The axel-tree of Heav'n shall breake in twain. + Sir John Davies, _Orchestra_, 35-6. + +l. 16. _Those things which elemented it._ Chambers follows _1669_ and +reads 'The thing'--wrongly, I think. 'Elemented' is just 'composed', +and the things are enumerated later, 20. 'eyes, lips, hands.' Compare: + + But neither chance nor compliment + Did element our love. + Katharine Phillips (Orinda), _To Mrs. M. A. at parting_. + +This and the fellow poem _Upon Absence_ may be compared with Donne's +poems on the same theme. See Saintsbury's _Caroline Poets_, i, pp. +548, 550. + +l. 20. _and hands_: 'and' has the support of _all_ the MSS. The want +of it is no great loss, for though without it the line moves a little +irregularly, 'and hands' is not a pleasant concatenation. + +ll. 25-36. _If they be two, &c._ Donne's famous simile has a close +parallel in Omar Khayyam. Whether Donne's 'hydroptic immoderate thirst +of humane learning and languages' extended to Persian I do not know. +Captain Harris has supplied me with translations and reference: + + In these twin compasses, O Love, you see + One body with two heads, like you and me, + Which wander round one centre, circle wise, + But at the last in one same point agree. + Whinfield's edition of _Omar Khayyam_ (Kegan Paul, + Trübner, 1901, Oriental Series, p. 216). + +'Oh my soul, you and I are like a compass. We form but one body having +two points. Truly one point moves from the other point, and makes the +round of the circle; but the day draws near when the two points must +re-unite.' J. H. M^{c}Carthy (D. Nutt, 1898). + + +PAGE =51=. THE EXTASIE. + +This is one of the most important of the lyrics as a statement +of Donne's metaphysic of love, of the interconnexion and mutual +dependence of body and soul. It is printed in _1633_ from _D_, _H49_, +_Lec_ or a MS. resembling it, and from this and the other MSS. I +have introduced some alterations in the text: and two rather vital +emendations, ll. 55 and 59. _The Extasie_ is probably the source of +Lord Herbert of Cherbury's best known poem, _An Ode Upon a Question +Moved Whether Love Should Continue For Ever_. Compare with the opening +lines of Donne's poem: + + They stay'd at last and on the grass + Reposed so, as o're his breast + She bowed her gracious head to rest, + Such a weight as no burden was. + + While over eithers compass'd waist + Their folded arms were so compos'd + As if in straightest bonds inclos'd + They suffer'd for joys they did taste + + Long their fixt eyes to Heaven bent, + Unchanged they did never move, + As if so great and pure a love + No glass but it could represent. + +In a letter to Sir Thomas Lucy, Donne writes: 'Sir I make account that +this writing of letters, when it is with any seriousness, is a kind of +extasie, and a departing, and secession, and suspension of the soul, +which doth then communicate itself to two bodies.' Ecstasy in +Neo-Platonic philosophy was the state of mind in which the soul, +escaping from the body, attained to the vision of God, the One, the +Absolute. Plotinus thus describes it: 'Even the word vision ([Greek: +theama]) does not seem appropriate here. It is rather an ecstasy +([Greek: ekstasis]), a simplification, an abandonment of self, a +perfect quietude ([Greek: stasis]), a desire of contact, in short a +wish to merge oneself in that which one contemplates in the +Sanctuary.' _Sixth Ennead_, ix. 11 (from the French translation of +Bouillet, 1857-8). Readers will observe how closely Donne's poem +agrees with this--the exodus of the souls (ll. 15-16), the perfect +quiet (ll. 18-20), the new insight (ll. 29-33), the contact and union +of the souls (l. 35). Donne had probably read Ficino's translation of +Plotinus (1492), but the doctrine of ecstasy passed into Christian +thought, connecting itself especially with the experience of St. Paul +(2 Cor. xii. 2). St. Paul's word is [Greek: harpagenta], and Aquinas +distinguishes between 'raptus' and 'ecstasis': 'Extasis importat +simpliciter excessum a seipso ... raptus super hoc addit violentiam +quandam.' Another word for 'ecstasy' was 'enthusiasm'. + +l. 9. _So to entergraft our hands._ All the later editions read +'engraft', which makes the line smoother. But to me it seems more +probable that Donne wrote 'entergraft' and later editors changed this +to 'engraft', than that the opposite should have happened. Moreover, +'entergraft' gives the reciprocal force correctly, which 'engraft' +does not. Donne's precision is as marked as his subtlety. 'Entergraft' +has the support of all the best MSS. + +PAGE =52=, l. 20. _And wee said nothing all the day._ 'En amour un +silence vaut mieux qu'un langage. Il est bon d'être interdit; il y +a une éloquence de silence qui pénètre plus que la langue ne saurait +faire. Qu'un amant persuade bien sa maîtresse quand il est interdit, +et que d'ailleurs il a de l'esprit! Quelque vivacité que l'on ait, +il est bon dans certaines rencontres qu'elle s'éteigne. Tout cela se +passe sans règle et sans réflexion; et quand l'esprit le fait, il n'y +pensait pas auparavant. C'est par nécessité que cela arrive.' Pascal, +_Discours sur les passions de l'amour_. + +l. 32. _Wee see, wee saw not what did move._ Chambers inserts a comma +after 'we saw not', perhaps rightly; but the punctuation of the old +editions gives a distinct enough sense, viz., 'We see now, that we did +not see before the true source of our love. What we thought was due +to bodily beauty, we perceive now to have its source in the soul.' +Compare, 'But when I wakt, I saw, that I saw not.' _The Storme_, l. +37. + +l. 42. _Interinanimates two soules._ The MSS. give the word which +the metre requires and which I have no doubt Donne used. The verb +_inanimates_ occurs more than once in the sermons. 'One that quickens +and inanimates all, and is the soul of the whole world.' _Sermons_ 80. +29. 289. 'That universall power which sustaines, and inanimates the +whole world.' Ibid. 80. 31. 305. 'In these bowels, in the womb of this +promise we lay foure thousand yeares; The blood with which we were fed +then, was the blood of the Sacrifices, and the quickening which we had +there, was an inanimation, by the often refreshing of this promise +of that Messias in the Prophets.' Ibid. 80. 38. 381. 'Hee shews them +Heaven, and God in Heaven, sanctifying all their Crosses in this +World, inanimating all their worldly blessings.' Ibid. 80. 44. 436. + +PAGE =53=, l. 51. _They'are ours though they'are not wee, Wee are_ +The line as given in all the MSS. is metrically, in the rhetorically +effective position of the stresses, superior to the shortened form of +the editions: + + They'are ours, though not wee, wee are + +l. 52. _the spheare._ The MSS. all give the singular, the editions +the plural. Donne is not incapable of making a singular rhyme with a +plural, or at any rate a form with 's' with one without: + + Then let us at these mimicke antiques jeast, + Whose deepest projects, and egregious gests + Are but dull Moralls of a game of Chests. + _To S^r Henry Wotton_, p. 188, ll. 22-4. + +Still, I think 'spheare' is right. The bodies made one are the Sphere +in which the two Intelligences meet and command. This suits all that +followes: + + Wee owe them thanks, because they thus, &c. + +The Dutch translation runs: + + Het Hemel-rond zijn sy, + Wy haren _Hemel-geest_. + +l. 55. _forces, sense_, This reading of all the MSS. is, I think, +certainly right; the 'senses force' of the editions being an +emendation. (1) It is the more difficult reading. It is inconceivable +that an ordinary copyist would alter 'senses force' to 'forces sense', +which, unless properly commaed, is apt to be read as 'forces' sense' +and make nonsense. (2) It is more characteristic of Donne's thought. +He is, with his usual scholastic precision, distinguishing the +functions of soul and body. Perception is the function (the [Greek: +dynamis], power or force) of soul: + + thy faire goodly soul, which doth + Give this flesh power to taste joy. + _Satyre III._ + +But the body has its function also, without which the soul could not +fulfil its; and that function is 'sense'. It is through this medium +that human souls must operate to obtain knowledge of each other. The +bodies must yield their forces or faculties ('sense' in all its forms, +especially sight and touch--hands and eyes) to us before our souls can +become one. The collective term 'sense' recurs: + + T'affections, and to faculties, + Which sense may reach and apprehend. + + ll. 57-8. _On man heavens influence workes not so, + But that it first imprints the ayre._ + +'Aucuns ont escrit que l'air a aussi cette vertu de faire decouler +avec le feu elementaire les influences et proprietez secrettes des +estoilles et planettes: alleguans que l'efficace des corps celestes +ne peut s'estendre aux inferieurs et terrestres, que par les moyens et +elemens qui sont entre deux. Mais cela soit au iugement des lecteurs +que nous renvoyons aux disputes de ceux qui ont escrit sur la +philosophie naturelle. Voyez aussi _Pline au 5 ch. du 2 liu._, +_Plutarque au 5 & 2 liu. des opinions des Philosophes_, _Platon en +son Timee_, _Aristote_ en ses disputes de physique, specialement au i. +liu. de la generation et corruption, et ceux qui ont escrit depuis luy +touchant les elemens.' Du Bartas, _La Sepmaine, &c._ (1581), _Indice_. +Air. + +l. 59. _Soe soule into the soule may flow._ The 'Soe' of the MSS. +must, I think, be right rather than the 'For' of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, +and the editions. It corresponds to the 'So' in l. 65, and it +expresses the simpler and more intelligible thought. In references +to the heavenly bodies and their influence on men one must remember +certain aspects of older thought which have become unfamiliar to us. +They were bodies of great dignity, 'aeterna corpora,' not composed +of any of the four elements, and subject to no change in time but +movement, change of position. If not as the older philosophers and +some of the Fathers had held, 'animata corpora,' having a soul united +to the body, yet each was guided by an Intelligence operating by +contact: 'Ad hoc autem quod moveat, non opportet quod uniatur ei +ut forma, sed per contactum virtutis, sicut motor unitur mobili.' +Aquinas, _Summa_ I. lxx. 3. Such bodies, it was claimed, influence +human actions: 'Corpora enim coelestia, cum moveantur a spiritualibus +substantiis ... agunt in virtute earum quasi instrumenta. Sed illae +substantiae spirituales sunt superiores animabus nostris. Ergo videtur +quod possint _imprimere in animas nostras_, et sic causare actus +humanos.' Aquinas, however, disputes this, as Plotinus had before him, +and distinguishes: As bodies, the stars affect us only indirectly, in +so far namely as the mind and will of man are subject to the influence +of physical and corporeal disturbances. But man's will remains free. +'_Sapiens homo dominatur astris_ in quantum scilicet dominatur suis +passionibus.' As Intelligences, the stars do not operate on man +thus mediately and controllingly: 'sed in intellectum humanum agunt +_immediate illuminando_: voluntatem autem immutare non possunt.' +Aquinas, _Summa_ I. cxv. 4. + +Now if 'Soe' be the right reading here then Donne is thinking of +the heavenly bodies without distinguishing in them between soul or +intelligence and body. 'As these high bodies or beings operate on +man's soul through the comparatively low intermediary of air, so +lovers' souls must interact through the medium of body.' + +If 'For' be the right reading, then Donne is giving as an example of +soul operating on soul through the medium of body the influence of the +heavenly intelligences on our souls. But this is not the orthodox view +of their interaction. I feel sure that 'Soe' is the right reading. The +thought and construction are simpler, and 'Soe' and 'For' are easily +interchanged. + +Of noblemen Donne says: 'They are _Intelligences_ that move great +_Spheares_.' _Sermon_, Judges xv. 20, p. 20 (1622). + + ll. 61-4. _As our blood labours to beget + Spirits, as like soules as it can, + Because such fingers need to knit + That subtile knot, which makes us man._ + +'Spirit is a most subtile vapour, which is expressed from the Bloud, +and the instrument of the soule, to perform all his actions; a common +tye or _medium_ betwixt the body and the soule, as some will have it; +or as _Paracelsus_, a fourth soule of itselfe. _Melancthon_ holds +the fountaine of these spirits to be the _Heart_, begotten there; and +afterward convayed to the Braine, they take another nature to them. Of +these spirits there be three kindes, according to the three principall +parts, _Braine_, _Heart_, _Liver_; _Naturall_, _Vitall_, _Animall_. +The _Naturall_ are begotten in the _Liver_, and thence dispersed +through the Veines, to performe those naturall actions. The _Vitall +Spirits_ are made in the Heart, of the _Naturall_, which by the +Arteries are transported to all the other parts: if these _Spirits_ +cease, then life ceaseth, as in a _Syncope_ or Swowning. The _Animall +spirits_ formed of the _Vitall_, brought up to the Braine, and +diffused by the Nerves, to the subordinate Members, give sense and +motion to them all.' Burton, _Anatomy of Melancholy_ (1638), p. 15. +'The spirits in a man which are the thin and active part of the blood, +and so are of a kind of middle nature, between soul and body, those +spirits are able to doe, and they doe the office, to unite and apply +the faculties of the soul to the organs of the body, and so there is a +man.' _Sermons_ 26. 20. 291. + + +PAGE =55=. LOVES DIET. + +ll. 19-24. This stanza, carefully and correctly printed in the 1633 +edition, which I have followed, was mangled in that of 1635, and +has remained in this condition, despite conjectural emendations, in +subsequent editions, including those of Grosart and Chambers. What +Donne says is obvious: 'Whatever Love dictated I wrote, but burned the +letters. When she wrote to me, and when (correctly resumed by 'that') +that favour made him (i.e. Love) fat, I said,' &c. The 1650-54 +'Whate'er might him distaste,' &c. is obviously an attempt to put +right what has gone wrong. No reading but that of the 1633 edition +gives _any_ sense to 'that favour' and 'convey'd by this'. + +ll. 25-7. _reclaim'd ... sport._ In _1633_ 'reclaim'd' became +'redeem'd', probably owing to the frequent misreading of 'cl' as 'd'. +The mistake here increases the probability that 'sports' is an error +for 'sport' or 'sporte'. It is doubtful if 'sports' was used as now. + + +PAGE =56=. THE WILL. + +ll. 19-27. This verse is omitted in most of the MSS. Probably in +James's reign its references to religion were thought too outspoken +and flippant. Charles admired in Donne not only the preacher but also +the poet, as Huyghens testifies. + +The first three lines turn on a contrast that Donne is fond of +elaborating between the extreme Protestant doctrine of justification +by faith only and the Catholic, especially Jesuit, doctrine of +co-operant works. It divided the Jesuits and the Jansenists. The +Jansenists had not yet emerged, but their precursors in the quarrel +(as readers of _Les Provinciales_ will recall) were the Dominicans, +to whom Donne refers: 'So also when in the beginning of S. Augustines +time, Grace had been so much advanced that mans Nature was scarce +admitted to be so much as any means or instrument (not only no kind +of cause) of his own good works: And soon after in S. Augustines time +also mans free will (by fierce opposition and arguing against the +former error) was too much overvalued, and admitted into too near +degrees of fellowship with Grace; those times admitted a doctrine and +form of reconciliation, which though for reverence to the time, both +the Dominicans and Jesuits at this day in their great quarrell about +Grace and Free Will would yet seem to maintaine, yet indifferent and +dispassioned men of that Church see there is no possibility in it, and +therefore accuse it of absurdity, and almost of heresie.' _Letters_ +(1651), pp. 15-16. As an Anglican preacher Donne upheld James's point +of view, that the doctrine of grace and free-will was better left +undiscussed: 'Resistibility, and Irresistibility of Grace, which is +every Artificers wearing now, was a stuff that our Fathers wore not, a +language that pure antiquity spake not.... They knew Gods law, and his +Chancery: But for Gods prerogative, what he could do of his absolute +power, they knew Gods pleasure, _Nolumus disputari_: It should scarce +be disputed of in Schools, much less serv'd in every popular pulpit +to curious and itching ears; least of all made table-talke, and +houshold-discourse.' _Sermons_ 26. 1. 4. + +The 'Schismaticks of Amsterdam' were the extreme Puritans. See +Jonson's _The Alchemist_ for Tribulation Wholesome and 'We of the +separation'. + + +PAGE =58=. THE FUNERALL. + +l. 3. _That subtile wreath of haire, which crowns my arme_; 'And +Theagenes presented her with a diamond ring which he used to wear, +entreating her, whensoever she did cast her eyes upon it, to conceive +that it told her in his behalf, that his heart would prove as hard as +that stone in the admittance of any new affection; and that his to +her should be as void of end as that circular figure was;' (compare +_A Ieat Ring sent_, p. 65) 'and she desired him to wear for her sake +a lock of hair which she gave him; the splendour of which can be +expressed by no earthly thing, but it seemed as though a stream of +the sun's beams had been gathered together and converted into a solid +substance. With this precious relique about his arm,' (compare _The +Relique_, p. 62) 'whose least hair was sufficient' (compare _Aire and +Angels_, p. 22, 'Ev'ry thy hair' and note) 'to bind in bonds of love +the greatest heart that ever was informed with life, Theagenes took +his journey into Attica.' Kenelm Digby's _Private Memoirs_ (1827), pp. +80-1. When later Theagenes heard that Stelliana (believing Theagenes +to be dead) was to wed Mardonius, 'he tore from his arm the bracelet +of her hair ... and threw it into the fire that was in his chamber; +when that glorious relic burning shewed by the wan and blue colour +of the flame that it had sense and took his words unkindly in her +behalf.' + +Theagenes was Sir Kenelm Digby himself, Stelliana being Lady Venetia +Stanley, afterwards his wife. Mardonius was probably Edward, Earl of +Dorset, the brother of Donne's friend and patron. + +It is probable that this sequence of poems, _The Funerall_, _The +Blossome_, _The Primrose_ and _The Relique_, was addressed to Mrs. +Herbert in the earlier days of Donne's intimacy with her in Oxford or +London. + +l. 24. _That since you would save none of me, I bury some of you._ I +have hesitated a good deal over this line. The reading of the editions +is 'have none of me'; and in the group of MSS. _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, +while _H49_ reads 'save', _D_ has corrected 'have' to what _may_ be +'save', and _Lec_ reads 'have'. The reading of the editions is the +full form of the construction, which is more common without the +'have'. 'It's four to one she'll none of me,' _Twelfth Night_, I. +iii. 113; 'She will none of him,' Ibid. II. ii. 9, are among Schmidt's +examples (_Shakespeare Lexicon_), in none of which 'have' occurs. +The reading of the MSS., 'save none of me,' is also quite idiomatic, +resembling the ' fear none of this' (i.e. 'do not fear this') of +_Winter's Tale_, IV. iv. 601; and I have preferred it because: (1) It +seems difficult to understand how it could have arisen if 'have none' +was the original. (2) It gives a sharper antithesis, 'You would not +save me, keep me alive. Therefore I will bury, not you indeed, but +a part of you.' (3) To be saved is the lover's usual prayer; and the +idea of the poem is that his death is due to the lady's cruelty. + + Come not, when I am dead, + To drop thy foolish tears upon my grave, + To trample round my fallen head, + And vex the unhappy dust thou wouldst not save. + There let the wind sweep and the plover cry; + But thou go by. + +Compare also the Letter _To M^{rs} M. H._ (pp. 216-8), where the same +idea recurs: + + When thou art there, if any, whom we know, + Were sav'd before, and did that heaven partake, &c. + + +PAGE =59=. THE BLOSSOME. + +l. 10. _labour'st._ The form with 't' occurs in most of the MSS., and +'t' is restored in _1635_. The 'labours' of _1633_ represents a +common dropping of the 't' for ease of pronunciation. See Franz, +_Shakespeare-Grammatik_, § 152. It is colloquial, and I doubt if Donne +would have preserved it if he had printed the poem, supposing that he +wrote the word so, and not some copyist. + + ll. 21-4. _You goe to friends, whose love and meanes present + Various content + To your eyes, eares, and tongue, and every part: + If then your body goe, what need you a heart?_ + +I have adopted the MS. readings 'tongue' and 'what need you a heart?' +because they seem to me more certainly what Donne wrote. He may have +altered them, but so may an editor. 'Tongue' is more exactly parallel +to eyes and ears, and the whole talk is of organs. 'What need you a +heart?' is more pointed. 'With these organs of sense, what need have +you of a heart?' The idiom was not uncommon, the verb being used +impersonally. The O.E.D. gives among others: + + What need us so many instances abroad. + _Andros Tracts_, 1691. + +'What need your heart go' is of course also idiomatic. The latest +example the O.E.D. gives is from Hall's _Satires_, 1597: 'What needs +me care for any bookish skill?' + + +PAGE =61=. THE PRIMROSE, &c. + +It is noteworthy that the addition 'being at Montgomery Castle', &c. +was made in _1635_. It is unknown to _1633_ and the MSS. It may be +unwarranted. If it be accurate, then the poem is probably addressed +to Mrs. Herbert and is a half mystical, half cynical description of +Platonic passion. The perfect primrose has apparently five petals, but +more or less may be found. Seeking for one to symbolize his love, he +fears to find either more or less. What can be less than woman? But if +more than woman she becomes that unreal thing, the object of Platonic +affection and Petrarchian adoration: but, as he says elsewhere, + + Love's not so pure and abstract as they use + To say, which have no Mistresse but their Muse. + +Let woman be content to be herself. Since five is half ten, united +with man she will be half of a perfect life; or (and the cynical +humour breaks out again) if she is not content with that, since five +is the first number which includes an even number (2) and an odd (3), +it may claim to be the perfect number, and she to be the whole in +which we men are included and absorbed. We have no will of our own. + +'From Sarai's name He took a letter which expressed the number ten, +and reposed one which made but five; so that she contributed that +five which man wanted before, to show a mutual indigence and support.' +_Essays in Divinity_ (Jessop, 1855), p. 118. + +'Even for this, he will visite to the third, and fourth generation; +and three and foure are seven, and seven is infinite. _Sermons_ 50. +47. 440. + +l. 30. _this, five,_ I have introduced a comma after 'this' to show +what, I think, must be the relation of the words. The later editions +drop 'this', and it seems to me probable that an original reading and +a correction have survived side by side. Donne may have written 'this' +alone, referring back to 'five', and then, thinking the reference too +remote, he may have substituted 'five' in the margin, whence it crept +into the text without completely displacing 'this'. The support which +the MSS. lend to _1633_ make it dangerous to remove either word now, +but I have thought it well to show that 'this' _is_ 'five'. In +the MSS. when a word is erased a line is drawn under it and the +substituted word placed in the margin. + + +PAGE =62=. THE RELIQUE. + +l. 13. _Where mis-devotion doth command._ The unanimity of the earlier +editions and the MSS. shows clearly that 'Mass-devotion' (which +Chambers adopts) is merely an ingenious conjecture of the _1669_ +editor. Donne uses the word frequently, e.g.: + + Here in a place, where miss-devotion frames + A thousand Prayers to Saints, whose very names + The ancient Church knew not, &c. + _Of the Progresse of the Soule_, p. 266, ll. 511-13. + +and: 'This mis-devotion, and left-handed piety, of praying for the +dead.' _Sermons_ 80. 77. 780. + +l. 17. _You shalbe._ I have recorded this reading of several MSS. +because the poem is probably addressed to Mrs. Herbert and Donne may +have so written. His discrimination of 'thou' and 'you' is very marked +throughout the poems. 'Thou' is the pronoun of feeling and intimacy, +'you' of respect. Compare 'To Mrs. M. H.', and remember that Mrs. +Herbert's name was Magdalen. + +ll. 27-8. _Comming and going, wee Perchance might kisse, but not +between those meales_: i.e. the kiss of salutation and parting. In a +sermon on the text 'Kisse the Son, lest he be angry', Donne enumerates +the uses of kissing sanctioned by the Bible, and this among them: 'Now +by this we are slid into our fourth and last branch of our first +part, The perswasion to come to this holy kisse, though defamed by +treachery, though depraved by licentiousnesse, since God invites us to +it, by so many good uses thereof in his Word. It is an imputation laid +upon _Nero_, that _Neque adveniens neque proficiscens_, That whether +comming or going he never kissed any: And Christ himself imputes it +to _Simon_, as a neglect of him, That when he _came into his house_ he +did not _kisse_ him. This then was in use', &c. _Sermons_ 80. 41. 407. + +The kiss of salutation lasted in some countries till the later +eighteenth century, perhaps still lasts. See Rousseau's _Confessions_, +Bk. 9, and Byron's _Childe Harold_, III. lxxix. + +But Erasmus, in 1499, speaks as though it were a specially English +custom: 'Est praeterea mos nunquam satis laudatus. Sive quo venis, +omnium osculis exciperis; sive discedis aliquo, osculis dimitteris; +redis, redduntur suavia; venitur ad te, propinantur suavia; disceditur +abs te, dividuntur basia; occurritur alicubi, basiatur affatim; +denique quocunque te moves, suaviorum plena sunt omnia.' + + +PAGE =64=. THE DISSOLUTION. + +l. 10. _earthly sad despaire._ Cf. O.E.D.: 'Earthly. 3. Partaking of +the nature of earth, resembling earth as a substance, consisting of +earth as an element; = Earthy, archaic or obsolete.' The form was +used as late as 1843, but the change in the later editions of Donne +indicates that it was growing rare in this sense. Compare,'A young +man of a softly disposition.' Camden's _Reign of Elizabeth_ (English +transl.). + + +PAGE =66=. NEGATIVE LOVE. + +l. 15. _What we know not, our selves._ 'All creatures were brought to +Adam, and, because he understood the natures of all those creatures, +he gave them names accordingly. In that he gave no name to himselfe it +may be by some perhaps argued, that he understood himselfe lesse then +he did other creatures.' _Sermons_ 80. 50. 563. + + +PAGE =67=. THE PROHIBITION. + +l. 18. _So, these extreames shall neithers office doe._ The 'neithers' +of _D_, _H40_, _JC_, supported by 'neyther' in _O'F_ and 'neyther +their' in _Cy_, is much more characteristic than 'ne'er their', and +more likely to have been altered than to have been substituted for +'ne'er their'. The reading of _Cy_ shows how the phrase puzzled an +ordinary copyist. 'These extremes shall by counteracting each other +prevent either from fulfilling his function.' Compare, 'As two +yoke-devils sworn to either's purpose' (i.e. each to the other's +purpose). Shakespeare, _Hen. V_, II. ii. 107. + +l. 22. _So shall I, live, thy stage not triumph bee._ I have placed +a comma after I to make quite clear that 'live' is the adjective, not +the verb. The 'stay' of _1633_ is defensible, but the _1633_ editor +was somewhat at sea about this poem, witness the variations introduced +while the edition was printing in ll. 20 and 24 and the misprinting +of l. 5. All the MSS. I have consulted support 'stage'; and this gives +the best meaning: 'Alive, I shall continue to be the stage on which +your victories are daily set forth; dead, I shall be but your triumph, +a thing achieved once, never to be repeated.' Compare: + + And cause her leave to triumph in this wise + Upon the prostrate spoil of that poor heart! + That serves a Trophy to her conquering eyes, + And must their glory to the world impart. + Daniel, _Delia_, X. + +ll. 23, 24. There are obviously two versions of these lines which the +later editions have confounded. The first is that of the text, from +_1633_. The second is that of the MSS. and runs, properly pointed: + + Then lest thy love, hate, and mee thou undoe, + O let me live, O love and hate me too. + +The punctuation of the MSS. is very careless, but the lines as printed +are quite intelligible. As given in the editions _1635-69_ they are +nonsensical. + + +PAGE =68=. THE EXPIRATION. + +l. 5. _We ask'd._ The past tense of the MSS. makes the antithesis +and sense more pointed. 'It was with no one's leave we lov'd to begin +with, and we will owe to no one the death that comes with parting.' + + ll. 7 f. _Goe: and if that word have not quite kil'd thee, + Ease mee with death, by bidding mee goe too_. + +Compare: + + _Val._ No more: unless the next word that thou speak'st + Have some malignant power upon my life: + If so, I pray thee, breathe it in mine ear, + As ending anthem of my endless dolour. + _Two Gentlemen of Verona_, III. i. 236 f. + + +PAGE =70=. THE PARADOX. + +l. 14. _lights life._ The MSS. correct the obvious mistake of the +editions, 'lifes light.' The 'lights life' is, of course, the sun. +In the same way at 21 'lye' is surely better suited than 'dye' to an +epitaph. This poem is not in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and _1633_ has printed +it from _A18_, _N_, _TC_. + +In the latter group of MSS. this poem is followed immediately by +another of the same kind, which is found also in _H40_, _RP31_, and +_O'F_, as well as several more miscellaneous MSS. I print from _TCC_: + +A PARADOX. + + Whosoe termes Love a fire, may like a poet + Faine what he will, for certaine cannot showe it. + For Fire nere burnes, but when the fuell's neare + But Love doth at most distance most appeare. + Yet out of fire water did never goe, + But teares from Love abundantly doe flowe. + Fire still mounts upward; but Love oft descendeth. + Fire leaves the midst: Love to the Center tendeth. + Fire dryes and hardens: Love doth mollifie. + Fire doth consume, but Love doth fructifie. + The powerful Queene of Love (faire Venus) came + Descended from the Sea, not from the flame, + Whence passions ebbe and flowe, and from the braine + Run to the hart like streames, and back againe. + Yea Love oft fills mens breasts with melting snow + Drowning their Love-sick minds in flouds of woe. + What is Love, water then? it may be soe; + But hee saith trueth, that saith hee doth not knowe. + +FINIS. + + +PAGE =71=. FAREWELL TO LOVE. + +l. 12. _His highnesse &c._ 'Presumably his highness was made of gilt +gingerbread.' Chambers. See Jonson, _Bartholomew Fair_, III. i. + +ll. 28-30. As these lines stand in the old editions they are +unintelligible: + + Because that other curse of being short, + And only for a minute made to be + Eager, desires to raise posterity. + +Grosart prints: + + Because that other curse of being short + And--only-for-a-minute-made-to-be-- + Eager desires to raise posterity. + +This and the note which he appends I find more incomprehensible than +the old text. This is his note: 'The whole sense then is: Unless +Nature decreed this in order that man should despise it, (just) as +she made it short, that man might for that reason also despise a +sport that was only for a minute made to be eager desires to raise +posterity.' Surely this is Abracadabra! + +What has happened is, I believe, this: Donne here, as elsewhere, used +an obsolescent word, viz. 'eagers', the verb, meaning 'sharpens'. The +copyist did not recognize the form, took 'desire' for the verb, and +made 'eager' the adjectival complement to 'be', changing 'desire' +to 'desires' as predicate to 'curse'. What Donne had in mind was +the Aristotelian doctrine that the desire to beget children is +an expression of man's craving for immortality. The most natural +function, according to Aristotle, of every living thing which is not +maimed in any way is to beget another living thing like itself, that +so it may partake of what is eternal and divine. This participation +is the goal of all desire, and of all natural activity. But perishable +individuals cannot partake of the immortal and divine by continuous +existence. Nothing that is perishable can continue always one and the +same individual. Each, therefore, participates as best he may, some +more, some less; remaining the same in a way, i.e. in the species, not +in the individual.' (_De Anima_, B. 4. 415 A-B.) Donne's argument then +is this: 'Why of all animals have we alone this feeling of depression +and remorse after the act of love? Is it a device of nature to +restrain us from an act which shortens the life of the individual (he +refers here to a prevalent belief as to the deleterious effect of the +act of love), needed because that other curse which Adam brought upon +man, the curse of mortality, + + of being short, + And only for a minute made to be, + Eagers [i.e. whets or provokes] desire to raise posterity.' + +The latest use of 'eager' as a verb quoted by the O.E.D. is from +Mulcaster's _Positions_ (1581), where the sense is that of imitating +physically: 'They that be gawled ... may neither runne nor wrastle +for eagering the inward'. The Middle English use is closer to Donne's: +'The nature of som men is so ... unconvenable that ... poverte myhte +rather egren hym to don felonies.' Chaucer, Boëth. _De Consol. Phil._ +In the Burley MS. (seventeenth century) the following epigram on +Bancroft appears: + + A learned Bishop of this land + Thinking to make religion stand, + In equall poise on every syde + The mixture of them thus he tryde: + An ounce of protestants he singles + And a dramme of papists mingles, + Then adds a scruple of a puritan + And melts them down in his brayne pan, + But where hee lookes they should digest + The scruple eagers all the rest. + +In Harl. MS. 4908 f. 83 the last line reads: + + That scruple troubles all the rest. + + +PAGE =71=. A LECTURE UPON THE SHADOW. + +The text of this poem in the editions is that of _A18_, _N_, _TC_ +among the MSS. A slightly different recension is found in most of the +other MSS. The chief difference is that the latter read 'love' for +'loves' at ll. 9, 14, and 19. They also, however, read 'least' for +'high'st' at l. 12. In l. 19 they vacillate between 'once' and 'our'. +It would not be difficult to defend either version. The only variation +from the printed text which I have admitted is that on which all the +MSS. are unanimous, viz. 'first' for 'short' in l. 26; 'short' is an +obvious blunder. + + +NOTE ON THE MUSIC TO WHICH CERTAIN OF DONNE'S SONGS WERE SET. + +A song meant for the Elizabethans a poem intended to be sung, +generally to the accompaniment of the lute. Donne had clearly no +thought of his songs being an exception to this rule: + + But when I have done so, + Some man his art and voice to show + Doth set and sing my paine. + +Yet it is difficult to think of some, perhaps the majority, of Donne's +_Songs and Sonets_ as being written to be sung. Their sonorous and +rhetorical rhythm, the elaborate stanzas which, like the prolonged +periods of the _Elegies_, seem to give us a foretaste of the Miltonic +verse-paragraph, suggest speech,--impassioned, rhythmical speech +rather than the melody of song. We are not haunted by a sense of the +tune to which the song should go, as we are in reading the lyrics of +the Elizabethan Anthologies or of Robert Burns. Yet some of Donne's +songs _were_ set to music. A note in one group of MSS. describes three +of them as 'Songs which were made to certain ayres which were made +before'. One of these is _The Baite_, which must have been set to +the same air as Marlowe's song. I reproduce here a lute-accompaniment +found in William Corkine's _Second Book of Ayres_ (1612). The airs of +the other two (see p. 18) I have not been able to find, nor are they +known to Mr. Barclay Squire, who has kindly helped and guided me in +this matter of the music. With his aid I have reproduced here the +music of two other songs, and, at another place, that of one of +Donne's great _Hymns_. + + +PAGE =8=. SONG. + +The following air is found in Egerton MS. 2013. As given here it has +been conjecturally corrected by Mr. Barclay Squire: + +[Music: + + Go and catch a falling star + Get with child a mandrake roote, + Tell me where all past times are + Or who cleft the Devil's foot, + Teach me to hear mermaid's singing + Or to keep of Envy's singing + And find + what wind + Serves to advance an honest mind.] + + +PAGE =23=. BREAKE OF DAY. + +This is set to the following air in Corkine's _Second Book of Ayres_ +(1612). As given here it has been transcribed by Mr. Barclay Squire, +omitting the lute accompaniment: + +[Music: + + 'Tis true 'tis day, What though it be? + And will you there-fore rise from me? + What, will you rise, What, will you rise be-cause 'tis light? + Did we lye downe be-cause 'twas night? + Love that in spight of dark-nesse brought us he-ther, + In spight of light should keepe us still to-ge-ther, + In spight of light should keepe us still to-ge-ther, + In spight of light should keepe us still to-ge-ther.] + + +PAGE =46=. THE BAITE. + +From Corkine's _Second Book of Ayres_ (1612). + +[Music: _Lessons for the Lyra Violl._ + +Come liue with me, and be my Loue.] + + + + +EPIGRAMS. + +PAGES =75-8=. Of the epigrams sixteen are given in all the editions, +_1633-69_. Of these, thirteen are in _A18_, _N_, _TC_, none in _D_, +_H49_, _Lec_. Of the remaining three, two are in _W_, one in _HN_, +both good authorities. I have added three of interest from _W_, of +which one is in _HN_, and all three are in _O'F_. _W_ includes among +the _Epigrams_ the short poem _On a Jeat Ring Sent_, printed generally +with the _Songs and Sonets_. In _HN_ there is one and in the Burley +MS. are three more. Of these the one in _HN_ and two of those in _Bur_ +are merely coarse, and there is no use burdening Donne with more of +this kind than he is already responsible for. The last in _Bur_ runs: + + Why are maydes wits than boyes of lower strayne? + Eve was a daughter of the ribb not brayne. + +Donne's epigrams were much admired, and some of his elegies were +classed with them as satirical 'evaporations of wit'. Drummond says: +'I think if he would he might easily be the best epigrammatist we +have found in English; of which I have not yet seen any come near +the Ancients. Compare his Marry and Love with Tasso's stanzas against +beauty; one shall hardly know who hath best.' The stanzas referred to +are entitled _Sopra la bellezza_, and begin: + + Questo che tanto il cieco volgo apprezza. + +PAGE =75=. PYRAMUS AND THISBE. The Grolier Club edition prints the +first line of this epigram, + + Two by themselves each other love and fear, + +which suggests that 'love' and 'fear' are verbs. As punctuated in +_1633_ the epigram is condensed but precise: 'These two, slain by +themselves, by each other, by fear, and by love, are joined here in +one tomb, by the friends whose cruel action in parting them brought +them together here.' Every point in the epigram corresponds to the +incidents of the story as narrated in Ovid's _Metamorphoses_, iv. +55-165. The closing line runs: + + Quodque rogis superest, una requiescit in urna. + +A BURNT SHIP. In _W_ the title is given in Italian, in _O'F_ in +Latin. Compare James's letter to Salisbury on the Dutch demands for +assistance against Spain;--'Should I ruin myself for maintaining +them.... I look that by a peace they should enrich themselves to pay +me my debts, and if they be so weak as they cannot subsist, either in +peace or war, without I ruin myself for upholding them, in that case +surely the nearest harm is to be first eschewed: _a man will leap out +of a burning ship and drown himself in the sea_; and it is doubtless +a farther off harm from me to suffer them to fall again into the hands +of Spain, and let God provide for the danger that may with time fall +upon me or my posterity, than presently to starve myself and mine +with putting the meat in their mouth.' _The King to Salisbury_, 1607, +Hatfield MSS., quoted in Gardiner's _History of England_, ii. 25. + +PAGE =76=. A LAME BEGGER. Compare: + + Dull says he is so weake, he cannot rise, + Nor stand, nor goe; if that be true, he lyes. + Finis quoth R. + + Thomas Deloney, _Strange Histories of Songes & Sonets of + Kings, Princes, Dukes, Lords, Ladyes, Knights and Gentlemen. + Very pleasant either to be read or songe, &c._, 1607. + +PAGE =76=. SIR JOHN WINGEFIELD. _In that late Island._ Mr. Gosse has +inadvertently printed 'base' for 'late'. The 'Lady' island of _O'F_ +is due probably to ignorance of what island was intended. It is, of +course, Cadiz itself, which is situated on an island at the extreme +point of the headland which closes the bay of Cadiz to the west. 'Then +we entered into the island of Cales with our footmen,' says Captain +Pryce in his letter to Cecil. Strype's _Annals_, iv. 398. Another +account relates how 'on the 21st they took the town of Cadiz and at +the bridge in the island were encountered by 400 horses'. Here the +severest fighting took place at 'the bridge from Mayne to Cadiz'. What +does Donne mean by 'late island'? Is it the island we lately visited +so gloriously, or the island on which the sun sets late, that western +island, now become a new Pillar of Hercules? It would not be unlike +Donne to give a word a startlingly condensed force. Compare (if the +reading be right) 'far faith' (p. 189, l. 4) and the note. + +PAGES =75-6=. The series of Epigrams _A burnt ship_, _Fall of a wall_, +_A lame begger_, _Cales and Guyana_, _Sir John Wingefield_ seem to +me all to have been composed during the Cadiz expedition. The first +suggests, and was probably suggested by, the fight in the harbour when +so many of the Spanish ships were burned. The _Fall of a wall_ may +mark an incident in the attack of the landing party which forced its +way into the city. _A lame begger_ records a common spectacle in a +Spanish and Catholic town. _Cales and Guyana_ must clearly have been +written when, after Cadiz had been taken and sacked, the leaders were +debating their next step. Essex (and Donne is on Essex's side) urged +that the fleet should sail west and intercept the silver fleet, but +Howard, the Lord Admiral, insisted on an immediate return to England. +The last of the series chronicles the one death to which every account +of the expedition refers. + +PAGE =77=. ANTIQUARY. Who is the Hamon or Hammond that is evidently +the subject of this epigram and is referred to in _Satyre V_, l. 87, I +cannot say. I am disposed to think that it may be John Hammond, LL.D., +the civilist, the father of James I's physician and of Charles I's +chaplain. I have no proof that he was an antiquarian, but a civilist +and authority on tithes may well have been so, and he belonged to +the class which Donne satirizes with most of anger and feeling, the +examiners and torturers of Catholic prisoners. We find him in Strype's +_Annals_ collaborating with the notorious Topcliffe. + +PHRYNE. An epigram often quoted by Ben Jonson. Drummond, +_Conversations_, ed. Laing, 842. + +PAGE =78=. RADERUS. 'Matthew Rader (1561-1634), a German Jesuit, +published an edition of and commentary upon Martial in 1602.' +Chambers. Compare: 'He added, moreover, that though Raderus and others +of his order did use to geld Poets and other authors (and here I could +not choose but wonder why they have not gelded their Vulgar Edition +which in some places hath such obscene words, as the Hebrew tongue +which is therefore called holy, doth so much abhorre that no obscene +thing can be uttered in it)....' The reason which Donne gives is that +'They reserve to themselves the divers forms, and the secrets, and +mysteries in this latter which they find in the authors whom they +gelde.' _Ignatius his Conclave_ (1610), pp. 94-6. The epigram is +therefore a coarse hit at the Jesuits. + +MERCURIUS GALLO-BELGICUS. A journal or register of news started at +Cologne in 1598. The first volume consisted of 659 pages and was +entitled: _Mercurius Gallo-Belgicus; sive rerum in Gallia et Belgia +potissimum: Hispania quoque, Italia, Anglia, Germania, Polonia, +vicinisque locis ab anno 1588 usque ad Martium anni praesentis 1594 +gestarum, nuncius_. In the seventeenth century it was published +half-yearly and ornamented with maps. Its Latin was not unimpeachable +(Jonson speaks of a 'Gallo-Belgic phrase', _Poetaster_, V. i), nor its +news always trustworthy. + +THE LIER. This was first printed in Sir John Simeon's _Unpublished +Poems of Donne_ (1856-7), whence it is included by Chambers in his +Appendix A. It is given the title _Supping Hours_. Its inclusion in +_HN_ (whence the present title) and _W_ strengthens its claim to +be genuine. Probably it was written after the Cadiz expedition, and +contains a reminiscence (Mr. Gosse has suggested this) of Spanish +fare. + +l. 3. _Like Nebuchadnezar._ Compare: 'I am no great Nebuchadnezzar, +sir; I have not much skill in grass.' Shakespeare, _All's Well_, IV. +v. + + + + +THE ELEGIES. + +Of the Elegies two groups seem to have been pretty widely circulated +before the larger collections were made or publication took place. +Each contained either twelve or thirteen, the twelve or thirteen being +made up sometimes by the inclusion of the Funeral Elegy, 'Sorrow who +to this house,' afterwards called _Elegie on the L. C._ The order +in the one group, as we find it in e.g. _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, is _The +Bracelet_,[1] _Going to Bed_, _Jealousie_, _The Anagram_, _Change_, +_The Perfume_, _His Picture_, 'Sorrow who to this house,' 'Oh, let +mee not serve,' _Loves Warr_, _On his Mistris_, 'Natures lay Ideott, +I taught,' _Loves Progress_. The second group, as we find it in +_A25_, _JC_, and _W_, contains _The Bracelet_, _The Comparison_, _The +Perfume_, _Jealousie_, 'Oh, let not me (_sic_ _W_) serve,' 'Natures +lay Ideott, I taught,' _Loves Warr_, _Going to Bed_, _Change_, _The +Anagram_, _On his Mistris_, _His Picture_, 'Sorrow, who to this +house.' The last is not given in _A25_. It will be noticed that +_D_, _H49_, _Lec_ drops _The Comparison_; _A25_, _JC_, _W_, _Loves +Progress_; and that there were thirteen elegies, taking the two groups +together, apart from the Funeral Elegy. + + + [Footnote 1: I take the titles given in the editions for ease + of reference to the reader of this edition. The only title + which _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ have is _On Loves Progresse_; + _A25_, _JC_, and _W_ have none. Other MSS. give one or other + occasionally.] + + +These are the most widely circulated and probably the earliest of +Donne's _Elegies_, taken as such. Of the rest _The Dreame_ is given in +_D_, _H49_, _Lec_, but among the songs, and _The Autumnall_ is placed +by itself. The rest are either somewhat doubtful or were not allowed +to get into general circulation. + +Can we to any extent date the _Elegies_? There are some hints which +help to indicate the years to which the earlier of them probably +belong. In _The Bracelet_ Donne speaks of Spanish 'Stamps' as having + + slily made + Gorgeous France, ruin'd, ragged and decay'd; + Scotland which knew no State, proud in one day: + mangled seventeen-headed Belgia. + +The last of these references is too indefinite to be of use. I mean +that it covers too wide a period. Nor, indeed, do the others bring us +very far. The first indicates the period from the alliance between +the League and the King of Spain, 1585, when Philip promised a monthly +subsidy of 50,000 crowns, to the conversion and victory of Henry IV in +1593; the second, the short time during which Spanish influence gained +the upper hand in Scotland, between 1582 and 1586. After 1593 is the +only determinable date. In _Loves Warre_ we are brought nearer to a +definite date. + + France in her lunatique giddiness did hate + Ever our men, yea and our God of late; + Yet shee relies upon our Angels well + Which nere retorne + +points to the period between Henry's conversion ('yea and our God of +late') and the conclusion of peace between France and Spain in 1598. +The line, + + And Midas joyes our Spanish journeyes give + +(taken with a similar allusion in one of his letters: + + Guyanaes harvest is nip'd in the spring + I feare, &c., p. 210), + +refers most probably to Raleigh's expedition in 1595 to discover the +fabulous wealth of Manoa. Had the Elegy been written after the Cadiz +expedition there would certainly have been a more definite reference +to that war. The poem was probably written in the earlier part of +1596, when the expedition was in preparation and Donne contemplated +joining it. + +To date one of the poems is not of course to date them all, but their +paradoxical, witty, daring tone is so uniform that one may fairly +conjecture that these thirteen Elegies were written between 1593 and +Donne's first entry upon responsible office as secretary to Egerton in +1598. + +The twelfth (_His parting from her_) and fifteenth (_The +Expostulation_) Elegies it is impossible to date, but it is not +_likely_ that they were written after his marriage. _Julia_ is quite +undatable, a witty sally Donne might have written any time before +1615. But the fourteenth (_A Tale of a Citizen and his Wife_) was +certainly written after 1609, probably in 1610. + +_The Autumnall_ raises rather an interesting question. Mr. Gosse has +argued that it was most probably composed as late as 1625. Walton's +dating of it is hopelessly confused. He states (_Life of Mr. George +Herbert_, 1670, pp. 14-19) 'that Donne made the acquaintance of Mrs. +Herbert and wrote this poem when she was residing at Oxford with her +son Edward, Donne being then near to (about _First Ed._) the Fortieth +year of his Age'; 'both he and she were then past the Meridian of +man's life.' But according to Lord Herbert his mother left Oxford and +brought him to town about 1600, shortly before the insurrection of +Essex, i.e. when Donne was twenty-seven years old, and secretary +to Sir Thomas Egerton, and Lady Herbert was about thirty-five or +thirty-six. It is, of course, not impossible that Donne visited Oxford +between 1596 and 1600, but he was not then the grave person Walton +portrays. The period which the latter has in view is that in which +Donne was at Mitcham and Mrs. Herbert living in London. 'This day', he +writes in a letter to her, dated July 23, 1607, 'I came to town and to +the best part of it your house.' In 1609 Mrs. Herbert married Sir John +Danvers. We know that in 1607-9 Donne was in correspondence with Mrs. +Herbert and was sending her copies of his religious verses. Walton's +evidence points to its being about the same time that he wrote this +poem. + +Mr. Gosse's argument for a later date is, regarded _a priori_, very +persuasive. 'Unless it is taken as describing the venerable and +beautiful old age of a distinguished woman, the piece is an absurdity; +to address such lines to a youthful widow, who was about to become the +bride of a boy of twenty, would have been a monstrous breach of taste +and good manners' (_Life, &c._, ii. 228). It is, however, somewhat +hazardous to fix a standard of taste for the age of James I, and above +all others for John Donne. To the taste of the time and the temper +of Donne such a poem might more becomingly be addressed to a widow +of forty, the mother of ten children, one already an accomplished +courtier, than it might be written by a priest in orders. Donne would +have been startled to hear that in 1625 he had spent any time in such +a vain amusement as composing a secular elegy. The poem he wrote +to Mrs. Herbert before 1609 was probably thought by her and him an +exquisite compliment. He expressly disclaims speaking of the old age +which disfigures. He writes of one whose youthful beauty has flown. +Forty seemed old for a woman, even to Jane Austen, and in Montaigne's +opinion it is old for a man: 'J'estois tel, car je ne me considère pas +à cette heure, que je suis engagé dans les avenues de la vieillesse, +ayant pieça franchy les quarante ans: + + Minutatim vires et robur adultum + Frangit, et in partem pejorem liquitur aetas. + +Ce que je seray doresnevant ce ne sera plus qu'un demy estre, ce ne +sera plus moy; je m'eschappe les jours et me desrobe a moy mesme: + + Singula de nobis anni praedantur euntes.' + _Essais_, ii. 17. + +Mrs. Herbert's marriage was due to no 'heyday of the blood'. It was +the gravity of Danvers' temper which attracted her, and he became the +steady friend and adviser of her children. + +There are, moreover, some items of evidence which go to support +Walton's testimony. The poem is found in one MS., _S_, dated 1620, +which gives us a downward date; and in 1610 occurs what looks very +like an allusion to Donne's poem in Ben Jonson's _Silent Woman_. +Clerimont and True-wit are speaking of the Collegiate ladies, and the +former asks, + + Who is the president? + + _True._ The grave and youthful matron, the Lady Haughty. + + _Cler._ A pox of her autumnal face, her pieced beauty! there's no + man can be admitted till she be ready now-a-days, till she has + painted and perfumed ... I have made a song (I pray thee + hear it) on the subject + + Still to be neat, still to be drest... + +The resemblance may be accidental, yet the frequency with which the +poem is dubbed _An Autumnal Face_ or _The Autumnall_ shows that the +phrase had struck home. Jonson's comedies seethe with such allusions, +and I rather suspect that he is poking fun at his friend's paradoxes, +perhaps in a sly way at that 'grave and youthful matron' Lady Danvers. +We cannot _prove_ that the poem was written so early, but the evidence +on the whole is in favour of Walton's statement. + + +PAGE =79=. ELEGIE I. + +l. 4. That Donne must have written 'sere-barke' or 'seare-barke' is +clear, both from the evidence of the editions and MSS. and from the +vacillation of the latter. 'Cere-cloth' is a word which Donne uses +more than once in the sermons: 'A good Cere-cloth to bruises,' +_Sermons_ 80. 10. 101; 'A Searcloth that souples all bruises,' Ibid. +80. 66. 663. But to substitute 'sere-cloth' for 'sere-barke' would be +to miss the force of Donne's vivid description. The 'sere-cloth' with +which the sick man is covered is his own eruptive skin. Both Chambers +and Norton have noted the resemblance to Hamlet's poisoned father: + + a most instant tetter barked about, + Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust, + All my smooth body. + + ll. 19-20. _Nor, at his board together being sat + With words, nor touch, scarce looks adulterate._ + + Quum premit ille torum, vultu comes ipsa modesto + Ibis, ut adcumbas; clam mihi tange pedem, + Me specta, nutusque meos, vultumque loquacem: + Excipe furtivas, et refer ipsa, notas. + Verba superciliis sine voce loquentia dicam: + Verba leges digitis, verba notata mero. + Quum tibi succurrit Veneris lascivia nostrae, + Purpureas tenero pollice tange genas. + Si quid erit, de me tacita quod mente queraris, + Pendeat extrema mollis ab aure manus: + Quum tibi, quae faciam, mea lux, dicamve placebunt, + Versetur digitis annulus usque tuis, + Tange manu mensam, quo tangunt more precantes, + Optabis merito quum mala multa viro. + Quod tibi miscuerit sapias, bibat ipse iubeto; + Tu puerum leviter posce, quod ipsa velis. + Quae tu reddideris, ego primus pocula sumam, + Et qua tu biberis, hac ego parte bibam. + Ovid, _Amores_, I. iv. 15-32. + + Thenceforth to her he sought to intimate + His inward grief, by meanes to him well knowne: + Now Bacchus fruit out of the silver plate + He on the table dasht as overthrowne, + Or of the fruitfull liquor overflowne, + And by the dancing bubbles did divine, + Or therein write to let his love be showne; + Which well she red out of the learned line; + (A sacrament profane in mysterie of wine.) + Spenser, _Faerie Queene_, III. ix. + + ll. 21 f. _Nor when he, swoln and pamper'd with great fare + Sits down and snorts, cag'd in his basket chair, &c._ + + Vir bibat usque roga: precibus tamen oscula desint; + Dumque bibit, furtim, si potes, adde merum. + Si bene compositus somno vinoque iacebit; + Consilium nobis resque locusque dabunt. + Ovid, _Amores_, I. iv. 51-4. + + +PAGE =80=. ELEGIE II. + +l. 4. _Though they be Ivory, yet her teeth be jeat_: i.e. 'Though her +eyes be yellow as ivory, her teeth are black as jet.' The edition +of 1669 substitutes 'theirs' for 'they', referring back to 'others'. +Grosart follows. + +l. 6. _rough_ is the reading of _1633_, _1669_, and all the best MSS. +Chambers and Grosart prefer the 'tough' of _1635-54_, but 'rough' +means probably 'hairy, shaggy, hirsute'. O.E.D., _Rough_, B. I. 2. Her +hair is in the wrong place. To have hair on her face and none on her +head are alike disadvantageous to a woman's beauty. + +PAGE =81=, ll. 17-21. _If we might put the letters, &c._ Compare: + + As six sweet Notes, curiously varied + In skilfull Musick, make a hundred kindes + Of Heav'nly sounds, that ravish hardest mindes; + And with Division (of a choice device) + The Hearers soules out at their ears intice: + Or, as of twice-twelve Letters, thus transpos'd, + The World of Words, is variously compos'd; + And of these Words, in divers orders sow'n + This sacred _Volume_ that you read is grow'n + (Through gracious succour of th'Eternal Deity) + Rich in discourse, with infinite Variety. + Sylvester, _Du Bartas_, First Week, Second Day. + +Sylvester follows the French closely. Du Bartas' source is probably: + + Quin etiam passim nostris in versibus ipsis + Multa elementa vides multis communia verbis, + Cum tamen inter se versus ac verba necessest + Confiteare et re et sonitu distare sonanti, + Tantum elementa queunt permutato ordine solo. + Lucretius, _De Rerum Natura_, I. 824-7. + +Compare Aristotle, _De Gen. et Corr._ I. 2. + +l. 22. _unfit._ I have changed the semicolon after this word to a full +stop. The former suggests that the next two lines are an expansion +or explanation of this statement. But the poet is giving a series of +different reasons why Flavia may be loved. + +ll. 41-2. _When Belgias citties, the round countries drowne, + That durty foulenesse guards, and armes the towne:_ + +Chambers, adopting a composite text from editions and MSS., reads: + + Like Belgia' cities the round country drowns, + That dirty foulness guards and arms the towns. + +Here 'the round country drowns' is an adjectival clause with the +relative suppressed. But if the country actually drowned the cities +the protector would be as dangerous as the enemy. The best MSS. agree +with _1633-54_, and the sentence, though a little obscure, is probably +correct: 'When the Belgian cities, to keep at bay their foes, drown +(i.e. flood) the neighbouring countries, the foulness thus produced +is their protection.' The 'cities' I take to be the subject. The +reference is to their opening the sluices. See Motley's _Rise of the +Dutch Republic_, the account of the sieges of Alkmaar and Leyden. +'The Drowned Land' ('Het verdronken land') was the name given to land +overflowed by the bursting of the dykes. + + +PAGE =82=. ELEGIE III. + +l. 5. _forc'd unto none_ is a strange expression, and the 'forbid +to none' of _B_ is an attempt to emend it; but 'forc'd unto none' +probably means 'not bound by compulsion to be faithful to any'. In +woman's love and in the arts you may always expect to be ousted from +a favoured position by a successful rival. No one has in these a +monopoly: + + Is sibi responsum hoc habeat, in medio omnibus + Palmam esse positam, qui artem tractant musicam. + Ter. _Phorm._ Prol. 16-17. + +l. 8. _these meanes, as I,_ It is difficult to say whether the 'these' +of the editions and of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ or the 'those' of the rest of +the MSS. is preferable. The construction with either in the sense of +'the same as', 'such as', was not uncommon: + + Under these hard conditions as this time + Is like to lay upon us. + Shakespeare, _Jul. Caes._ I. ii. 174. + +l. 17. _Who hath a plow-land, &c._ This has nothing to do, as Grosart +seems to think, with the name for a certain measurement of land in the +north of England corresponding to a hide in the south. A 'plow-land' +here is an arable or cultivated field. Possibly the 'a' has crept in +and one should read simply 'plow-land', or, like _P_, 'plow-lands.' +Otherwise 'Who hath' is to be slurred in reading the line. The meaning +of the passage seems to be that though a man puts all his own seed +into his land, he is quite willing to reap the corn which has sprung +from others' seed, brought thither, it may be, by wind or birds. + +l. 30. _To runne all countries, a wild roguery._ The Oxford English +Dictionary quotes this line, giving to 'roguery' the meaning of 'a +knavish, rascally act'. But Grosart is certainly right in explaining +it as 'vagrancy'. In love, Donne does not wish to be a captive bound +to one, but he does not wish on the other hand to be a vagrant with +no settled abode. The O.E.D. dates the poem c. 1620, which is much too +late. Donne was not writing in this manner after he took orders. It +cannot be later than 1601, and is probably earlier. + +l. 32. _more putrifi'd_, or, as in the MSS., 'worse putrifi'd.' +The latter is probably correct, but the difference is trifling. By +'putrifi'd' Donne means 'made salt' and so less fit for drinking. The +'purifi'd' of some editions points to a misunderstanding of Donne's +meaning; for saltness and putrefaction were not identical: 'For Salt +as incorruptible was the Symbol of friendship, and before the other +service was offered unto their guests.' Browne, _Vulgar Errors_, v. +22. + + +PAGE =84=. ELEGIE IV. + +l. 2. _All thy suppos'd escapes._ He is addressing the lady. All her +supposed transgressions (e.g. of chastity) are laid to the poet's +charge. 'Escape' = 'An inconsiderate transgression; a peccadillo, +venial error. (In Shaks. with different notion: an outrageous +transgression.) Applied _esp._ to breaches of chastity.' O.E.D. It is +probably in Shakespeare's sense that Donne uses the word: + + _Brabantio._ For your sake, jewel, + I am glad at soul I have no other child; + For thy escape would teach me tyranny, + To hang clogs on them. + Shakespeare, _Othello_, I. iii. 195-8. + +ll. 7-8. + + _Though he had wont to search with glazed eyes, + As though he came to kill a Cockatrice,_ + +i.e. 'with staring eyes'. I take 'glazed' to be the past participle of +the verb 'glaze', 'to stare': + + I met a lion + Who glaz'd upon me, and went surly by, + Without annoying me. + Shakespeare, _Jul. Caes._ I. iii. 20-2. + +The past participle is thus used by Shakespeare in: 'With time's +deformed hand' (_Com. of Err._ V. i. 298), i.e. 'deforming hand'; +'deserved children' (_Cor._ III. i. 292), i.e. 'deserving'. See Franz, +_Shakespeare-Grammatik_, § 661. + +The Cockatrice or Basilisk killed by a glance of its eye: + + Here with a cockatrice dead-killing eye + He rouseth up himself, and makes a pause. + Shakespeare, _Lucrece_, 540-1. + +The eye of the man who comes to kill a cockatrice stares with terror +lest he be stricken himself. + +If 'glazed' meant 'covered with a film', an adverbial complement would +be needed: + + For sorrow's eye, glazed with blinding tears. + Shakespeare, _Rich. II_, II. ii. 16. + +ll. 9, 15. _have ... take._ I have noted the subjunctive forms +found in certain MSS., because this is undoubtedly Donne's usual +construction. In a full analysis that I have made of Donne's syntax in +the poems I have found over ninety examples of the subjunctive against +seven of the indicative in concessive adverbial clauses. In these +ninety are many where the concession is an admitted fact, e.g. + + Though her eyes be small, her mouth is great. + _Elegie II_, 3 ff. + + Though poetry indeed be such a sin. + _Satire II_, 5. + +Of the seven, two are these doubtful examples here noted; one, where +the subjunctive would be more appropriate, is due to the rhyme. + + ll. 10-11. _Thy beauties beautie, and food of our love, + Hope of his goods._ + +Grosart is puzzled by this phrase and explains 'beauties beautie' as +'the beauty of thy various beauties' (face, arms, shape, &c.). I fear +that Donne means that the beauty which he most loves in his mistress +is her hope or prospect of obtaining her father's goods. The whole +poem is in a vein of extravagant and cynical wit. It must not be taken +too seriously. + +l. 22. _palenesse, blushing, sighs, and sweats._ All the MSS. read +'blushings', which is very probably correct, but I have left the two +singulars to balance the two plurals. But the use of abstract nouns +as common is a feature of Donne's syntax: 'We would not dwell upon +increpations, and chidings, and bitternesses; we would pierce but so +deepe as might make you search your wounds, when you come home to your +Chamber, to bring you to a tendernesse there, not to a palenesse or +blushing here.' _Sermons_ 80. 61. 611. + +l. 29. _ingled_: i.e. fondled, caressed. O.E.D. + + ll. 33-4. _He that to barre the first gate, doth as wide + As the great Rhodian Colossus stride._ + +Porters seem to have been chosen for their size. Compare: 'Those +big fellows that stand like Gyants (at Lords Gates) having bellies +bumbasted with ale in Lambswool and with Sacks.' Dekker. + +l. 37. _were hir'd to this._ All the MSS. read 'for this', but 'to' +is quite Elizabethan, and gives the meaning more exactly. He was not +taken on as a servant for this purpose, but was specially paid for +this piece of work: + + This naughty man + Shall face to face be brought to Margaret, + Who I believe was pack'd in all this wrong, + Hir'd to it by your brother. + Shakespeare, _Much Ado_, V. i. 307. + +l. 44. _the pale wretch shivered._ I have (with the support of the +best MSS.) changed the semicolon to a full stop here, not that as +the punctuation of the editions goes it is wrong, but because it is +ambiguous and has misled both Chambers and the Grolier Club editor. +By changing the semicolon to a comma they make ll. 43-4 an adverbial +clause of time which, with the conditional clause 'Had it beene some +bad smell', modifies 'he would have thought ... had wrought'. This +seems to me out of the question. The 'when' links the statement 'the +pale wretch shivered' to what precedes, not to what follows. As soon +as the perfume reached his nose he shivered, knowing what it meant. A +new thought begins with 'Had it been some bad smell'. + +The use of the semicolon, as at one time equivalent to a little less +than a full stop, at another to a little more than a comma, leads +occasionally to these ambiguities. The few changes which I have +made in the punctuation of this poem have been made with a view to +obtaining a little more consistency and clearness without violating +the principles of seventeenth-century punctuation. + +l. 49. _The precious Vnicornes._ See Browne, _Vulgar Errors_, iii. 23: +'Great account and much profit is made of _Unicornes horn_, at least +of that which beareth the name thereof,' &c. He speaks later of the +various objects 'extolled for precious Horns'; and Donne's epithet +doubtless has the same application, i.e. to the horns. + + +PAGE =86=. ELEGIE V. + +l. 8. _With cares rash sodaine stormes being o'rspread._ I have +let the _1633_ reading stand, though I feel sure that Donne is not +responsible for 'being o'rspread'. Printing from _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, +in which probably the word 'cruel' had been dropped, the editor or +printer supplied 'being' to adjust the metre. I have not corrected it +because I am not sure which is Donne's version. Clearly the line has +undergone some remodelling. My own view is that the earliest form is +suggested by _B_, _S_, _S96_, + + With Cares rash sudden storms o'rpressed, + +where 'o'erpress' means 'conquer, overwhelm'. Compare Shakespeare's + + but in my sight + Deare heart forbear to glance thine eye aside. + What need'st thou wound with cunning when thy might + Is more than my o'erprest defence can bide. + _Sonnets_, 139. 8. + + He bestrid an o'erpressed Roman. + _Coriolanus_, II. ii. 97. + +To begin with, Donne described his grey hairs by a bold synecdoche, +leaving the greyness to be inferred: 'My head o'erwhelmed, +o'ermastered by Cares storms.' But 'o'erpressed' was harshly used and +was easily changed to 'o'erspread', which was made more appropriate by +substituting the effect, 'hoariness,' for the cause, 'Cares storms.' +This is what we find in _JC_ and such a good MS. as _W_: + + With cares rash sudden horiness o'erspread. + +In _B_ and _P_ 'cruel' has been inserted to complete the verse +when 'o'erpressed' was contracted to 'o'erprest' or changed to +'o'erspread'. In _1635-69_ the somewhat redundant 'rash' has been +altered to 'harsh'. + + With cares harsh, sodaine horinesse o'rspread. + +The image is more easily apprehended, and this may be Donne's final +version, but the original (if my view is correct) was bolder, and more +in the style of Shakespeare's + + That time of yeeare thou maist in me behold, + When yellow leaues, or none, or few doe hange + Vpon those boughes which shake against the could, + Bare ruin'd quiers, where late the sweet birds sang. + _Sonnets_, 72. 1-4. + +l. 16. _Should now love lesse, what hee did love to see._ Here again +there has been some recasting of the original by Donne or an editor. +Most MSS. read: + + Should like and love less what hee did love to see. + +To 'like and love' was an Elizabethan combination: + + And yet we both make shew we like and love. + Farmer, _Chetham MS._ (ed. Grosart), i. 90. + + Yet every one her likte, and every one her lov'd. + Spenser, _Faerie Queene_, III. ix. 24. + +Donne or his editor has made the line smoother. + +l. 20. _To feed on that, which to disused tasts seems tough._ I have +made the line an Alexandrine by printing 'disused', which occurs in +_A25_ and _B_, but it is 'disus'd' in the editions and most MSS. The +'weak' of _1650-69_ adjusts the metre, but for that very reason one +a little suspects an editor. Donne certainly wrote 'disus'd' or +'disused'. Who changed it to 'weak' is not so certain. The meaning of +'disused' is, of course, 'unaccustomed.' The O.E.D. quotes: 'I can +nat shote nowe but with great payne, I am so disused.' Palsgr. (1530). +'Many disused persons can mutter out some honest requests in secret.' +Baxter, _Reformed Pastor_ (1656). + +It seems to me probable that _P_ preserves an early form of these +lines: + + who now is grown tough enough + To feed on that which to disused tastes seems rough. + +The epithet 'tough' is appropriately enough applied to Love's +mature as opposed to his childish constitution, while rough has the +recognized sense of 'sharp, acid, or harsh to the taste'. The O.E.D. +quotes: 'Harshe, rough, stipticke, and hard wine,' Stubbs (1583). +'The roughest berry on the rudest hedge', Shakespeare, _Antony and +Cleopatra_, I. iv. 64 (1608). + +Possibly Donne changed 'tough' to 'strong' in order to avoid the +monotonous sound of 'tough enough ... rough', and this ultimately led +to the substitution of 'weak' for 'disused'. The present close of the +last line I find it difficult to away with. How can a thing seem tough +to the taste? Even meat does not _taste_ tough: and it is not of meat +that Donne is thinking but of wine. I should be disposed to return +to the reading of _P_, or, if we accept 'strong' and 'weak' as +improvements, at any rate to alter 'tough' to 'rough '. + + +PAGE =87=. ELEGIE VI. + +l. 6. _Their Princes stiles, with many Realmes fulfill._ This is the +reading of all the best MSS. The 'which' for 'with' of the editions +is due to an easy confusion of two contractions invariably used in +the MSS. Grosart and Chambers accept 'with' from _S_ and _A25_, but +further alter 'styles' to 'style', following these generally inferior +MSS. The plural is correct. Donne refers to more than one prince and +style. The stock instance is + + the poor king Reignier, whose large style + Agrees not with the leanness of his purse. + _2 Henry VI_, I. i. 111-12. + +But the English monarchs themselves bore in their 'style' the kingdom +of France, and for some years (1558-1566) Mary, Queen of Scots, bore +in her 'style' the arms of England and Ireland. + +PAGE =88=, ll. 21-34. These lines evidently suggested Carew's poem, +_To my Mistress sitting by a River's Side, An Eddy_: + + Mark how yon eddy steals away + From the rude stream into the bay; + There, locked up safe, she doth divorce + Her waters from the channel's course, + And scorns the torrent that did bring + Her headlong from her native spring, &c. + + ll. 23-4. _calmely ride + Her wedded channels bosome, and then chide._ + +The number of MSS. and editions is in favour of 'there', but the +quality (e.g. _1633_ and _W_) of those which read 'then', and the +sense of the lines, favour 'then'. The stream is at one moment in +'speechless slumber', and the next chiding. She cannot in the same +place do both at once: + + The current that with gentle murmur glides, + Thou know'st, being stopp'd, impatiently doth rage; + But when his fair course is not hindered, + He makes sweet music with the enamell'd stones, + Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge + He overtaketh in his pilgrimage; + And so by many winding nooks he strays, + With willing sport to the wild ocean. + Shakespeare, _Two Gentlemen of Verona_, II. vii. 25-32. + + ll. 27-8. _Yet if her often gnawing kisses winne + The traiterous banke to gape, and let her in._ + +The 'banke' of the MSS. must, I think, be the right reading rather +than the 'banks' of the editions, the 's' having arisen from the final +'e'. A river which bursts or overflows its banks does not leave its +course, though it 'drowns' the 'round country', but if it breaks +through a weak part in a bank it may quit its original course for +another. 'The traiterous bank' I take to be equivalent to 'the weak or +treacherous spot in its bank'. + + +PAGE =89=. ELEGIE VII. + +l. 1. _Natures lay Ideot._ Here 'lay' means, I suppose, ignorant', +as Grosart says. His other suggestion, that 'lay' has the meaning of +'lay' in 'layman', a painter's figure, is unlikely. That word has a +different origin from 'lay' (Lat. _laicus_), and the earliest example +of it given in O.E.D. is dated 1688. + + ll. 7-8. _Nor by the'eyes water call a maladie + Desperately hot, or changing feaverously._ + +The 'call' of _1633_ is so strongly supported by the MSS. that it is +dangerous to alter it. Grosart (whom Chambers follows) reads 'cast', +from _S_; but a glance at the whole line as it stands there shows how +little can be built upon it. 'To cast' is generally used in the phrase +'to cast his water' and thereby tell his malady; but the O.E.D. gives +one example which resembles this passage if 'cast' be the right word +here: + + Able to cast his disease without his water. + Greene's _Menaphon_. + +I rather fancy, however, that 'call' is right, and is to be taken +in close connexion with the next line, 'You could not cast the +eyes water, and thereby call the malady desperately hot or changing +feverously.' + + If thou couldst, Doctor, cast + The water of my land, find her disease. + Shakespeare, _Macbeth_, V. iii. 50. + +The 'casting' preceded and led to the finding, naming the disease, +calling it this or that. + + ll. 9 f. _I had not taught thee then, the Alphabet + Of flowers, &c._ + +'_Posy_, in both its senses, is a contraction of _poesy_, the flowers +of a nosegay expressing by their arrangement a sentiment like that +engraved on a ring.' Weekly, _Romance of Words_, London, 1912, p. 134. +She had not yet learned to sort flowers so as to make a posy. + +l. 13. _Remember since, &c._ For the idiom compare: + + Beseech you, sir, + Remember since you owed no more to time + Than I do now. + Shakespeare, _Winter's Tale_, V. i. 219. + +See Franz, _Shakespeare-Grammatik_, § 559. + +l. 22. _Inlaid thee._ The O.E.D. cites this line as the only example +of 'inlay' meaning 'to lay in, or as in, a place of concealment or +preservation.' The sense is much that of 'to lay up', but the word has +perhaps some of its more usual meaning, 'to set or embed in another +substance.' 'Your husband has given to you, his jewel, such a setting +as conceals instead of setting off your charms. I have refined and +heightened those charms.' + +l. 25. _Thy graces and good words my creatures bee._ I was tempted +to adopt with Chambers the 'good works' of _1669_ and some MSS., the +theological connexion of 'grace' and 'works' being just the kind of +conceit Donne loves to play with. But the 'words' of _1633-54_ has the +support of so good a MS. as _W_, and 'good words' is an Elizabethan +idiom for commendation, praise, flattery: + + He that will give, + Good words to thee will flatter neath abhorring. + Shakespeare, _Coriolanus_, I. i. 170-1. + + In your bad strokes you give good words. + Shakespeare, _Julius Caesar_, V. i. 30. + +Moreover, Donne's word is 'graces', not 'grace'. 'Your graces and +commendations are my work', i.e. either the commendations you receive, +or, more probably, the refined and elegant flatteries with which you +can now cajole a lover, though once your whole stock of conversation +did not extend beyond 'broken proverbs and torne sentences'. Compare, +in _Elegie IX: The Autumnall_, the description of Lady Danvers' +conversation: + + In all her words, unto all hearers fit, + You may at Revels, you at Counsaile, sit. + +And again, _Elegie XVIII: Loves Progresse_: + + So we her ayres contemplate, words and heart, + And virtues. + +l. 28. _Frame and enamell Plate._ Compare: 'And therefore they that +thinke to gild and enamell deceit, and falsehood, with the additions +of good deceit, good falshood, before they will make deceit good, +will make God bad.' _Sermons_ 80. 73. 742. 'Frame' means, of course, +'shape, fashion', and 'plate' gold or silver service. The elaborate +enamelling of such dishes and cups was, I presume, as common as in the +case of gold watches and clocks. See F. J. Britten's _Old Clocks and +Watches and their Makers_, 1904. + + +PAGE =90=. ELEGIE VIII. + +l. 2. _Muskats_, i.e. 'Musk-cats.' The 'muskets' of _1669_ is only a +misprint. + +ll. 5-6. In these lines as they stand in the editions and most of the +MSS. there is clearly something wrong: + + And on her neck her skin such lustre sets, + They seeme no sweat drops but pearle coronets. + +A 'coronet' is not an ornament of the neck, but of the head. The +obvious emendation is that of _A25_, _C_, _JC_, and _W_, which Grosart +and Chambers have adopted. A 'carcanet' is a necklace, and carcanets +of pearl were not unusual: see O.E.D., _s. v._ But why then do the +editions and so many MSS. read 'coronets'? Consideration of this +has convinced me that the original error is not here but in the word +'neck'. Article by article, as in an inventory, Donne contrasts his +mistress and his enemy's. But in the next line he goes on: + + Ranke sweaty froth thy Mistresse's _brow_ defiles, + +contrasting her brow with that of his mistress, where the sweat drops +seem 'no sweat drops but pearle coronets'. + +The explanation of the error is, probably, that an early copyist +passed in his mind from breast to neck more easily than to brow. +Another explanation is that Donne altered 'brow' to 'neck' and forgot +to alter 'coronets' to 'carcanets'. I do not think this likely. The +force of the poem lies in its contrasts, and the brow is proverbially +connected with sweat. 'In the sweat of thy brow,' &c. Possibly Donne +himself in the first version, or a copy of it, wrote 'neck', meaning +to write 'brow', misled by the proximity and associations of 'breast'. +Mr. J. C. Smith has shown that Spenser occasionally wrote a word which +association brought into his mind, but which was clearly not the word +he intended to use, as it is destructive of the rhyme-scheme. Oddly +enough the late Francis Thompson used 'carcanet' in the sense of +'coronet': + + Who scarfed her with the morning? and who set + Upon her brow the day-fall's carcanet? + _Ode to the Setting Sun._ + +PAGE =91=, l. 10. _Sanserra's starved men._ 'When I consider what God +did for Goshen in Egypt ... How many Sancerraes he hath delivered from +famines, how many Genevas from plots and machinations.' _Sermons._ + +The Protestants in Sancerra were besieged by the Catholics for nine +months in 1573, and suffered extreme privations. Norton quotes Henri +Martin, _Histoire de France_, ix. 364: 'On se disputa les débris les +plus immondes de toute substance animale ou végétale; on créa, pour +ainsi dire, des aliments monstrueux, impossibles.' + + ll. 13-14. _And like vile lying stones in saffrond tinne, + Or warts, or wheales, they hang upon her skinne._ + +Following the MSS. I have made 'lying' an epithet attached to 'stones' +and substituted 'they hang' for the superficially more grammatical 'it +hangs'. The readings of _1633_, 'vile stones lying' and 'it hangs', +seem to me just the kind of changes a hasty editor would make, the +kind of changes which characterize the Second Folio of Shakespeare. +The stones are not only 'vile'; they are 'lying', inasmuch as they +pretend to be what they are not, as the 'saffron'd tinne' pretends to +be gold. + +l. 19. _Thy head_: i.e. 'the head of thy mistress.' Donne continues +this construction in ll. 25, 32, 39, and I have restored it from the +later editions and MSS. at l. 34, 'thy gouty hand.' + +l. 34. _thy gouty hand_: 'thy' is the reading of all the editions +except _1633_ and of all the MSS. except _JC_ and _S_. It is probably +right, corresponding to l. 19 'Thy head' and l. 32 'thy tann'd +skins'. Donne uses 'thy' in a condensed fashion for 'the head of thy +mistress', &c. + +PAGE =92=, l. 51. _And such._ The 'such' of the MSS. is doubtless +right, the 'nice' of the editions being repeated from l. 49. + + +PAGE =92=. ELEGIE IX. + +For the date, &c., of this poem, see the introductory note on the +_Elegies_. + +The text of _1633_ diverges in some points from that of all the MSS., +in some others it agrees with _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. In the latter case I +have retained it, but where _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ agree with the rest of +the MSS. I have corrected _1633_, e.g.: + +PAGE =93=, l. 6. _Affection here takes Reverences name_: where +'Affection' seems more appropriate than 'Affections'; and l. 8. _But +now shee's gold_: where 'They are gold' of _1633_ involves a very +loose use of 'they'. Possibly _1633_ here gives a first version +afterwards corrected. + +ll. 29-32. _Xerxes strange Lydian love, &c._ Herodotus (vii. 31) tells +how Xerxes, on his march to Greece, found in Lydia a plane-tree which +for its beauty ([Greek: kalleos heineka]) he decked with gold +ornaments, and entrusted to a guardian. Aelian, _Variae Historiae_, +ii. 14, _De platano Xerxe amato_, attributes his admiration to its +size: [Greek: en Lydia goun, phasin, idôn phyton eumegethes platanou,] +&c. In the Latin translation in Hercler's edition (Firmin Didot, 1858) +size is taken as equivalent to height, 'quum vidisset proceram +platanum,' but the reference is more probably to extent. Pliny, _N. +H._ 12. 1-3, has much to say of the size of certain planes under which +companies of men camped and slept. + +The quotation from Aelian confirms the _1633_ reading, 'none being so +large as shee,' which indeed is confirmed by the lines that follow. +The question of age is left open. The reference to' barrennesse' I do +not understand. + +PAGE =94=, l. 47. _naturall lation._ This, the reading of the +great majority of the MSS., is obviously correct and explains the +vacillation of the editions. The word was rare but quite good. The +O.E.D. quotes: 'I mean lation or Local-motion from one place to +another.' Fotherby (1619); + + Make me the straight and oblique lines, + The motions, lations, and the signs. + (Herrick, _Hesper._ 64); + +and other examples as late as 1690. The term was specially +astronomical, as here. The 'motion natural' of _1633_ is an unusual +order in Donne; the 'natural station' of _1635-69_ is the opposite +of motion. The first was doubtless an intentional alteration by the +editor, which the printer took in at the wrong place; the second a +misreading of 'lation'. + + +PAGE =95=. ELEGIE X. + +The title of this Elegy, _The Dream_, was given it in _1635_, perhaps +wrongly. _S96_ seems to come nearer with _Picture_. The 'Image of +her whom I love', addressed in the first eight lines, seems to be a +picture. When that is gone and reason with it, fantasy and dreams come +to the lover's aid (ll. 9-20). But the tenor of the poem is somewhat +obscure; the picture is addressed in terms that could hardly be +strengthened if the lady herself were present. + +l. 26. _Mad with much heart, &c._ Aristotle made the heart the source +of all 'the actions of life and sense'. Galen transferred these to the +brain. See note to p. 99, l. 100. + + +PAGE =96=. ELEGIE XI. + +Donne has in this Elegy carried to its farthest extreme, as only a +metaphysical or scholastic poet like himself could, the favourite +Elizabethan pun on the coin called the Angel. Shakespeare is fond of +the same quibble: 'She has all the rule of her husband's purse; she +hath a legion of angels' (_Merry Wives_, I. iii. 60). But Donne knows +more of the philosophy of angels than Shakespeare and can pursue the +analogy into more surprising subtleties. Nor is the pun on angels the +only one which he follows up in this poem: crowns, pistolets, and gold +are all played with in turn. The poem was a favourite with Ben +Jonson: 'his verses of the Lost Chaine he hath by heart' (_Drummond's +Conversations_, ed. Laing). + +The text of the poem, which was first printed in _1635_ (Marriot +having been prohibited from including it in the edition of 1633), +is based on a MS. closely resembling _Cy_ and _P_, and differing +in several readings from the text given in the rest of the MSS., +including _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and _W_. I have endeavoured rather to +give this version correctly, while recording the variants, than either +to substitute another or contaminate the two. When _Cy_ and _P_ go +over to the side of the other MSS. it is a fair inference that the +editions have gone astray. When they diverge, the question is a more +open one. + +PAGE =97=, l. 24. _their naturall Countreys rot_: i.e. 'their native +Countreys rot', the 'lues Gallica'. Compare 'the naturall people of +that Countrey', Greene, _News from Hell_ (ed. Grosart, p. 57). This +is the reading of _Cy_, and the order of the words in the other MSS. +points to its being the reading of the MS. from which _1635_ was +printed. + +l. 26. _So pale, so lame, &c._ The chipping and debasement of the +French crown is frequently referred to, and Shakespeare is fond +of punning on the word. But two extracts from Stow's _Chronicle_ +(_continued ... by_ Edmund Howes), 1631, will throw some light on the +references to coins in this poem: In the year 1559 took place the last +abasement of English money whereby testons and groats were lowered in +value and called in, 'and according to the last valuation of them, +she gave them fine money of cleane silver for them commonly called +Sterling money, and from this time there was no manner of base money +coyned or used in England ... but all English monies were made of gold +and silver, which is not so in any other nation whatsoever, but have +sundry sorts of copper money.' + +'The 9. of November, the French crowne that went currant for six +shillings foure pence, was proclaimed to be sixe shillings.' + +In 1561, 'The fifteenth of November, the Queenes Maiestie published a +Proclamation for divers small pieces of silver money to be currant, +as the sixe pence, foure pence, three pence, 2 pence and a peny, three +half-pence, and 3 farthings: and also forbad all forraigne coynes to +be currant within the same Realme, as well gold as silver, calling +them all into her Maiesties Mints, except two sorts of crownes of +gold, the one the French crowne, the other the Flemish crowne.' The +result was the bringing in of large sums in 'silver plates: and as +much or more in pistolets, and other gold of Spanish coynes, and one +weeke in pistolets and other Spanish gold 16000 pounds, all these to +be coyned with the Queenes stamps.' + +l. 29. _Spanish Stamps still travelling._ Grosart regards this as an +allusion to the wide diffusion of Spanish coins. The reference is more +pointed. It is to the prevalence of Spanish bribery, the policy of +securing paid agents in every country. It was by money that Parma +secured his first hold on the revolted provinces. Gardiner has shown +that Lord Cranborne, afterwards Earl of Salisbury, accepted a pension +from the Spanish king (_Hist. of England_, i, p. 215). The discovery +of the number of his Court who were in Spanish pay came as a profound +shock to James at a later period. The invariable charge brought by +one Dutch statesman against another was of being in the pay of the +Spaniard. + +'It is his Indian gold,' says Raleigh, speaking of the King of Spain +in 1596, 'that endangers and disturbs all the nations of Europe; it +creeps into councils, purchases intelligence, and sets bound loyalty +at liberty in the greatest monarchies thereof.' + + ll. 40-1. _Gorgeous France ruin'd, ragged and decay'd; + Scotland, which knew no state, proud in one day:_ + +The punctuation of _1669_ has the support generally of the MSS., +but in matters of punctuation these are not a very safe guide. As +punctuated in _1635_, 'ragged and decay'd' are epithets of Scotland, +contrasting her with 'Gorgeous France'. I think, however, that the +antithesis to 'gorgeous' is 'ruin'd, ragged and decay'd', describing +the condition of France after the pistolets of Spain had done their +work. The epithet applied to Scotland is 'which knew no state', the +antithesis being 'proud in one day'. + +PAGE =98=, ll. 51-4. _Much hope which they should nourish, &c._ +Professor Norton proposed that the last two of these lines should run: + + Will vanish if thou, Love, let them alone, + For thou wilt love me less when they are gone; + +but that 'alone' is a misprint for 'atone.' This is unnecessary, and +there is no authority for 'atone'. What Donne says, in the cynical +vein of _Elegie VI_, 9-10, is: 'If thou love me let my crowns alone, +for the poorer I grow the less you will love me. I shall lose the +qualities which you admired in me when you saw them through the +glamour of wealth.' + +l. 55. _And be content._ The majority of the MSS. begin a new +paragraph here and read: + + Oh, be content, &c. + +Donne would almost seem to have read or seen (he was a frequent +theatre-goer) the old play of _Soliman and Perseda_ (pr. 1599). There +the lover, having lost a carcanet, sends a cryer through the street +and offers one hundred crowns reward. Chambers notes a similar case in +_The Puritan_ (1607). Lost property is still cried by the bellman +in northern Scottish towns. The custom of resorting in such cases +to 'some dread Conjurer' is frequently referred to. See Jonson's +_Alchemist_ for the questions with which their customers approached +conjurers. + +ll. 71-2. _So in the first falne angels, &c._ Aquinas discusses the +question: 'Utrum intellectus daemonis sit obtenebratus per privationem +cognitionis omnis veritatis.' After stating the arguments for such +privation he replies: 'Sed contra est quod Dionysius dicit ... quod +"data sunt daemonibus aliqua dona, quae nequaquam mutata esse dicimus, +sed sunt integra et splendidissima." Inter ista, autem, naturalia +dona est cognitio veritatis.' Aquinas then explains that knowledge is +twofold, that which comes by nature, and that which comes by +grace: and that the latter again is twofold, that which is purely +speculative, and that which is 'affectiva, producens amorem Dei'. +'Harum autem trium cognitionum prima in daemonibus nec est ablata nec +diminuta: consequitur enim ipsam naturam Angeli, qui secundum suam +naturam est quidam intellectus vel mens. Propter simplicitatem autem +suae substantiae a natura eius aliquid subtrahi non potest.' +Devils, therefore, have natural knowledge in an eminent degree +(_splendidissima_); they have even the knowledge which comes by grace +in so far as God chooses to bestow it, for His own purposes, by +the mediation of angels or 'per aliqua temporalia divinae virtutis +effecta' (Augustine). But of the knowledge which leads to good they +have nothing: 'tenendum est firmiter secundum fidem catholicam, quod +et voluntas bonorum Angelorum confirmata est in bono, et voluntas +daemonum obstinata est in malo.' _Summa_ I. + +lxiv. 1-2. They have 'wisdom and knowledge', but it is immovably set +to do ill. + + ll. 77-8. _Pitty these Angels; yet their dignities + Passe Vertues, Powers and Principalities._ + +There is a good deal of vacillation in the MSS. as to the punctuation +of 'Angels yet', some placing the semicolon before, others after +'yet'. The difference is not great, but that which I have adopted, +though it has least authority, brings out best what I take to be the +meaning of these somewhat difficult lines. 'Pity these Angels, for yet +(i.e. until they are melted down and lose their form) they, as good +angels, are superior in dignity to Vertues, Powers, and Principalities +among the bad angels.' The order of the Angelic beings, which the +Middle Ages took from Pseudo-Dionysius, consisted of nine Orders in +three Hierarchies. The first and highest Hierarchy included (beginning +with the highest Order) Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones; the second, +Dominions, Virtues, and Powers; the third, Principalities, Archangels, +Angels. Thus the three Orders mentioned by Donne are all in rank +superior to mere Angels; but the lowest Order of Good Angels is +superior to the highest Order of Evil Spirits, although before their +fall these belonged to the highest Orders. Probably, however, there +is a second and satiric reference in Donne's words which explains his +choice of Vertues, Powers, and Principalities. In the other sense of +the words Angels are coins, money; and the power of money surpasses +that of earthly Vertues, Powers, and Principalities. This may explain, +further, why Donne singles out 'Vertues, Powers, and Principalities'. +One would expect that, to make the antithesis between good and bad +angels as complete as possible, he would have named the three highest +orders, Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones. But the three orders which he +does mention are the highest Orders which travel, as money does. The +angels are divided into _Assistentes_ and _Administrates_. To the +former class belong all the Orders of the first Hierarchy, and the +Dominions of the second. The Vertues are thus the highest Order of +_Administrantes_. Aquinas, _Summa_, cxii. 3, 4. The _Assistentes_ are +those who 'only stand and wait'. + +PAGE =99=, l. 100. _rot thy moist braine_: So Sylvester's _Du Bartas_, +I. ii. 18: + + the Brain + Doth highest place of all our Frame retain, + And tempers with its moistful coldness so + Th'excessive heat of other parts below. + +This was Aristotle's opinion (_De Part. Anim._ II. 7), refuted by +Galen, who, like Plato, made the brain the seat of the soul and the +generator of the animal spirits. See II. p. 45. + +PAGE =100=, ll. 112, 114. _Gold is Restorative ... 'tis cordiall._ +'Most men say as much of gold, and some other minerals, as these have +done of precious stones. Erastus still maintaineth the opposite part, +Disput. in Paracelsum, cap. 4, fol. 196, he confesseth of gold, that +it makes the heart merry, but in no other sense but as it is in a +miser's chest: + + ----at mihi plaudo + ----simulac nummos contemplor in arcâ + +as he said in the poet: it so revives the spirits, and is an excellent +receipt against melancholy, + + For gold in phisik is a cordial, + Therefore he lovede gold in special.' + Burton, _Anatomy of Melancholy_, Pt. 2, Sub. 4. + + +ELEGIE XII. + +PAGE =101=, l. 37. _And mad'st us sigh and glow_: 'sigh and blow' has +been the somewhat inelegant reading of all editions hitherto. + +l. 42. _And over all thy husbands towring eyes._ The epithet 'towring' +is strange and the MSS. show some vacillation. Most of them read +'towred', probably the past participle of the same verb, though +Grosart alters to 'two red'--not a very poetical description. _RP31_ +here diverges from _H40_ and reads 'loured', perhaps for 'lurid', but +both these MSS. alter the order of the words and attach the epithet +to 'husbands', which is manifestly wrong, and the Grolier Club edition +prints 'lowering' without comment, regarding, I suppose, 't' as a +mistake for 'l'. + +The 'towring' of _1669_ and _TCD_ is probably correct, being a +bold metaphor from hawking, and having the force practically of +'threatening'. The hawk towers threateningly above its prey before it +'sousing kills with a grace'. If 'towring' is not right, 'lowring' is +the most probable emendation. + +PAGE =102=, l. 43. _That flam'd with oylie sweat of jealousie._ This +is the reading of all the MSS., and as on the whole their text is +superior I have followed it. If 'oylie' is, as I think, the right +epithet, it means 'moist', as in 'an oily palm', with perhaps a +reference to the inflammability of oil. If 'ouglie '(i.e. ugly) be +preferred it is a forcible transferred epithet. + +l. 49. _most respects?_ This is the reading of all the MSS., and +'best' in _1669_ is probably an emendation. The use of 'most' as an +adjective, superlative of 'great', is not uncommon: + + God's wrong is most of all. + Shakespeare, _Rich. III_, IV. iv. 377. + + Though in this place most master wear no breeches. + Ibid., _2 Hen. VI_, I. iii. 144. + +l. 54. I can make no exact sense of this line either as it stands in +_1669_ or in the MSS. One is tempted to combine the versions and read: + + Yea thy pale colours, and thy panting heart, + +the 'secrets of our Art' being all the signs by which they +communicated to one another their mutual affection. But it is +necessary to explain the presence of 'inwards' or 'inward' in both the +versions. + +PAGE =103=, l. 79. _The Summer how it ripened in the eare_; This fine +passage has been rather spoiled in all editions hitherto by printing +in this line 'yeare' for 'eare', even in modernized texts. The MSS. +and the sense both show that 'eare' is the right word, and indeed I +have no doubt that 'year' in _1635_ was simply due to a compositor's +or copyist's pronunciation. It occurs again in the 1669 edition in the +song _Twicknam Garden_ (p. 28, l. 3): + + And at mine eyes, and at mine years, + +These forms in 'y' are common in Sylvester's _Du Bartas_, e.g. +'yerst'. The O.E.D. gives the fourteenth to the sixteenth centuries as +those in which 'yere' was a recognized pronunciation of 'ear', but it +is found sporadically later and has misled editors. Thus in Sir George +Etherege's letter to the Earl of Middleton from Ratisbon, printed in +Dryden's _Works_ (Scott and Saintsbury), xi, pp. 38-40, some lines +run: + + These formed the jewel erst did grace + The cap of the first Grave o' the race, + Preferred by Graffin Marian + To adorn the handle of her fan; + And, as by old record appears, + Worn since in Kunigunda's years; + Now sparkling in the Froein's hair, + No rocket breaking in the air + Can with her starry head compare. + +In a modernized text, as this is, surely 'Kunigunda's years' should be +'Kunigunda's ears'. + +ll. 93-4. _That I may grow enamoured on your mind, + When my own thoughts I there reflected find._ + +'I there neglected find' has been the reading of all editions +hitherto--a strange reason for being enamoured. + +PAGE =104=, l. 96. _My deeds shall still be what my words are now_: +'words' suits the context better than either the 'deeds' of _1635-69_ +or 'thoughts' of _A25_. + + +PAGE =104=. ELEGIE XIII. + +PAGE =105=, ll. 13-14. _Liv'd Mantuan now againe, + That foemall Mastix, to limme with his penne_ + +Chambers, following the editions from _1639_ onwards, drops the comma +after 'Mastix', which suggests that Julia is the 'foemall Mastix', +not Mantuan. By Mantuan he understands Virgil, and supposes there is +a reference to the 'flammis armataque Chimaera' of _Aen._ vi. 289. The +Mantuan of the text is the 'Old Mantuan' of _Love's Labour's Lost_, +iv. 2. 92. Donne calls Mantuan the scourge of women because of his +fourth eclogue _De natura mulierum_. Norton quotes from it: + + Femineum servile genus, crudele, superbum. + +The O.E.D. quotes from S. Holland, _Zara_ (1656): 'It would have +puzzell'd that Female Mastix Mantuan to have limn'd this she +Chymera'--obviously borrowed from this poem. The dictionary gives +examples of 'mastix' in other compounds. + +The reference to Mantuan as a woman-hater is a favourite one with +the prose-pamphleteers: 'To this might be added _Mantuans_ invective +against them, but that pittie makes me refraine from renewing his +worne out complaints, the wounds whereof the former forepast feminine +sexe hath felt. I, but here the _Homer_ of Women hath forestalled an +objection, saying that _Mantuans_ house holding of our Ladie, he was +enforced by melancholic into such vehemencie of speech', &c. Nash, +_The Anatomy of Absurdity_ (ed. McKerrow, i. 12). + +'Where I leave you to consider, Gentlemen, how far unmeete women are +to have such reproches laid upon them, as sundrye large lipt fellows +have done: who when they take a peece of work in hand, and either for +want of matter, or lack of wit, are half gravelled, then they must +fill up the page with slaundering of women, who scarsly know what +a woman is: but if I were able either by wit or arte to be their +defender, or had the law in my hand to dispose as I list, which would +be as unseemely, as an Asse to treade the measures: yet, if it were +so, I would correct _Mantuans Egloge_, intituled _Alphus_: or els +if the Authour were alive, I would not doubt to persuade him in +recompence of his errour, to frame a new one,' &c. Greene, _Mamillia_ +(ed. Grosart), 106-7. Greene is probably the '_Homer_ of Women' +referred to in the first extract. + +l. 19. _Tenarus._ In the _Anatomy of the World_ 'Tenarif' is thus +spelt in the editions of 1633 to 1669, and Grosart declared that the +reference here is to that island. It is of course to 'Taenarus' in +Laconia. There was in that headland a sulphurous cavern believed to be +a passage to Hades. Through it Orpheus descended to recover Eurydice. +Ovid, _Met._ x. 13; Paus. iii. 14, 25. + +l. 28. _self-accusing oaths_: 'oaths' is the reading of the MSS., +'loaths' of the editions. The word 'loaths' in the sense of 'dislike, +hatred, ill-will' is found as late as 1728 (O.E.D.). 'If your Horse +... grow to a loath of his meat.' Topsell (1607). A self-accusing +loath may mean a hatred, e.g. of good, which condemns yourself. In +the context, however, 'cavils, untroths,' I am inclined to think that +'oaths' is right. Among the malevolent evils with which her breast +swarms are oaths accusing others of crimes, which accuse herself, +either because she is willing to implicate herself so long as she +secures her enemy's ruin, or because the information is of a kind that +could be got only by complicity in crime. + + +PAGE =105=. ELEGIE XIV. + +PAGE =106=, l. 6. _I touch no fat sowes grease._ Probably 'I say +nothing libellous as to the way in which this or that rich man has +acquired his wealth'. I cannot find the proverb accurately explained, +or given in quite this form, in any collection. + +l. 10. _will redd or pale._ The reading of _1669_ and the two MSS. is +doubtless correct, 'looke' being an editorial insertion as the use +of 'red' as a verb was growing rare. If 'looke' had belonged to the +original text 'counsellor' would probably have had the second syllable +elided. Compare: + + Roses out-red their [i.e. women's] lips and cheeks, + Lillies their whiteness stain. + Brome, _The Resolve_. + +l. 21. _the number of the Plaguy Bill_: i.e. the weekly bill of deaths +by the plague. By a Privy Council order of April 9, 1604, the theatres +were permitted to be open 'except ther shall happen weeklie to die of +the Plague above the number of thirtie'. The number was later raised +to forty. The theatres were repeatedly closed for this reason between +July 10, 1606, and 1610. In 1609 especially the fear of infection made +it difficult for the companies, driven from London, to gain permission +to act anywhere. There were no performances at Court during the winter +1609-10. Murray, _English Dramatic Companies_. + +l. 22. _the Custome Farmers._ The Privy Council registers abound in +references to the farmers of the customs and their conflicts with the +merchants. As they had to pay dearly for their farm, they were tempted +to press the law against the merchants in exacting dues. + +l. 23. _Of the Virginian plot._ Two expeditions were sent to Virginia +in 1609, in May under Sir Thomas Gates, Sir George Somers, and Captain +Newport, and at the end of the year under Lord de la Warr, 'who by +free election of the Treasurer and counsell of Virginia, and with the +full consent of the generality of that company was constituted and +authorized, during his natural life to be Lord Governor and Captaine +Generall of all the English Collonies planted, or to be planted in +Virginia, according to the tenor of his Majesties letters patents +granted that yeare 1609.' Stow. Speculation in Virginia stock was +encouraged: 'Besides many noblemen, knights, gentlemen, merchants, +and wealthy tradesmen, most of the incorporated trades of London were +induced to take shares in the stock.' Hildreth, _History of the United +States_, i. 108, quoted by Norton. + +The meaning of 'plot' here is 'device, design, scheme' (O.E.D.), as +'There have beene divers good plottes devised, and wise counsells +cast allready about reformation of that realme': Spenser, _State of +Ireland_. Donne uses the word also in the more original sense of 'a +piece of ground, a spot'. See p. 132, l. 34. + +l. 23-4. _whether Ward ... the I(n)land Seas._ I have taken 'Iland' +_1635-54_ as intended for 'Inland', perhaps written 'ĩland', not +for 'Island'. The edition of 1669 reads 'midland', and there is no +doubt that the Mediterranean was the scene of the career and exploits +of the notorious Ward, whose head-quarters were at Tunis. The +Mediterranean is called the Inland sea in Holland's translation of +Pliny (_Hist. of the World_, III. _The Proeme_); and Donne uses +the phrase (with a different application but one borrowed from this +meaning) in the _Progresse of the Soule_, p. 308, ll. 317-8: + + as if his vast wombe were + Some Inland sea. + +Previous editors read 'Island seas' but do not explain the reference, +except Grosart, who declares that the 'Iland seas are those around the +West Indian and other islands. The Midland seas (as in _1669_) +were probably the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Seas'. He cites no +authority; nor have we proof that Ward was ever in these seas. Writing +to Salisbury on the 7th of March, 1607-8, Wotton says: 'The voice is +here newly arrived that Warde hath taken another Venetian vessel of +good value, so as the hatred of him increaseth among them and fully +as fast as the fear of him. These are his effects. Now to give your +Lordship some taste of his language. One Moore, captain of an English +ship that tradeth this way ... was hailed by him not long since a +little without the Gulf, and answering that he was bound for Venice, +"Tell those flat caps" (said he) "who have been the occasion that I +am banished out of my country that before I have done with them I will +make them sue for pardon." In this style he speaketh.' Pearsall Smith, +_Life and Letters of ... Wotton_, ii. 415. Mr. Pearsall Smith adds in +a note that Ward hoped to 'buy or threaten the English Government into +pardoning him', and that some attempt was also made by the Venetian +Government to procure his assassination. + +If 'Island' be the right reading the sea referred to must be the +Adriatic. The Islands of the Illyrian coast were at various times the +haunt of pirates. But I have found no instance of the phrase in this +sense. + +l. 25. _the Brittaine Burse._ This was built by the Earl of Salisbury +on the site of an 'olde long stable' in the Strand on the north side +of Durham House: 'And upon Tuesday the tenth of Aprill this yeere, one +thousand sixe hundred and nine, many of the upper shoppes were richly +furnished with wares, and the next day after that, the King, Queene, +and Prince, the Lady Elizabeth and the Duke of Yorke, with many great +Lords, and chiefe Ladies, came thither, and were there entertained +with pleasant speeches, giftes, and ingenious devices, and then +the king gave it a name, and called it Brittaines Burse.' Stow, +_Chronicle_, p. 894. + +l. 27. _Of new built Algate, and the More-field crosses._ Aldgate, one +of the four principal gates in the City wall, was taken down in 1606 +and rebuilt by 1609: Stow, _Survey_. Norton refers to Jonson's _Silent +Woman_, I. i: 'How long did the canvas hang afore Aldgate? Were the +people suffered to see the city's Love and Charity while they were +rude stone, before they were painted and burnished?' + +'The More-field crosses' are apparently the walks at Moor-field. +Speaking of the embellishment of London which ensued from the long +duration of peace, Stow says, 'And lastly, whereof there is a more +generall, and particular notice taken by all persons resorting and +residing in London, the new and pleasant walks on the north side of +the city, anciently called More fields, which field (untill the third +yeare of King James) was a most noysome and offensive place, being a +generall laystall, a rotten morish ground, whereof it tooke first the +name.' Stow, _Chronicle_. For the ditches which crossed the field were +substituted 'most faire and royall walkes'. + +PAGE =107=, l. 41. The '(_quoth Hee_)' of the 1669 edition is +obviously correct. 'Hee' is required both by rhyme and reason. Mr. +Chambers has ingeniously put '"True" quoth I' into a parenthesis, as +a remark interjected by the poet. But apart from the rhyme the 'quoth +Hee' is needed to explain the transition to direct speech. Without it +the long speech of the citizen begins very awkwardly. + +ll. 42-44. These lines seem to echo the Royal Proclamation of 1609, +though the reference is different: 'in this speciall Proclamation his +Majestic declared how grievously, the people of this latter age and +times are fallen into verball profession, as well of religion, as of +all commendable morall vertues, but wanting the actions and deeds of +so specious a profession, and the insatiable and immeasurable itching +boldnesse of the spirits, tongues and pens of most men.' Stow, +_Chronicle_. + +l. 46. _Bawd, Tavern-keeper, Whore and Scrivener_; The singular number +of the MS. gives as good a sense as the plural and a better rhyme. + + l. 47. _The much of Privileg'd kingsmen, and the store + Of fresh protections, &c._ + +'We have many bankrupts daily, and as many protections, which doth +marvellously hinder all manner of commerce.' Chamberlain to Carleton, +Dec. 31, 1612. By 'kingsmen' I understand noblemen holding monopolies +from the King. I do not understand the 'kinsmen' of the editions. +By 'protections' is meant 'exemptions from suits in law', especially +suits for debt. The London tradesmen were much cheated by the +protections granted to the servants and followers of members of +Parliament. + +l. 65. _found nothing but a Rope._ I cannot identify this Rope. In the +_Aulularia_ of Plautus, when Euclio finds his treasure gone he laments +in the usual manner. At l. 721 he says, 'Heu me miserum, misere perii, +male perditu', _pessume ornatus eo_.' The last words may have been +taken as meaning 'I have the rope round my neck'. + + +PAGE =108=. ELEGIE XV. + +l. 12. Following _RP31_ and also Jonson's _Underwoods_ I have taken +'at once' as going with 'Both hot and cold', not with 'make life, and +death' as in _1633-69_. This is one of the poems which _1633_ derived +from some other source than _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. + +ll. 16-18 (_all sweeter ... the rest_) Chambers has overlooked +altogether the _1633_ reading 'sweeter'. He prints 'sweeten'd' +from _1635-69_. It is clear from the MSS. that this is an editor's +amendment due to Donne's 'all sweeter' suggesting, perhaps +intentionally, 'all the sweeter'. By dropping the bracket Chambers +has left at least ambiguous the construction of 17-18: _And the divine +impression of stolne kisses That sealed the rest._ Does this, as in +_1633_, belong to the parenthesis, or is 'the divine impression' to be +taken with 'so many accents sweet, so many sighes' and 'so many oathes +and teares' as part subject to 'should now prove empty blisses'. I +prefer the _1633_ arrangement, which has the support of the MSS., +though the punctuation of these is apt to be careless. The accents, +sighs, oaths, and tears were all made sweeter by having been stolen +with fear and trembling. This is how the Grolier Club editor takes it; +Grosart and Chambers prefer to follow _1635-69_. + +PAGE 109, l. 34. I do not know whence Chambers derived his reading +'drift' for 'trust'--perhaps from an imperfect copy of _1633_. He +attributes it to all the editions prior to 1669. This is an oversight. + +PAGE =110=, ll. 59 f. _I could renew, &c._ Compare Ovid, _Amores_, III. +ii. 1-7. + + Non ego nobilium sedeo studiosus equorum; + Cui tamen ipsa faves, vincat ut ille precor. + Ut loquerer tecum veni tecumque sederem, + Ne tibi non notus, quem facis, esset amor. + Tu cursum spectas, ego te; spectemus uterque + Quod iuvat, atque oculos pascat uterque suos. + O, cuicumque faves, felix agitator equorum! + + +PAGE =111=. ELEGIE XVI. + +A careful study of the textual notes to this poem will show that there +is a considerable difference between the text of this poem as given +for the first time in _1635_, and that of the majority of the MSS. It +is very difficult, however, to decide between them as the differences +are not generally such as to suggest that one reading is necessarily +right, the other wrong. The chief variants are these: 7 'parents' and +'fathers'. Here I fancy the 'parents' of the MSS. is right, and that +'fathers' in the editions and in a late MS. like _O'F_ is due to the +identification of Donne's mistress with his wife. Only the father of +Anne More was alive at the time of their first acquaintance. It is not +at all certain, however, that this poem is addressed to Anne More, +and in any case Donne would probably have disguised the details. The +change of 'parents' to 'fathers' is more likely than the opposite. +In l. 12 'wayes' (edd.) and 'meanes' (MSS.) are practically +indistinguishable; nor is there much to choose between the two +versions of l. 18: 'My soule from other lands to thee shall soare' +(edd.) and 'From other lands my soule towards thee shall soare' +(MSS.). In each case the version of the editions is slightly the +better. In l. 28, on the other hand, I have adopted 'mindes' without +hesitation although here the MSS. vary. There is no question of +changing the mind, but there is of changing the mind's habit, of +adopting a boy's cast of thought and manner: as Rosalind says, + + and in my heart + Lie there what hidden woman's fear there will, + We'll have a swashing and a martial outside, + As many other mannish cowards have + That do outface it with their semblances. + _As You Like It_, I. iii. 114-18. + +In l. 35 the reading 'Lives fuellers', i.e. 'Life's fuellers', which +is found in such early and good MSS. as _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ and _W_, +is very remarkable. If I were convinced that it is correct I should +regard it as decisive and prefer the MS. readings throughout. But +'Loves fuellers', though also a strange phrase, seems more easy of +interpretation, and applicable. + +In l. 37 there can, I think, be no doubt that the original reading is +preserved by _A18_, _N_, _S_, _TCD_, and _W_. + + Will quickly knowe thee, and knowe thee, and, alas! + +The sudden, brutal change in the sense of the word 'knowe' is quite in +Donne's manner. The reasons for omitting or softening it are obvious, +and may excuse my not restoring it. The whole of these central lines +reveal that strange bad taste, some radical want of delicacy, which +mars not only Donne's poems and lighter prose but even at times the +sermons. In l. 49 the reading of the MSS. _A18_, _N_, _TC_; _D_, +_H49_, _Lec_, and _W_ is also probably original: + + Nor praise, nor dispraise me; Blesse nor curse. + +It is not uncommon in Donne's poetry to find a syllable dropped with +the effect of increasing the stress on a rhetorically emphatic word, +here 'Blesse'. An editor would be sure to supply 'nor'. + +Lamb has quoted from this Elegy in his note to Beaumont and Fletcher's +_Philaster_ (_Specimens of English Dramatic Poets_, 1808). It is +clear that he used a copy of the 1669 edition, for he reads 35 'Lives +fuellers', and also 42 'Aydroptique' for 'Hydroptique'. Both these +mistakes were corrected in _1719_. Donne speaks in his sermons of +'fuelling and advancing his tentations'. _Sermons_ 80. 10. 99. + +PAGE =112=, l. 44. _England is onely a worthy Gallerie_: i.e. entrance +hall or corridor: 'Here then is the use of our hope before death, that +this life shall be a gallery into a better roome and deliver us over +to a better Country: for, _if in this life only_,' &c. _Sermons_ 50. +30. 270. 'He made but one world; for, this, and the next, are not _two +Worlds_;... They are not _two Houses_; This is the _Gallery_, and +that the _Bedchamber_ of one, and the same Palace, which shall feel no +ruine.' _Sermons_ 50. 43. 399. + +In connexion with the general theme of this poem it may be noted +that in 1605 Sir Robert Dudley, the illegitimate son of the Earl of +Leicester, who like Donne served in the Cadiz and Islands expeditions, +left England accompanied by the beautiful Elizabeth Southwell +disguised as a page. At this period the most fantastic poetry was +never more fantastic than life itself. + + +PAGE =113=. ELEGIE XVII. + +l. 12. _wide and farr._ The MSS. here correct an obvious error of the +editions. + +PAGE =114=, l. 24. This line is found only in _A10_, which omits the +next eleven lines. It may belong to a shorter version of the poem, but +it fits quite well into the context. + +PAGE =115=, l. 58. _daring eyes._ The epithet looks as though it had +been repeated from the line above, and perhaps 'darling' or 'darting' +may have been the original reading. However, both the MSS. agree with +the editions, and the word is probably used in two distinct senses, +'bold, adventurous' with 'armes' and 'dazzling' with 'eyes'. Compare: + + O now no more + Shall his perfections, like the sunbeams, dare + The purblind world; in heaven those glories are. + Campion, _Elegie upon the Untimely Death of Prince Henry_. + + Let his Grace go forward + And dare us with his cap like larks. + Shakespeare, _Henry VIII_, III. ii. 282. + +This refers to the custom of 'daring' or dazzling larks with a mirror. + + +PAGE =116=. ELEGIE XVIII. + +PAGE =117=, ll. 31-2. _Men to such Gods, &c._ Donne has in view here +the different kinds of sacrifice described by Porphyry: + + How to devote things living in due form + My verse shall tell, thou in thy tablets write. + For gods of earth and gods of heaven each three; + For heavenly pure white; for gods of earth + Cattle of kindred hue divide in three, + And on the altar lay thy sacrifice. + For gods infernal bury deep, and cast + The blood into a trench. For gentle Nymphs + Honey and gifts of Dionysus pour. + Eusebius: _Praeparatio Evangelica_, iv. 9 + (trans. E. H. Gifford, 1903). + +l. 47. _The Nose_ (_like to the first Meridian_) 'In the state +of nature we consider the light, as the sunne, to be risen at the +Moluccae, in the farthest East; In the state of the law we consider it +as the sunne come to Ormus, the first Quadrant; but in the Gospel to +be come to the Canaries, the fortunate Ilands, the first Meridian. +Now whatsoever is beyond this, is Westward, towards a Declination.' +_Sermons_ 80. 68. 688. + +'Longitude is length, and in the heavens it is understood the distance +of any starre or Planet, from the begining of Aries to the place of +the said Planet or Starre ... Otherwise, longitude in the earth, is +the distance of the Meridian of any place, from the Meridian which +passeth over the Isles of Azores, where the beginning of longitude is +said to be.' _The Sea-mans Kalender_, 1632. But ancient Cosmographers +placed the first meridian at the Canaries. See note to p. 187, l. 2. + +PAGE =118=, l. 52. _Not faynte Canaries but Ambrosiall._ The 'Canary' +of several MSS. is probably right--an adjective, like 'Ambrosiall'. +By 'faynte' is meant 'faintly odorous' as opposed to 'Ambrosial', i.e. +'divinely fragrant; perfumed as with Ambrosia' (O.E.D.). 'Fruit that +ambrosial smell diffus'd': Milton, _Par. Lost_, ix. 852. The text +gives an earlier use of both these words in this meaning than any +indicated by the O.E.D. William Morris uses the same adjective in a +somewhat ambiguous way but meaning, I suppose, 'weak, ready to die': + + Where still mid thoughts of August's quivering gold + Folk hoed the wheat, and clipped the vine in trust + Of faint October's purple-foaming must. + _Earthly Paradise, Atalanta's Race._ + + +PAGE =119=. ELEGIE XIX. + +PAGE =120=, l. 17. _then safely tread._ The 'safely' of so many MSS., +including _W_, seems to me a more likely reading than 'softly'. The +latter was probably suggested by the 'soft' of the following line. The +'safely' means of course that even without her shoes she will not be +hurt. + +l. 22. _Ill spirits._ It is not easy to decide between the 'Ill' of +_1669_ and some MSS. and the 'All' of some other MSS. Besides those +enumerated, two lesser MSS., viz. the Sloane MSS. 542 and 1792, read +'all'. + +In _Elegie IV_, l. 68, 'all' is written for 'ill' in _B_. + +PAGE =121=, l. 30. _How blest am I in this discovering thee!_ +The 'this' of almost all the MSS. is supported by the change of +'discovering' into 'discovery' of _B_, _O'F_, one way of evading the +rather unusual construction, 'this' with a verbal noun followed by an +object. The alteration of 'this' to 'thus' in _1669_ is another. But +the construction, though bold, is not inexcusable, and Donne wishes +to lay the stress not on the manner of the discovery, but on the +discovery itself, comparing it (in a very characteristic manner) to +the discovery of America. This figure alone is sufficient to establish +Donne's authorship, for he is peculiarly fond of these allusions to +voyages, using them again and again in his sermons. For the use of +'this' with the gerund compare: 'Sir,--I humbly thank you for this +continuing me in your memory, and enlarging me so far, as to the +memory of my Sovereign, and (I hope) my Master.' _Letters_, p. 306. + +l. 32. _Then where my hand is set, my seal shall be._ Chambers reads +'my soul'--I do not know from what source. The metaphor is from +signing and sealing. + +ll. 35-8. _Gems which you women use, &c._ I have adopted several +emendations from the MSS. In the edition of 1669 the lines are printed +thus: + + Jems which you women use + Are like Atlantas ball: cast in men's views, + That when a fools eye lighteth on a Jem + His earthly soul may court that, not them: + +I have adopted 'balls' from several MSS. as agreeing with the story +and with the plural 'Gems'. I have taken 'are' with 'cast in mens +views', regarding 'like Atlantas balls' as parenthetic. Both the metre +and the sense of l. 38 are improved by reading 'covet' for 'court', +though the latter has considerable support. The two words are easily +confused in writing. I have adopted 'theirs' too in preference to +'that' because it is more in Donne's manner as well as strongly +supported. 'A man who loves dress and ornaments on a woman loves +not her but what belongs to her; what is accessory, not what is +essential.' Compare: + + For he who colour loves, and skin, + Loves but their oldest clothes. + +The antithesis 'theirs not them' is much more pointed than 'that not +them'. + +l. 46. _There is no pennance due to innocence._ I suspect that the +original cast of this line was that pointed to by the MSS., + + Here is no penance, much less innocence: + +Penance and innocence alike are clothed in white. The version in the +text is a softening of the original to make it compatible with the +suggestion that the poem could be read as an epithalamium. 'Why', says +a note in the margin of the Bridgewater MS., 'may not a man write his +own epithalamium if he can do it so modestly?' + + +PAGE =122=. ELEGIE XX. + +Though not printed till 1802 there can be no doubt that this poem +is by Donne. The MS. which Waldron used is the Dyce fellow of _JC_. +Compare Ovid, _Amor._ i. 9: 'Militat omnis amans, et habet sua castra +Cupido.' + + +PAGE =124=. HEROICALL EPISTLE. _Sapho to Philaenis._ + +I have transferred this poem hither from its place in _1635-69_ among +the sober _Letters to Severall Personages_. It has obviously a closer +relation to the Elegies, and must have been composed about the same +time. Its genus is the Heroical Epistle modelled on Ovid, of which +Drayton produced the most popular English imitations in 1597. Donne's +was possibly evoked by these and written in 1597-8, but there is no +means of dating it exactly. 'Passionating' and 'conceited' eloquence +is the quality of these poems modelled on Ovid, and whatever one may +think of the poem on moral grounds it is impossible to deny that Donne +has caught the tone of the kind, and written a poem passionate and +eloquent in its own not altogether admirable way. The reader is more +than once reminded of Mr. Swinburne's far less conceited but more +diffuse _Anactoria_. + +l. 22. _As Down, as Stars, &c._ 'Down' is probably correct, but the +'Dowves' (i.e. doves) of _P_ gives the plural as in the other +nouns, and a closer parallel in poetic vividness. We get a series of +pictures--doves, stars, cedars, lilies. The meaning conveyed would be +the same: + + this hand + As soft as doves-downe, and as white as it. + _Wint. Tale_, IV. iv. 374. + +But of course swan's down is also celebrated: + + Heaven with sweet repose doth crowne + Each vertue softer than the swan's fam'd downe. + Habington, _Castara_. + +PAGE =125=, l. 33. Modern editors separate 'thorny' and 'hairy' by a +comma. They should rather be connected by a hyphen as in _TCD_. + +l. 40. _And are, as theeves trac'd, which rob when it snows._ This is +doubtless the source of Dryden's figurative description of Jonson's +thefts from the Ancients: 'You track him everywhere in their snow.' +_Essay of Dramatic Poesy_. + + + + +EPITHALAMIONS. + +PAGE =127=. The dates of the two chief Marriage Songs are: the +Princess Elizabeth, Feb. 14, 1613; the Earl of Somerset, Dec. 26, +1613. The third is an earlier piece of work, dating from the years +when Donne was a student at Lincoln's Inn. It is found in _W_, +following the _Satyres_ and _Elegies_ and preceding the _Letters_, +being probably the only one written when the collection in the first +part of that MS. was made. + +While quite himself in his treatment of the theme of this kind of +poem, Donne comes in it nearer to Spenser than in any other kind. +In glow and colour nothing he has written surpasses the Somerset +Epithalamion: + + First her eyes kindle other Ladies eyes, + Then from their beams their jewels lusters rise, + And from their jewels torches do take fire, + And all is warmth and light and good desire. + + +_An Epithalamion, or Marriage Song, &c._ 'In February following, the +Prince Palatine and that lovely Princess, the Lady Elizabeth, were +married on Bishop Valentine's Day, in all the Pomp and Glory that so +much grandeur could express. Her vestments were white, the Emblem of +Innocency; her Hair dishevel'd hanging down her Back at length, +an Ornament of Virginity; a Crown of pure Gold upon her Head, the +Cognizance of Majesty, being all over beset with precious Gems, +shining _like a Constellation_; her Train supported by Twelve young +Ladies in White Garments, so adorned with Jewels, that her passage +looked like a Milky-way. She was led to Church by her Brother Prince +Charles, and the Earl of Northampton; the young Batchelor on the Right +Hand, and the old on the left.' Camden, _Annales_. + +A full description of the festivities will be found in Nichol's +_Progresses of King James_, in Stow's _Chronicle_, and other works. +In a letter to Mrs. Carleton, Chamberlain gives an account of what he +saw: 'It were long and tedious to tell you all the particulars of the +excessive bravery, both of men and women, but you may conceive the +rest by one or two. The Lady Wotton had a gown that cost fifty pounds +a yard the embroidery.... The Viscount Rochester, the Lord Hay, and +the Lord Dingwall were exceeding rich and costly; but above all, they +speak of the Earl of Dorset. But this extreme cost and riches makes us +all poor.' _Court and Times of James I_, i. 226. The princess had been +educated by Lord and Lady Harington, the parents of Donne's patroness, +the Countess of Bedford. They accompanied her to Heidelberg, but +Lord Harington died on his way home, Lady Harington shortly after her +return. Donne had thus links with the Princess, and these were renewed +and strengthened later when with Lord Doncaster he visited Heidelberg +in 1619, and preached before her and her husband. He sent her his +first printed sermon and his _Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, &c._ +(1624), and to the latter she, then in exile and trouble, replied in a +courteous strain. + +PAGE =128=. Compare with the opening stanzas Chaucer's _Parliament +of Foules_ and Skeat's note (_Works of Chaucer_, i. 516). Birds were +supposed to choose their mates on St. Valentine's Day (Feb. 14). + +l. 42. _this, thy Valentine._ This is the reading of all the editions +except _1669_ and of all the MSS. except two of no independent value. +I think it is better than 'this day, Valentine', which Chambers adopts +from _1669_. The bride is addressed throughout the stanza, and it +would be a very abrupt change to refer 'thou' in l. 41 to Valentine. +I take 'this, thy Valentine' to mean 'this which is thy day, _par +excellence_', 'thy Saint Valentine's day', 'the day which saw you +paired'. But 'a Valentine' is a 'true-love': 'to be your +Valentine' (_Hamlet_, IV. v. 50), and the reference may be to +Frederick,--Frederick's Day is to become an era. + +ll. 43-50. The punctuation of these lines requires attention. That of +the editions, which Chambers follows, arranges them thus: + + Come forth, come forth, and as one glorious flame + Meeting Another growes the same, + So meet thy Fredericke, and so + To an unseparable union goe, + Since separation + Falls not on such things as are infinite, + Nor things which are but one, can disunite. + You'are twice inseparable, great, and one. + +In this it will be seen that the clause 'Since separation ... can +disunite' is attached to the _previous_ verb. It gives the reason +why they should 'go to an unseparable union'. In that which I have +adopted, which is that of several good MSS., the clause 'Since +separation ... can disunite' goes with what _follows_, explains 'You +are twice inseparable, great, and one.' This is obviously right. My +attention was first called to this emendation by the punctuation of +the Grolier Club editor, who changes the comma after 'goe' (l. 46) to +a semicolon. + +l. 46. _To an unseparable union growe._ I have adopted 'growe' from +the MSS. in place of 'goe' from the editions. The former are unanimous +with the strange exception of _Lec_. This MS., which in several +respects seems to be most like that from which _1633_ was printed, +varies here from its fellows _D_ and _H49_, probably for the same +reason that the editor of _1633_ did, because he did not quite +understand the phrase 'growe to' as used here, and 'goe' follows +later. But it is unlikely that 'goe' would have been changed to +'growe', and + + To an unseparable union growe + +is, I think, preferable, because (1) both the words used in l. 44 are +thus echoed. + + _Meeting_ Another, _growes_ the same, + So _meet_ thy Fredericke, and so + To an unseparable union _growe_. + +(2) 'To an unseparable union growe', meaning 'Become inseparably +incorporated with one another', is a slightly violent but not +unnatural application of the phrase 'grow to' so common in Elizabethan +English: + +'I grow to you, and our parting is a tortured body.' _All's Well that +Ends Well_, II. i. 36. + + First let our eyes be rivited quite through + Our turning brains, and both our lips grow to. + Donne, _Elegie XII_, 57-8. + +l. 56. The 'or' of the MSS. must, I think, be right. 'O Bishop +Valentine' does not make good sense. Chambers's ingenious emendation +of _1669_, by which he connects 'of Bishop Valentine' with 'one way +left', lacks support. Bishop Valentine has paired them; the Bishop in +church has united them; the consummation is their own act. + + +PAGE =131=. ECCLOGUE. 1613. _December_ 26, &c. + +It is unnecessary to detail all the ugly history of this notorious +marriage. See Gardiner, _History of England_, ii. 16 and 20. Frances +Howard, daughter of Thomas Howard, the first Earl of Suffolk, was +married in 1606 to the youthful Earl of Essex, the later Parliamentary +general. In 1613, after a prolonged suit she was granted a divorce, +or a decree of nullity, and was at once married to King James's ruling +favourite, Robert Carr, created Viscount Rochester in 1611, and +Earl of Somerset in 1613. Donne, like every one else, had sought +assiduously to win the favour of the all-powerful favourite. Mr. Gosse +was in error in attributing to him a report on 'the proceedings in the +nullity of the marriage of Essex and Lady Frances Howard' (Harl. MS. +39, f. 416), which was the work of his namesake, Sir Daniell Dunn. +None the less, Donne's own letters show that he was quite willing to +lend a hand in promoting the divorce; and that before the decree was +granted he was already busy polishing his epithalamium. One of these +letters is addressed to Sir Robert Ker, afterwards Earl of Ancrum, a +friend of Donne's and a protégé of Somerset's. It seems to me probable +that Sir Robert Ker is the 'Allophanes' of the Induction. Donne is +of course 'Idios', the private man, who holds no place at Court. +'Allophanes' is one who seems like another, who bears the same name as +another, i.e. the bridegroom. The name of both Sir Robert and the Earl +of Somerset was Robert Ker or Carr. + +PAGE =132=, l. 34. _in darke plotts._ Here the reading of _1635_, +'plotts,' has the support of all the MSS., and the 'places' of _1633_, +to which _1669_ returns, is probably an emendation accidental or +intentional of the editor or printer. It disturbs the metre. The word +'plot' of a piece of ground was, and is, not infrequent, and here its +meaning is only a little extended. In the _Progresse of the Soule_, l. +129, Donne speaks of 'a darke and foggie plot'. + +_fire without light._ Compare: 'Fool, saies Christ, this night they +will fetch away thy soul; but he neither tells him, who they be that +shall fetch it, nor whither they shall carry it; he hath no light but +lightnings; a sodain flash of horror first, and then he goes into fire +without light.' _Sermons_ 26. 19. 273. 'This dark fire, which was not +prepared for us.' Ibid. + +l. 57. _In the East-Indian fleet._ The MSS. here give us back a word +which _1633_ had dropped, the other editions following suit. It was +the East-Indian fleet which brought spices, the West-Indian brought +'plate', i.e. gold or (more properly) silver, to which there is no +reference here. + +l. 58. _or Amber in thy taste?_ 'Amber' is here of course 'Ambergris', +which was much used in old cookery, in which considerable importance +was attached to scent as well as flavour. Compare: + + beasts of chase, or foul of game, + In pastry built, or from the spit, or boil'd, + Gris-amber steam'd; + Milton, _Paradise Regained_, ii. 344. + +and + + Be sure + The wines be lusty, high, and full of spirit, + And amber'd all. + Beaumont and Fletcher, _The Custom of the Country_, iii. 2. + +This was the original meaning of the word 'amber', which was extended +to the yellow fossil resin through some mistaken identification of +the two substances. Mr. Gosse has called my attention to some passages +which seem to indicate that the other amber was also eaten. Tallemant +des Réaux says of the Marquise de Rambouillet, 'Elle bransle un peu la +teste, et cela lui vient d'avoir trop mangé d'ambre autrefois.' +This may be ambergris; but Olivier de Serres, in his _Théâtre +d'Agriculture_ (1600), speaks of persons who had formed a taste for +drinking 'de l'ambre jaune subtilement pulvérisé'. + +PAGE =134=, ll. 85-6. _Thou hast no such; yet here was this, and more, + An earnest lover, wise then, and before._ + +This is the reading of _1633_ and gives, I think, Donne's meaning. +Missing this, later editions placed a full stop after 'more', so that +each line concludes a sentence. Mr. Chambers emends by changing the +full stop after 'before' into a comma, and reading: + + Thou hast no such; yet here was this and more. + An earnest lover, wise then, and before, + Our little Cupid hath sued livery. + +This looks ingenious, but I confess I do not know what it means. When +was Cupid wise? When had he been so before? And with what special +propriety is Cupid here called 'an earnest lover'? What Donne says is: +'Here _was_ all this,--a court such as I have described, and more--an +earnest lover (viz. the Earl of Somerset), wise in love (when most +men are foolish), and wise before, as is approved by the King's +confidence. In being admitted to that breast Cupid has ceased to be a +child, has attained his majority, and the right to administer his own +affairs.' Compare: '_I love them that love me, &c._... The Person that +professes love in this place is Wisdom herself ... so that _sapere et +amare_, to be wise and to love, which perchance never met before nor +since, are met in this text.' _Sermons_ 26. 18, Dec. 14, 1617. + + Then, sweetest Silvia, let's no longer stay; + True love we know, precipitates delay. + Away with doubts, all scruples hence remove; + No man at one time can be wise and love. + Herrick, _To Silvia to Wed_. + +PAGE =135=. I have inserted the title _Epithalamion_ after the +_Ecclogue_ from _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, _O'F_, _S96_, as otherwise the +latter title is extended to the whole poem. This poem is headed in +two different ways in the MSS. In _A18_, _N_, _TC_, the title at the +beginning is: _Eclogue Inducing an Epithalamion at the marriage of the +E. of S._ The proper titles of the two parts are thus given at once, +and no second title is needed later. In the other MSS. the title at +the beginning is _Eclogue. 1613. Decemb. 26._ Later follows the title +_Epithalamion_. As _1633_ follows this fashion at the beginning, it +should have done so throughout. + +PAGE =136=, l. 126. _Since both have both th'enflaming eyes._ This +is the reading of all the MSS. and it explains the fact that +'th'enflaming' is so printed in _1633_. Without the 'both' this +destroys the metre and, accordingly, the later editions read 'the +enflaming'. It was natural to bring 'eye' into the singular and +make 'th'enflaming eye' balance 'the loving heart'. Moreover 'both +th'enflaming eyes' may have puzzled a printer. It is a Donnean device +for emphasis. He has spoken of _her_ flaming eyes, and now that he +identifies the lovers, that identity must be complete. Both the eyes +of both are lit with the same flame, both their hearts kindled at the +same fire. Compare later: 225. 'One fire of foure inflaming eyes,' &c. + +l. 129. _Yet let_ _A23_, _O'F_. The first of these MSS. is an early +copy of the poem. 'Yet' improves both the sense and the metre. It +would be easily dropped from its likeness to 'let' suggesting a +duplication of that word. + +PAGE =137=, l. 150. _Who can the Sun in water see._ The Grolier Club +edition alters the full stop here to a semicolon; and Chambers quotes +the reading of _A18_, _N_, _TC_, 'winter' for 'water', as worth +noting. Both the change and the suggestion imply some misapprehension +of the reference of these lines, which is to the preceding verse: + + For our ease, give thine eyes th'unusual part + Of joy, a Teare. + +The opening of a stanza with two lines which in thought belong to the +previous one is not unprecedented in Donne's poems. Compare the sixth +stanza of _A Valediction: of my name in the window_, and note. + +Dryden has borrowed this image--like many another of Donne's: + + Muse down again precipitate thy flight; + For how can mortal eyes sustain immortal light? + But as the sun in water we can bear, + Yet not the sun, but his reflection there, + So let us view her here in what she was, + And take her image in this watery glass. + _Eleonora_, ll. 134-9. + +l. 156. _as their spheares are._ The crystalline sphere in which each +planet is fixed. + +PAGE =138=, ll. 171-81. _The Benediction._ The accurate punctuation +of Donne's poetry is not an easy matter. In the 1633 edition the last +five lines of this stanza have no stronger stop than a comma. This may +be quite right, but it leaves ambiguous what is the exact force and +what the connexion of the line-- + + Nature and grace doe all, and nothing Art. + +The editions of 1635-69, by placing a full stop after 'give' (l. 178), +connect 'Nature and grace' with what follows, and Chambers and the +Grolier Club editor have accepted this, though they place a semicolon +after 'Art'. It seems to me that the line must go with what precedes. +The force of 'may' is carried on to 'doe all': + + may here, to the worlds end, live + Heires from this King, to take thanks, you, to give, + Nature and grace doe all and nothing Art. + +'May there always be heirs of James to receive thanks, of you two to +give; and may this mutual relation owe everything to nature and grace, +the goodness of your descendants, the grace of the king, nothing to +art, to policy and flattery.' That is the only meaning I can give to +the line. The only change in _1633_ is that of a comma to a full stop, +a big change in value, a small one typographically. + +PAGE =139=, l. 200. _they doe not set so too_; I have changed the full +stop after 'too' to a semicolon, as the 'Therefore thou maist' which +follows is an immediate inference from these two lines. 'You rose at +the same hour this morning, but you (the bride) must go first to bed.' + +ll. 204-5. _As he that sees, &c._ 'I have sometimes wondered in the +reading what was become of those glaring colours which amazed me in +_Bussy D'Ambois_ upon the theatre; but when I had taken up what I +supposed a fallen star, I found I had been cozened with a jelly; +nothing but a cold, dull mass, which glittered no longer than it was +a-shooting.' Dryden, _The Spanish Friar_. In another place Dryden uses +the figure in a more poetic or at least ambitious fashion: + + The tapers of the gods, + The sun and moon, run down like waxen globes; + The shooting stars end all in purple jellies, + And chaos is at hand. + _Oedipus_, II. i. + +The idea was a common one, but I have no doubt that Dryden owed his +use of it as an image to Donne. There is no poet from whom he pilfers +'wit' more freely. + +PAGE =140=, ll. 215-16. _Now, as in Tullias tombe_, i.e. Cicero's +daughter. 'According to a ridiculous story, which some of the moderns +report, in the age of Pope Paul III a monument was discovered on the +Appian road with the superscription _Tulliolae filiae meae_; the body +of a woman was found in it, which was reduced to ashes as soon as +touched; there was also a lamp burning, which was extinguished as soon +as the air gained admission there, and which was supposed to have been +lighted above 1500 years.' Lemprière. See Browne, _Vulgar Errors_, +iii. 21. + +PAGE =141=, l. 17. _Help with your presence and devise to praise._ +I have dropped the comma after 'presence' because it suggests to us, +though it did not necessarily do so to seventeenth-century readers, +that 'devise' here is a verb--both Dr. Grosart and Mr. Chambers have +taken it as such--whereas it is the noun 'device' = fancy, invention. +Their fancy and invention is to be shown in the attiring of the bride: + + Conceitedly dresse her, and be assign'd + By you, fit place for every flower and jewell, + Make her for love fit fewell + As gay as Flora, and as rich as Inde. + +'Devise to praise' would be a very awkward construction. + +PAGE =142=, l. 26. _Sonns of these Senators wealths deep oceans._ The +corruption of the text here has arisen in the first place from the +readily explicable confusion of 'sonnes' or 'sonns' as written and +'sonne', the final 's' being the merest flourish and repeatedly +overlooked in copying and printing, while 'sonne' easily becomes +'some', and secondly from a misapprehension of Donne's characteristic +pun. The punctuation of the 1633 edition is supported by almost every +MS. + +The 'frolique Patricians' are of course not the sons of 'these +Senators' by birth. 'I speak not this to yourselves, you Senators +of London,' says Donne in the _Sermon Preached at Pauls Cross ... 26 +Mart. 1616_, 'but as God hath blessed you in your ways, and in your +callings, so put your children into ways and courses too, in which God +may bless them.... The Fathers' former labours shall not excuse their +Sons future idleness.' The sons of wealthy citizens might grow idle +and extravagant; they could not be styled 'Patricians'. It is not +of them that Donne is thinking, but of the young noblemen who are +accompanying their friend on his wedding-day. They are, or are willing +to be, the sons, by marriage not by blood, of 'these Senators', or +rather of their money-bags. In a word, they marry their daughters for +money, as the hero of the _Epithalamion_ is doing. It is fortunate for +the Senators if the young courtiers do not find in their wives as well +as their daughters, like Fastidious Brisk in Jonson's comedy, 'Golden +Mines and furnish'd Treasurie.' But they are 'Sunnes' as well as +Sonnes'--suns which drink up the deep oceans of these Senators' +wealth: + + it rain'd more + Then if the Sunne had drunk the sea before. + _Storme_, 43-4. + +Hence the metaphor 'deep oceans', and hence the appropriateness of the +predicate 'Here shine'. This pun on 'sunne' and 'sonne' is a favourite +with Donne: + + Mad paper stay, and grudge not here to burne + With all those sonnes [sunnes _B_, _S96_] whom my braine did create. + _To Mrs. M. H. H._, p. 216. + + I am thy sonne, made with thyself to shine. + _Holy Sonnets_, II. 5. + + Sweare by thyself, that at my death thy sonne + Shall shine as hee shines now, and heretofore. + + _A Hymn to God the Father._ + +'This day both Gods Sons arose: The Sun of his Firmament, and the Son +of his bosome.' _Sermons_ 80. 26. 255. 'And when thy Sun, thy soule +comes to set in thy death-bed, the Son of Grace shall suck it up into +glory.' Ibid. 80. 45. 450. + +Correctly read the line has a satiric quality which Donne's lines +rarely want, and in which this stanza abounds. I have chosen the +spelling 'Sonns' as that which is most commonly used in the MSS. for +'sonnes' and 'sunnes'. + +PAGE =143=, l. 57. _His steeds nill be restrain'd._ I had adopted +the reading 'nill' for 'will' conjecturally before I found it in _W_. +There can be no doubt it is right. As printed, the two clauses (57-8) +simply contradict each other. The use of 'nill' for 'will' was one +of Spenser's Chaucerisms, and Donne comes closer to Spenser in the +_Epithalamia_ than anywhere else. Sylvester uses it in his translation +of Du Bartas: + + For I nill stiffly argue to and fro + In nice opinions, whether so or so. + +And it occurs in Davison's _Poetical Rhapsody_: + + And therefore nill I boast of war. + +In Shakespeare, setting aside the phrase 'nill he, will he', we have: + + in scorn or friendship, nill I construe whether. + + ll. 81-2. _Till now thou wast but able + To be what now thou art_; + +She has realized her potentiality; she is now actually what hitherto +she has been only [Greek: en dynamei], therefore she 'puts on +perfection'. 'Praeterea secundum Philosophum ... _qualibet potentiâ +melior est eius actus_; nam forma est melior quam materia, et actio +quam potentia activa: est enim finis eius.' Aquinas, _Summa_, xxv. i. +See also Aristotle, _Met._ 1050 _a_ 2-16. This metaphysical doctrine +is not contradicted by the religious exaltation of virginity, for it +is not virginity as such which is preferred to marriage by the Church, +but the virgin's dedication of herself to God: 'Virginitas inde +honorata, quia Deo dicata.... Virgines ideo laudatae, quia Deo +dicatae. Nec nos hoc in virginibus praedicamus, quod virgines sunt; +sed quod Deo dicatae piâ continentiâ virgines. Nam, quod non temere +dixerim, felicior mihi videtur nupta mulier quam virgo nuptura: habet +enim iam illa quod ista adhuc cupit.... Illa uni studet placere cui +data est: haec multis, incerta cui danda est,' &c.; August. _De Sanct. +Virg._ I. x, xi. Compare Aquinas, _Summa_ II. 2, Quaest. clii. 3. +Wedded to Christ the virgin puts on a higher perfection. + + + + +SATYRES. + +The earliest date assignable to any of the _Satyres_ is 1593, or more +probably 1594-5. On the back of the Harleian MS. 5110 (_H51_), in the +British Museum, is inscribed:[1] + + Jhon Dunne his Satires + Anno Domini 1593 + +The handwriting is not identical with that in which the poems are +transcribed, and it is impossible to say either when the poems were +copied or when the title and date were affixed. One may not build too +absolutely on its accuracy; but there are in the three first _Satires_ +(which alone the MS. contains) some indications that point to 1593-5 +as the probable date. Mr. Chambers notes the reference in 1., 80, 'the +wise politic horse,' to Banks' performing horse, and says: 'A large +collection of them' (i.e. allusions to the horse) 'will be found in +Mr. Halliwell-Phillips's Memoranda on _Love's Labour's Lost_. Only one +of these allusions is, however, earlier than 1593. It is in 1591, and +refers not to an exhibition in London, but in the provinces, and not +to Morocco, which was a bay, but to a white horse. It is probable, +therefore, that by 1591 Banks had not yet come to London, and if so +the date 1593 on the Harl. MS. 5110 of Donne's _Satires_ cannot be far +from that of their composition.' But this is not the only allusion. +The same lines run on: + + Or thou O Elephant or Ape wilt doe. + +This has been passed by commentators as a quite general reference; but +the Ape and Elephant seem to have been animals actually performing, +or exhibited, in London about 1594. Thus in _Every Man out of his +Humour_, acted in 1599, Carlo Buffone says (IV. 6): ''S heart he keeps +more ado with this monster' (i.e. Sogliardo's dog) 'than ever Banks +did with his horse, or the fellow with the elephant.' Further, all +three are mentioned in the _Epigrams_ of Sir John Davies, e.g.: + +In Dacum. + + Amongst the poets Dacus numbered is + Yet could he never make an English rime; + But some prose speeches I have heard of his, + Which have been spoken many an hundred time: + The man that keepes the Elephant hath one, + Wherein he tells the wonders of the beast: + Another Bankes pronounced long agon, + When he his curtailes qualities exprest: + Hee first taught him that keepes the monuments + At Westminster his formall tale to say: + And also him which Puppets represents, + And also him that w^{th} the Ape doth play: + Though all his poetry be like to this, + Amongst the poets Dacus numbred is. + +And again: + +In Titum + + Titus the brave and valorous young gallant + Three years together in the town hath beene, + Yet my Lo. Chancellors tombe he hath not seene, + Nor the new water-worke, nor the Elephant. + I cannot tell the cause without a smile: + Hee hath been in the Counter all the while. + +Colonel Cunningham has pointed out another reference in Basse's +_Metamorphosis of the Walnut Tree_ (1645), where he tells how 'in our +youth we saw the Elephant'. Grosart's suggestion that the Elephant was +an Inn is absurd. + +Davies' _Epigrams_ were first published along with Marlowe's version +of Ovid's _Elegies_, but no date is affixed to any of the three +editions which followed one another. But a MS. in the Bodleian +which contains forty-five of the Epigrams describes them as _English +Epigrammes much like Buckminsters Almanacke servinge for all England +but especially for the meridian of the honourable cittye of London +calculated by John Davies of Grayes Inne gentleman An^o 1594 in +November_.[2] This seems much too exact to be a pure invention, and +if it be correct it is very unlikely that the allusions would be to +ancient history. Banks' Horse, the performing Ape, and the Elephant +were all among the sights of the day, like the recently erected tomb +of Lord Chancellor Hatton, who died in 1591. The atmosphere of the +first _Satyre_, as of Davies' _Epigrams_, is that of 1593-5. +The phrase 'the Infanta of London, Heire to an India', in which +commentators have found needless difficulty, contains possibly, +besides its obvious meaning, an allusion to the fact that since 1587 +the Infanta of Spain had become in official Catholic circles heir to +the English throne. In 1594 Parsons' tract, _A Conference about the +next Succession to the Crown of England. By R. Doleman_, defended her +claim, and made the Infanta's name a byword in England. + +If _H51_ is thus approximately right in its dating of the first Satire +it may be the better trusted as regards the other two, and there is at +least nothing in them to make this date impossible. The references to +poetry in the second acquire a more vivid interest when their date or +approximate date is remembered. In 1593 died Marlowe, the greatest of +the brilliant group that reformed the stage, giving + + ideot actors means + (Starving 'themselves') to live by 'their' labour'd sceanes; + +and Shakespeare was one of the 'ideot actors'. Shakespeare, too, was +one of the many sonneteers who 'would move Love by rithmes', and in +1593 and 1594 he appeared among those 'who write to Lords, rewards to +get'. + +It would be interesting if we could identify the lawyer-poet, Coscus, +referred to in this Satire. Malone, in a MS. note to his copy of +_1633_ (now in the Bodleian Library), suggested John Hoskins or +Sir Richard Martin. Grosart conjectured that Donne had in view the +_Gullinge Sonnets_ preserved in the Farmer-Chetham MS., and ascribed +with probability to Sir John Davies, the poet of the _Epigrams_ +just mentioned. Chambers seems to lean to this view and says, 'these +sonnets are couched in legal terminology.' Donne is supposed to have +mistaken Davies' 'gulling' for serious poetry. This is very unlikely. +Moreover, only the last two of Davies' sonnets are 'couched in legal +terminology': + + My case is this, I love Zepheria bright, + Of her I hold my harte by fealty: + +and + + To Love my lord I doe knights service owe + And therefore nowe he hath my wit in ward. + +Nor, although Davies' style parodies the style of the sonneteers (not +of the anonymous _Zepheria_ only), is it particularly harsh. It is +much more probable that Donne, like Davies, has chiefly in view this +anonymous series of sonnets--_Zepheria_. _Ogni dì viene la sera. Mysus +et Haemonia juvenis qui cuspide vulnus senserat, hac ipsa cuspide +sensit opem. At London: Printed by the Widow Orwin, for N. L. +and John Busby._ 1594. The style of _Zepheria_ exactly fits Donne's +description: + + words, words which would teare + The tender labyrinth of a soft maids eare. + +'The verbs "imparadize", "portionize", "thesaurize", are some of +the fruits of his ingenuity. He claims that his Muse is capable +of "hyperbolised trajections"; he apostrophizes his lady's eyes as +"illuminating lamps" and calls his pen his "heart's solicitor".' +Sidney Lee, _Elizabethan Sonnets_. The following sonnet from the +series illustrates the use of legal terminology which both Davies and +Donne satirize: + +Canzon 20. + + How often hath my pen (mine heart's Solicitor) + Instructed thee in Breviat of my case! + While Fancy-pleading eyes (thy beauty's visitor) + Have pattern'd to my quill, an angel's face. + How have my Sonnets (faithful Counsellors) + Thee without ceasing moved for Day of Hearing! + While they, my Plaintive Cause (my faith's Revealers!), + Thy long delay, my patience, in thine ear ring. + How have I stood at bar of thine own conscience + When in Requesting Court my suit I brought! + How have the long adjournments slowed the sentence + Which I (through much expense of tears) besought! + Through many difficulties have I run, + Ah sooner wert thou lost, I wis, than won. + +We do not know who the author of _Zepheria_ was, so cannot tell how +far Donne is portraying an individual in what follows. It can hardly +be Hoskins or Martin, unless _Zepheria_ itself was intended to be +a burlesque, which is possible. Quite possibly Donne has taken the +author of _Zepheria_ simply as a type of the young lawyer who writes +bad poetry; and in the rest of the poem portrays the same type when +he has abandoned poetry and devoted himself to 'Law practice for +mere gain', extorting money and lands from Catholics or suspected +Catholics, and drawing cozening conveyances. If _Zepheria_ be the +poems referred to, then 1594-5 would be the date of this Satire. + +The third _Satyre_ has no datable references, but its tone reflects +the years in which Donne was loosening himself from the Catholic +Church but had not yet conformed, the years between 1593 and 1599, +and probably the earlier rather than the later of these years. On the +whole 1593 is a little too early a date for these three satires. They +were probably written between 1594 and 1597. + +The long fourth _Satyre_ is in the Hawthornden MS. (_HN_) headed +_Sat. 4. anno 1594_. But this is a mistake either of Drummond, who +transcribed the poems probably as late as 1610, or of Donne himself, +whose tendency was to push these early effusions far back in his life. +The reference to 'the losse of Amyens' (l. 114) shows that the poem +must have been written after March 1597, probably between that date +and September, when Amiens was re-taken by Henry IV. These lines _may_ +be an insertion, but there is no extant copy of the _Satyre_ without +them. It belongs to the period between the 'Calis-journey' and the +'Island-voyage', when first Donne is likely to have appeared at court +in the train of Essex. + +The fifth _Satyre_ is referred by Grosart and Chambers to 1602-3 on +the ground that the phrase 'the great Carricks pepper' is a reference +to the expedition sent out by the East India Company under Captain +James Lancaster to procure pepper, the price of which commodity was +excessively high. Lancaster captured a Portuguese Carrick and sent +home pepper and spice. There is no proof, however, that this ship was +ever known as 'the Carrick' or 'the great Carrick'. That phrase _was_ +applied to 'that prodigious great carack called the _Madre de Dios_ or +_Mother of God_, one of the greatest burden belonging to the crown of +Portugal', which was captured by Raleigh's expedition and brought to +Dartmouth in 1592. 'This prize was reckoned the greatest and richest +that had ever been brought into England' and 'daily drew vast numbers +of spectators from all parts to admire at the hugeness of it' (Oldys, +_Life of Raleigh_, 1829, pp. 154-7). Strype states that she 'was seven +decks high, 165 foot long, and manned with 600 men' (_Annals_, iv. +177-82). That pepper formed a large part of the Carrick's cargo is +clear from the following order issued by the Privy Council: _A letter +to Sir Francis Drake, William Killigrewe, Richard Carmarden and Thomas +Midleton Commissioners appointed for the Carrique_. 'Wee have received +your letter of the 23^{rd} of this presente of your proceeding in +lading of other convenient barkes with the pepper out of the Carrique, +and your opinion concerning the same, for answere whereunto we do +thinke it meete, and so require you to take order, so soone as the +goods are quite dischardged, that Sir Martin Frobisher be appointed to +have the charge and conduction of those shippes laden with the pepper +and other commodities out of the Carrique to be brought about to +Chatham.' 27 Octobris, 1592. See also under October 1. The reference +in 'the great Carricks pepper' is thus clear. The words 'You Sir, +whose righteousness she loves', &c., ll. 31-3, show that the poem was +written after Donne had entered Sir Thomas Egerton's service, +i.e. between 1598, if not earlier, and February 1601-2 when he was +dismissed, which makes the date suggested by Grosart and Chambers +(1602-3) impossible. The poem was probably written in 1598-9. There is +a note of enthusiasm in these lines as of one who has just entered +on a service of which he is proud, and the occasion of the poem was +probably Egerton's endeavour to curtail the fees claim'd by the Clerk +of the Star Chamber (see note below). With Essex's return from +Ireland in 1599 began a period of trouble and anxiety for Egerton, and +probably for Donne too. The more sombre cast of his thought, and +the modification in his feelings towards Elizabeth, after the fatal +February of 1600-1, are reflected in the satirical fragment _The +Progresse of the Soule_. + +The so-called sixth and seventh _Satyres_ (added in 1635 and 1669) +I have relegated to the _Appendix B_, and have given elsewhere my +reasons for assigning them to Sir John Roe. That Donne wrote only five +regular _Satyres_ is very definitely stated by Drummond of Hawthornden +in a note prefixed to the copy of the fourth in _HN_: 'This Satyre +(though it heere have the first place because no more was intended +to this booke) was indeed the authors fourth in number and order +he having written five in all to using which this caution will +sufficientlie direct in the rest.' + + + [Footnote 1: Attention was first called to this inscription by + J. Payne Collier in his _Poetical Decameron_ (1820). He uses + the date to vindicate the claim for Donne's priority as a + satirist to Hall. 'Dunne' is of course one of the many ways + in which the poet's name is spelt, and 'Jhon' is a spelling + of 'John'. The poet's own signature is generally 'Jo. Donne.' + 'Jhon Don' is Drummond's spelling on the title-page of _HN_. + In _Q_ the first page is headed 'M^r John Dunnes Satires'.] + + + [Footnote 2: Of the forty-five which the MS. contains, some + thirty-three were published in the edition referred to above. + On the other hand the edition contains some which are not + in the MS. Of these, one, 47, 'Meditations of a gull,' alone + refers to events which are certainly later than 1594. As this + is not in the MS. there is nothing to contradict the assertion + that it (and the Epigrams cited above) belong to 1594. + Davies' Epigrams are referred to in Sir John Harrington's + _Metamorphosis of Ajax_, 1596.] + + +PAGE =145=. SATYRE I. + +This _Satyre_ is pretty closely imitated in the _Satyra Quinta_ of +_SKIALETHEIA. or, A shadowe of Truth in certaine Epigrams and Satyres. +1598_. attributed to Edward Guilpin (or Gilpin), to whom extracts from +it are assigned in _Englands Parnassus_ (1600). Who Guilpin was we +do not know. Besides the work named he wrote two sonnets prefixed to +Gervase Markham's _Devoreux. Vertues tears for the losse of the most +Christian King Henry, third of that name; and the untimely death of +the most noble and heroical Gentleman, Walter Devoreux, who was slain +before Roan in France. First written in French by the most excellent +and learned Gentlewoman, Madame Geneuefe Petan Maulette. And +paraphrastically translated into English by Jervis Markham._ 1597. See +Grosart's Introduction to his reprint of _Skialetheia_ in _Occasional +Issues_. 6. (1878). Donne addresses a letter to _Mr. E. G._ (p. 208), +which Gosse conjectures to be addressed to Guilpin. That Guilpin +knew Donne is probable in view of this early imitation of a privately +circulated MS. poem. Guilpin's poem begins: + + Let me alone I prethee in thys Cell, + Entice me not into the Citties hell; + Tempt me not forth this _Eden_ of content, + To tast of that which I shall soone repent: + Prethy excuse me, I am hot alone + Accompanied with meditation, + And calme content, whose tast more pleaseth me + Then all the Citties lushious vanity. + I had rather be encoffin'd in this chest + Amongst these bookes and papers I protest, + Then free-booting abroad purchase offence, + And scandale my calme thoughts with discontents. + Heere I converse with those diviner spirits, + Whose knowledge, and admire, the world inherits: + Heere doth the famous profound _Stagarite_, + With Natures mistick harmony delight + My ravish'd contemplation: I heere see + The now-old worlds youth in an history: + +l. 1. _Away thou fondling, &c._ The reading of the majority of +editions and MSS. is 'changeling', but this is a case not of a right +and wrong reading but of two versions, both ascribable to the author. +Which was his emendation it is impossible to say. He may have changed +'fondling' (a 'fond' or foolish person) thinking that the idea was +conveyed by 'motley', which, like Shakespeare's epithet 'patch', is a +synecdoche from the dress of the professional fool or jester. On the +other hand the idea of 'changeling' is repeated in 'humorist', which +suggests changeable and fanciful. I have, therefore, let the _1633_ +text stand. 'Changeling' has of course the meaning here of 'a fickle +or inconstant person', not the common sense of a person or thing +or child substituted for another, as 'fondling' is not here a 'pet, +favourite', as in modern usage. + +l. 3. _Consorted._ Grosart, who professes to print from _H51_, reads +_Consoled_, without any authority. + +l. 6. _Natures Secretary_: i.e. Aristotle. He is always 'the +Philosopher' in Aquinas and the other schoolmen. Walton speaks of 'the +great secretary of nature and all learning, Sir Francis Bacon'. + +l. 7. _jolly Statesmen._ All the MSS. except _O'F_ agree with _1633_ +in reading 'jolly', though 'wily' is an obvious emendation. +Chambers adopts it. By 'jolly' Donne probably meant 'overweeningly +self-confident ... full of presumptuous pride ... arrogant, +over-bearing' (O.E.D.). 'Evilmerodach, a jolly man, without Iustyse +and cruel.' Caxton (1474). 'It concerneth every one of us ... not +to be too high-minded or jolly for anything that is past.' Sanderson +(1648). + +l. 10. _Giddie fantastique Poets of each land._ In a letter Donne +tells Buckingham, in Spain, how his own library is filled with Spanish +books 'from the mistress of my youth, Poetry, to the wife of mine age, +Divinity'. This line in the Satires points to the fact, which Donne +was probably tempted later to obscure a little, that his first +prolonged visit to the Continent had been made before he settled in +London in 1592 and probably without the permission of the Government. +The other than Spanish poets would doubtless be French and Italian. +Donne had read Dante. He refers to him in the fourth _Satyre_ ('who +dreamt he saw hell'), and in an unpublished letter in the Burley MS. +he dilates at some length, but in no very creditable fashion, on an +episode in the _Divina Commedia_. Of French poets he probably knew at +any rate Du Bartas and Regnier. + +l. 12. _And follow headlong, wild uncertain thee?_ I have retained the +_1633_ punctuation instead of, with Chambers, comma-ing 'wild' as +well as 'headlong'. The latter is possibly an adverb here, going with +'follow'. The use of 'headlong' as an adjective with persons was not +common. The earliest example in the O.E.D. is from _Hudibras_: + + The Friendly Rug preserv'd the ground, + And headlong Knight from bruise or wound. + +Donne's line is, however, ambiguous; and the subsequent description of +the humorist would justify the adjective. + +l. 18. _Bright parcell gilt, with forty dead mens pay._ Compare: +'Captains some in guilt armour (unbatt'red) some in buffe jerkins, +plated o'r with massy silver lace (raz'd out of the ashes of dead +pay).' Dekker, _Newes from Hell_, ii. 119 (Grosart). So many +'dead pays' (i.e. men no longer on the muster roll) were among the +perquisites allowed to every captain of a company, but the number was +constantly exceeded: 'Moreover where' (i.e. whereas) 'there are 15 +dead paies allowed ordinarily in every bande, which is paid allwaies +and taken by the captaines, althogh theire nombers be greatly +dyminished in soche sorte as sometimes there are not fower score or +fewer in a company, her Majestys pleasure is that from hence the saide +15 dead paies shall not be allowed unlesse the companies be full and +compleate, but after the rate of two dead paies for everie twenty men +that shalbe in the saide bande where the companies are dyminished.' +Letter to Sir John Norreyes, Knighte. _Acts of the Privy Council_, +1592. + +PAGE =146=, l. 27. _Oh monstrous, superstitious puritan._ The +'Monster' of the MSS. is of course _not_ due to the substitution +of the noun for the adjective, but is simply an older form of the +adjective. Compare 'O wonder Vandermast', Greene's _Friar Bacon and +Friar Bungay_. + +l. 32. _raise thy formall_: 'raise' is probably right, but 'vaile' is +a common metaphor. 'A Player? Call him, the lousie slave: what will +he saile by, and not once strike or vaile to a Man of Warre.' Captain +Tucca in Jonson's _Poetaster_, III. 3. + +l. 33. _That wilt consort none, &c._ It is unnecessary to alter +'consort none' to 'consort with none', as some MSS. do. The +construction is quite regular. 'Wilt thou consort me, bear me +company?' Heywood. The 'consorted with these few books' of l. 3 +is classed by the O.E.D. under a slightly different sense of the +word--not 'attended on by' these books, but 'associated in a common +lot with' them. + +l. 39. _The nakednesse and barenesse, &c._ The reading 'barrennesse' +of all the editions and some MSS. is due probably to similarity of +pronunciation (rather than of spelling) and a superficial suggestion +of appropriateness to the context. A second glance shows that +'bareness' is the correct reading. The MSS. give frequent evidence of +having been written to dictation. + +l. 46. The 'yet', which the later editions and Chambers drop, is quite +in Donne's style. It is heavily stressed and 'he was' is slurred, 'h' +was.' + +PAGE =147=, l. 58. _The Infanta of London, Heire to an India._ It is +not necessary to suppose a reference to any person in particular. +The allusion is in the first place to the wealth of the city, and the +greed of patricians and courtiers to profit by that wealth. 'No one +can tell who, amid the host of greedy and expectant suitors, will +carry off whoever is at present the wealthiest minor (and probably the +king's ward) in London, i.e. the City.' Compare the _Epithalamion made +at Lincolns Inn_: + + Daughters of London, you which be + Our Golden Mines, and furnish'd Treasury, + You which are Angels, yet still bring with you + Thousands of Angels on your marriage days + . . . . . . . . + Make her for Love fit fuel, + As gay as Flora, and as rich as Inde. + +Compare also: 'I possess as much in your wish, Sir, as if I were made +Lord of the Indies.' Jonson, _Every Man out of his Humour_, II. iii. + +The 'Infanta' of _A25_, _O'F_, _Q_ is pretty certainly right, though +'Infant' can be applied, like 'Prince', to a woman. There is probably +a second allusion to the claim of the Infanta of Spain to be heir to +the English throne. + +l. 60. _heavens Scheme_: 'Scheme' is certainly the right reading. The +common MS. spelling, 'sceame' or 'sceames', explains the 'sceanes' +which _1633_ has derived from _N_, _TCD_. For the _Satyres_ the editor +did not use his best MS. See _Text and Canon, &c._, p. xcv. It is +possible that a slurred definite article ('th'heavens') has been lost. + +In preparing his 'theme' or horoscope the astrologer had five +principal things to consider, (1) the heavenly mansions, (2) the signs +of the zodiac, (3) the planets, (4) the aspects and configurations, +(5) the fixed stars. With this end in view the astrologer divided the +heavens into twelve parts, called mansions, to which he related the +positions occupied at the same moment by the stars in each of them +('drawing the horoscope'). There were several methods of doing this. +That of Ptolemy consisted in dividing the zodiac into twelve equal +parts. This was called the equal manner. To represent the mansions the +astrologers constructed twelve triangles between two squares placed +one within the other. Each of the twelve mansions thus formed had +a different name, and determined different aspects of the life and +fortune of the subject of the horoscope. From the first was foretold +the general character of his life, his health, his habits, morals. +The second indicated his wealth; and so on. The different signs of +the zodiac and the planets, in like manner, had each its special +influence. But sufficient has been said to indicate what Donne means +by 'drawing forth Heavens scheme'. + +l. 62. _subtile-witted._ There is something to be said for the +'supple-witted' of _H51_ and some other MSS. 'Subtle-witted' means +'fantastic, ingenious'; 'supple-witted' means 'variable'. Like +Fastidious Brisk in _Every Man out of his Humour_, they have a fresh +fashion in suits every day. 'When men are willing to prefer their +friends, we heare them often give these testimonies of a man; He +hath good parts, and you need not be ashamed to speak for him; he +understands the world, he knowes how things passe, and he hath a +discreet, a supple, and an appliable disposition, and hee may make a +fit instrument for all your purposes, and you need not be afraid to +speake for him.' _Sermons_ 80. 74. 750. A 'supple disposition' is one +that changes easily to adapt itself to circumstances. + +PAGE =148=, l. 81. _O Elephant or Ape_, See Introductory Note to +_Satyres_. + +l. 89. _I whispered let'us go._ I have, following the example of +_1633_ in other cases, indicated the slurring of 'let'us' or 'let's', +which is necessary metrically if we are to read the full 'whispered' +which _1669_ first contracts to 'whisperd'. _Q_ shows that 'let's' +is the right contraction. Donne's use of colloquial slurrings must be +constantly kept in view when reading especially his satires. They are +not always indicated in the editions: but note l. 52: + + I shut my chamber doore, and come, lets goe. + +PAGE =149=, ll. 100-4. My punctuation of these lines is a slight +modification of that indicated by _W_ and _JC_, which give the proper +division of the speeches. The use of inverted commas would make this +clearer, but Chambers' division seems to me (if I understand it) to +give the whole speech, from 'But to me' to 'So is the Pox', to Donne's +companion, which is to deprive Donne of his closing repartee. The +Grolier Club editor avoids this, but makes 'Why he hath travelled +long?' a part of Donne's speech beginning 'Our dull comedians want +him'. I divide the speeches thus:-- + + _Donne._ Why stoop'st thou so? + + _Companion._ Why? he hath travail'd. + + _Donne._ Long? + + _Companion._ No: but to me (_Donne interpolates_ 'which + understand none') he doth seem to be + Perfect French and Italian. + + _Donne._ So is the Pox. + +The brackets round 'which understand none' I have taken from _Q_. +I had thought of inserting them before I came on this MS. Of course +brackets in old editions are often used where commas would be +sufficient, and one can build nothing on their insertion here in one +MS. But it seems to me that these words have no point unless regarded +as a sarcastic comment interpolated by Donne, perhaps _sotto voce_. +'To you, who understand neither French nor Italian, he may seem +perfect French and Italian--but to no one else.' Probably an eclectic +attire was the only evidence of travel observable in the person in +question. 'How oddly is he suited!' says Portia of her English wooer; +'I think he bought his doublet in Italy, his round hose in France, his +bonnet in Germany, and his behaviour everywhere.' Brackets are thus +used by Jonson to indicate a remark interjected _sotto voce_. See the +quotation from the _Poetaster_ in the note on _The Message_ (II. p. +37). Modern editors substitute for the brackets the direction 'Aside', +which is not in the Folio (1616). + + +PAGE =149=. SATYRE II. + +ll. 1-4. It will be seen that _H51_ gives two alternative versions of +these lines. The version of the printed text is that of the majority +of the MSS. + +PAGE =150=, ll. 15-16. _As in some Organ, &c._ Chambers prints these +lines with a comma after 'move', connecting them with what follows +about love-poetry. Clearly they belong to what has been said about +dramatic poets. It is Marlowe and his fellows who are the bellows +which set the actor-puppets in motion. + +ll. 19-20. _Rammes and slings now, &c._ The 'Rimes and songs' of _P_ +is a quaint variant due either to an accident of hearing or to an +interpretation of the metaphor: 'As in war money is more effective +than rams and slings, so it is more effective in love than songs.' But +there is a further allusion in the condensed stroke, for 'pistolets' +means also 'fire-arms'. Money is as much more effective than poetry in +love as fire-arms are than rams and slings in war. Donne is Dryden's +teacher in the condensed stroke, which 'cleaves to the waist', lines +such as + + They got a villain, and we lost a fool. + +PAGE =151=, l. 33. _to out-sweare the Letanie._ 'Letanie,' the reading +of all the MSS., is indicated by a dash in _1633_ and is omitted +without any indication by _1635-39_. In _1649-50_ the blank was +supplied, probably conjecturally, by 'the gallant'. It was not till +_1669_ that 'Letanie' was inserted. In 'versifying' Donne's _Satyres_ +Pope altered this to 'or Irishmen out-swear', and Warburton in a note +explains the original: 'Dr. Donne's is a low allusion to a licentious +quibble used at that time by the enemies of the English Liturgy, who, +disliking the frequent invocations in the Litanie, called them the +_taking God's name in vain_, which is the Scripture periphrasis for +swearing.' + +l. 36. _tenements._ Drummond in _HN_ writes 'torments', probably a +conjectural emendation. Drummond was not so well versed in Scholastic +Philosophy as Donne. + +l. 44. _But a scarce Poet._ This is the reading of the best MSS., and +I have adopted it in preference to 'But scarce a Poet', which is an +awkward phrase and does not express what the writer means. Donne does +not say that he is barely a poet, but that he is a bad poet. Donne +uses 'scarce' thus as an adjective again in _Satyre IV_, l. 4 (where +see note) and l. 240. It seems to have puzzled copyists and editors, +who amend it in various ways. By 'jollier of this state' he means +'prouder of this state', using the word as in 'jolly statesmen', I. 7. + +l. 48. '_language of the Pleas and Bench._' See Introductory Note for +legal diction in love-sonnets. + + PAGE =152=, ll. 62-3. _but men which chuse + Law practise for meere gaine, bold soule, repute._ + +The unpunctuated 'for meere gaine bold soule repute' of _1633-69_ and +most MSS. has caused considerable trouble to the editors and copyists. +One way out of the difficulty, 'bold souls repute,' appears in +Chambers' edition as an emendation, and before that in Tonson's +edition (1719), whence it was copied by all the editions to Chalmers' +(1810). Lowell's conjecture, 'hold soules repute,' had been anticipated +in some MSS. There is no real difficulty. I had comma'd the words +'bold soule' before I examined _Q_, which places them in brackets, +a common means in old books of indicating an apostrophe. The 'bold +soule' addressed, and invoked to esteem such worthless people +aright, is the 'Sir' (whoever that may be) to whom the whole poem is +addressed. A note in _HN_ prefixed to this poem says that it is taken +from 'C. B.'s copy', i.e. Christopher Brooke's. It is quite possible +that this _Satyre_, like _The Storme_, was addressed to him. + + ll. 71-4. _Like a wedge in a block, wring to the barre, + Bearing-like Asses; and more shamelesse farre, &c._ + +These lines are printed as in _1633_, except that the comma after +'Asses' is raised to a semicolon, and that I have put a hyphen between +'Bearing' and 'like'. The lines are difficult and have greatly puzzled +editors. Grosart prints from _H51_ and reads 'wringd', which, though +an admissible form of the past-participle, makes no sense here. The +Grolier Club editor prints: + + Like a wedge in a block, wring to the bar, + Bearing like asses, and more shameless far + Than carted whores; lie to the grave judge; for ... + +Chambers adopts much the same scheme: + + Like a wedge in a block, wring to the bar, + Bearing like asses, and more shameless far + Than carted whores; lie to the grave judge, for ... + +By retaining the comma after 'bar' in a modernized text with modern +punctuation these editors leave it doubtful whether they do or do not +consider that 'asses' is the object to 'wring'. Further, they connect +'and more shameless far than carted whores' closely with 'asses', +separating it by a semicolon from 'lie to the grave judge'. I take it +that 'more shameless far' is regarded by these editors as a qualifying +adjunct to 'asses'. This is surely wrong. The subject of the +long sentence is 'He' (l. 65), and the infinitives throughout are +complements to 'must': 'He must walk ... he must talk ... [he must] +lie ... [he must] wring to the bar bearing-like asses; [he must], more +shameless than carted whores, lie to the grave judge, &c.' This is the +only method in which I can construe the passage, and it carries with +it the assumption that 'bearing like' should be connected by a hyphen +to form an adjective similar to 'Relique-like', which is the MS. form +of 'Relique-ly' at l. 84. Certainly it is 'he', Coscus, who is 'more +shameless, &c.,' not his victims. These are the 'bearing-like asses', +the patient Catholics or suspected Catholics whom he wrings to the bar +and forces to disgorge fines. Coscus, a poet in his youth, has become +a Topcliffe in his maturer years. 'Bearing,' 'patient' is the regular +epithet for asses in Elizabethan literature: + + Asses are made to bear and so are you. + _Taming of the Shrew_, II. i. 200. + +In Jonson's _Poetaster_, v. i, the ass is declared to be the +hieroglyphic of + + Patience, frugality, and fortitude. + +Possibly, but it is not very likely, Donne refers not only to the +stupid patience of the ass but to her fertility: 'They be very +gainefull and profitable to their maisters, yielding more commodities +than the revenues of good farmers.' Holland's _Pliny_, 8. 43, _Of +Asses_. + +PAGE =153=, l. 87. _In parchments._ The plural is the reading of the +better MSS. and seems to me to give the better sense. The final 's' +is so easily overlooked or confounded with a final 'e' that one must +determine the right reading by the sense of the passage. + +ll. 93-6. _When Luther was profest, &c._ The 'power and glory clause' +which is not found in the Vulgate or any of the old Latin versions +of the New Testament (and is therefore not used in Catholic prayers, +public or private), was taken by Erasmus (1516) from all the Greek +codices, though he does not regard it as genuine. Thence it passed +into Luther's (1521) and most Reformed versions. In his popular and +devotional _Auslegung deutsch des Vaterunsers_ (1519) Luther makes no +reference to it. + +l. 105. _Whereas th'old ... In great hals._ The line as I have printed +it combines the versions of _1633_ and the later editions. It is found +in several MSS. Some of these, on the other hand, like _1633-69_, +read 'where'; but 'where's' with a plural subject following was quite +idiomatic. Compare: 'Here needs no spies nor eunuchs,' p. 81, l. 39; +'With firmer age returns our liberties,' p. 115, l. 77. + +At p. 165, l. 182, the MSS. point to 'cryes his flatterers' as +the original version. See Franz, _Shak.-Gram._ § 672; Knecht, _Die +Kongruenz zwischen Subjekt und Prädikat_ (1911), p. 28. + +Donne has other instances of irregular concord, or of the plural form +in 's', and 'th': + + by thy fathers wrath + By all paines which want and divorcement hath. + P. 111, l. 8. + + Had'st thou staid there, and look'd out at her eyes, + All had ador'd thee that now from thee flies. + P. 285, l. 17. + + Those unlick't beare-whelps, unfil'd pistolets + That (more than Canon shot) availes or lets. + P. 97, l. 32. + +The rhyme makes the form here indisputable. The MSS. point to a more +frequent use of 'hath' with a plural subject than the editions have +preserved. The above three instances seem all plurals. In other cases +the individuals form a whole, or there is ellipsis: + + All Kings, and all their favorites, + All glory of honors, beauties, wits, + The Sunne it selfe which makes times, as they passe, + Is elder by a year, now, then it was. + _The Anniversarie_, p. 24, ll. 1-4. + + He that but tasts, he that devours, + And he that leaves all, doth as well. + _Communitie_, p. 33, ll. 20-1. + +PAGE =154=, l. 107. _meanes blesse_. The reading of _1633_ has the +support of the best MSS. Grosart and Chambers prefer the reading of +the later editions, 'Meane's blest.' This, it would seem to me, needs +the definite article. The other reading gives quite the same sense, +'in all things means (i.e. middle ways, moderate measures) bring +blessings': + + Rectius vives, Licini, neque altum + Semper urgendo neque, dum procellas + Cautus horrescis, nimium premendo + Litus iniquum. + + Auream quisquis mediocritatem + Diligit, tutus caret obsoleti + Sordibus tecti, caret invidenda + Sobrius aula. + Horace, _Odes_, ii. 10. + +The general tenor of the closing lines recalls Horace's treatment of +the same theme in _Sat._ ii. 2. 88, 125, more than either Juvenal, +_Sat._ ix, or Persius, _Sat._ vi. + +Grosart states that 'means, then as now, meant riches, possessions, +but never the mean or middle'. But see O.E.D., which quotes for the +plural in this sense: 'Tempering goodly well Their contrary dislikes +with loved means.' Spenser, _Hymns_. In the singular Bacon has, 'But +to speake in a Meane.' _Of Adversitie_. + + +PAGE =154=. SATYRE III. + +PAGE =155=, l. 19. _leaders rage._ This phrase might tempt one to date +the poem after the Cadiz expedition and Islands voyage, in both of +which 'leaders' rage', i.e. the quarrels of Howard and Essex, and of +Essex and Raleigh, militated against success; but it is too little to +build upon. Donne may mean simply the arbitrary exercise of arbitrary +power on the part of leaders. + +ll. 30-2. _who made thee to stand Sentinell, &c._ 'Souldier' is the +reading of what is perhaps the older version of the _Satyres_. It +would do as well: 'Quare et tibi, Publi, et piis omnibus retinendus +est animus in custodia corporis; nec iniussu eius a quo ille est +vobis datus ex hominum vita migrandum est, ne munus assignatum a Deo +defugisse videamini.' Cicero, _Somnium Scipionis_. + +'Veteres quidem philosophiae principes, Pythagoras et Plotinus, +prohibitionis huius non tam creatores sunt quam praecones, omnino +illicitum esse dicentes _quempiam militiae servientem a praesidio et +commissa sibi statione discedere_ contra ducis vel principis iussum. +Plane eleganti exemplo usi sunt eo quod militia est vita hominis super +terram.' John of Salisbury, _Policrat._ ii. 27. + +Donne considers the rashness of those whom he refers to as a degree +of, an approach to, suicide. To expose ourselves to these perils we +abandon the moral warfare to which we are appointed. In his own work +on suicide ([Greek: BIATHANATOS], &c.) Donne discusses the permissible +approaches to suicide. An unpublished _Problem_ shows his knowledge of +John of Salisbury. + +ll. 33-4. _Know thy foes, &c._ I have followed the better MSS. here +against _1633_ and _L74_, _N_, _TCD_. The dropping of 's' after 'foe' +has probably led to the attempt to regularize the construction by +interjecting 'h'is'. Donne has three foes in view--the devil, the +world, and the flesh. + +l. 35. _quit._ Whether we read 'quit' or 'rid' the construction +is difficult. The phrase seems to mean 'to be free of his whole +Realm'--an unparalleled use of either adjective. + +l. 36. _The worlds all parts._ Here 'all' means 'every', but +Shakespeare would make 'parts' singular: 'All bond and privilege of +nature break,' _Cor._ V. iii. 25. Donne blends two constructions. + +PAGE =156=, l. 49. _Crantz._ I have adopted the spelling of _W_, which +emphasizes the Dutch character of the name. The 'Crates' of _Q_ is +tempting as bringing the name into line with the other classical ones, +but all the other MSS. have an 'n' in the word. Donne has in view +the 'schismatics of Amsterdam' (_The Will_) and their followers. +The change to Grant or Grants shows a tendency in the copyists to +substitute a Scotch for a Dutch name. + +PAGE =157=, ll. 69-71. _But unmoved thou, &c._ As punctuated in the +old editions these lines are certainly ambiguous. The semicolon after +'allow' has a little less value than that of a full stop; that +after 'right' a little more than a comma, or contrariwise. Grosart, +Chambers, and the Grolier Club editor all connect 'and the right' with +what precedes: + + But unmoved thou + Of force must one, and forced but one allow; + And the right. + +So Chambers,--Grosart and the Grolier Club editor place a comma after +'allow'. It seems to me that 'And the right' goes rather with what +follows: + + But unmoved thou + Of force must one, and forced but one allow. + And the right, ask thy father which is she. + +If the first arrangement be right, then 'And' seems awkward. The +second marks two stages in the argument: a stable judgement compels +us to acknowledge religion, and that there can be only one. This being +so, the next question is, Which is the true one? As to that, we cannot +do better than consult our fathers: + + In doubtful questions 'tis the safest way + To learn what unsuspected ancients say; + For 'tis not likely we should higher soar + In search of Heaven than all the Church before; + Nor can we be deceived unless we see + The Scriptures and the Fathers disagree. + Dryden, _Religio Laici_. + +'Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations: +ask thy father, and he will shew thee; thy elders, and they will tell +thee.' Deut. xxxii. 7. + +l. 76. _To adore, or scorne an image, &c._ Compare: 'I should violate +my own arm rather than a Church, nor willingly deface the name of +Saint or Martyr. At the sight of a Cross or Crucifix I can dispense +with my hat, but scarce with the thought or memory of my Saviour: I +cannot laugh at, but rather pity the fruitless journeys of Pilgrims, +or contemn the miserable condition of Friars; for though misplaced +in circumstances, there is something in it of Devotion. I could +never hear the _Ave-Mary_ Bell without an elevation, or think it a +sufficient warrant, because they erred in one circumstance, for me +to err in all, that is in silence and dumb contempt.... At a solemn +Procession I have wept abundantly, while my consorts blind with +opposition and prejudice, have fallen into an excess of scorn and +laughter.' Sir Thomas Browne, _Religio Medici_, sect. 3. Compare also +Donne's letter To Sir H. R. (probably to Goodyere), (_Letters_, +p. 29), 'You know I have never imprisoned the word Religion; not +straightning it Friarly _ad religiones factitias_, (as the Romans +call well their orders of Religion), nor immuring it in a Rome, or +a Geneva; they are all virtual beams of one Sun.... They are not so +contrary as the North and South Poles; and they are connaturall pieces +of one circle. Religion is Christianity, which being too spirituall to +be seen by us, doth therefore take an apparent body of good life and +works, so salvation requires an honest Christian.' + +l. 80. _Cragged and steep._ The three epithets, 'cragged', 'ragged', +and 'rugged', found in the MSS., are all legitimate and appropriate. +The second has the support of the best MSS. and is used by Donne +elsewhere: 'He shall shine upon thee in all dark wayes, and rectifie +thee in all ragged ways.' _Sermons_ 80. 52. 526. Shakespeare uses it +repeatedly: 'A ragged, fearful, hanging rock,' _Gent. of Ver._ I. +ii. 121; 'My ragged prison walls,' _Rich. II_, V. v. 21; and +metaphorically, 'Winter's ragged hand,' _Sonn._ VI. i. + +ll. 85-7. _To will implyes delay, &c._ I have changed the 'to' of +_1633_ to 'too'. It is a mere change of spelling and has the support +of both _H51_ and _W_. Grosart and Chambers take it as the preposition +following the noun it governs, 'hard knowledge to'--an unexampled +construction in the case of a monosyllabic preposition. Franz +(_Shak.-Gram._ § 544) gives cases of inversion for metrical purposes, +but only with 'mehrsilbigen Präpositionen', e.g. 'For fear lest day +should look their shapes upon.' _Mid. N. Dream_, III. ii. 385. + +Grosart, the Grolier Club editor, and Chambers have all, I think, been +misled by the accidental omission in _1633_ of the full stop or colon +after 'doe', l. 85. Chambers prints: + + To will implies delay, therefore now do + Hard deeds, the body's pains; hard knowledge to + The mind's endeavours reach. + +The Grolier Club version is: + + To will implies delay, therefore now do + Hard deeds, the body's pains; hard knowledge too + The mind's endeavours reach. + +The latter is the better version, but in each 'the body's pains' is a +strange apposition to 'deeds' taken as object to 'do'. We do not 'do +pains'. The second clause also has no obvious relation to the first +which would justify the 'too'. If we close the first sentence at +'doe', we get both better sense and a better balance: 'Act _now_, for +the night cometh. Hard deeds are achieved by the body's pains (i.e. +toil, effort), and hard knowledge is attained by the mind's efforts.' +The order of the words, and the condensed force given to 'reach' +produce a somewhat harsh effect, but not more so than is usual in the +_Satyres_, and less so than the alternative versions of the editors. +The following lines continue the thought quite naturally: 'No +endeavours of the mind will enable us to _comprehend_ mysteries, but +all eyes can _apprehend_ them, dazzle as they may.' Compare: 'In all +Philosophy there is not so darke a thing as light; As the sunne which +is _fons lucis naturalis_, the beginning of naturall light, is the +most evident thing to be seen, and yet the hardest to be looked upon, +so is naturall light to our reason and understanding. Nothing clearer, +for it is _clearnesse_ it selfe, nothing darker, it is enwrapped in so +many scruples. Nothing nearer, for it is round about us, nothing more +remote, for wee know neither entrance, nor limits of it. Nothing +more _easie_, for a child discerns it, nothing more _hard_ for no man +understands it. It is apprehensible by _sense_, and not comprehensible +by _reason_. If wee winke, wee cannot chuse but see it, if wee stare, +wee know it never the better.' _Sermons_ 50. 36. 324. + +PAGE =158=, ll. 96-7. _a Philip, or a Gregory, &c._ Grosart and Norton +conjecture that by Philip is meant Melanchthon, and for 'Gregory' +Norton conjectures Gregory VII; Grosart either Gregory the Great or +Gregory of Nazianzus. But surely Philip of Spain is balanced against +Harry of England, one defender of the faith against another, as +Gregory against Luther. What Gregory is meant we cannot say, +but probably Donne had in view Gregory XIII or Gregory XIV, +post-Reformation Popes, rather than either of those mentioned above. +Satire does not deal in Ancient History. The choice is between +Catholic and Protestant Princes and Popes. + + +PAGE =158=. SATYRE IIII. + +This satire, like several of the period, is based on Horace's _Ibam +forte via Sacra_ (_Sat._ i. 9), but Donne follows a quite independent +line. Horace's theme is at bottom a contrast between his own +friendship with Maecenas and 'the way in which vulgar and pushing +people sought, and sought in vain, to obtain an introduction'. Donne, +like Horace, describes a bore, but makes this the occasion for a +general picture of the hangers-on at Court. A more veiled thread +running through the poem is an attack on the ways and tricks of +informers. The bore's gossip is probably not without a motive: + + I ... felt my selfe then + Becoming Traytor, and mee thought I saw + One of our Giant Statutes ope his jaw + To sucke me in. + +The manner in which the stranger accosts him suggests the +'intelligencer': 'Two hungry turns had I scarce fetcht in this wast +gallery when I was encountered by a neat pedantical fellow, in the +forme of a Cittizen, who thrusting himself abruptly into my companie, +like an Intelligencer, began very earnestly to question me.' Nash, +_Pierce Penniless_. + +In the _Satyres_ Donne is always, though he does not state his +position too clearly, one with links attaching him to the persecuted +Catholic minority. He hates informers and pursuivants. + +ll. 1-4. These lines resemble the opening of Régnier's imitation of +Horace's satire: + + Charles, de mes peches j'ay bien fait penitence; + Or, toy qui te cognois aux cas de conscience, + Juge si j'ay raison de penser estre absous. + +I can trace no further resemblance. + +l. 4. _A recreation to, and scarse map of this._ I have ventured here +to restore, from _Q_ and its duplicate among the Dyce MSS., what I +think must have been the original form of this line. The adjective +'scarse' or 'scarce' used in this way ('a scarce poet', 'a scarce +brook') is characteristic of Donne, and it always puzzled his +copyists, who tried to correct it in one way or another, e.g. 'scarce +a poet', II. 44; 'a scant brooke', IV. 240. It is inconceivable that +they would have introduced it. The preposition 'to' governing 'such +as' regularizes the construction, but would very easily be omitted by +a copyist who wished to smooth the metre or did not at once catch its +reference. Donne's use of 'scarse', like his use of 'Macaron' in this +poem, is probably an Italianism; in Italian 'scarso' means 'wanting, +scanty, poor'--'stretta e scarsa fortuna', 'E si riduce talvolta nell' +Estate con si scarsa acqua', 'Veniva bellissima tanto quanto ogni +comparazione ci saria scarsa', 'Ma l'ingegno e le rime erano scarse' +(Petrarch). + +PAGE =159=, l. 21. _seaven Antiquaries studies._ Donne has more than +one hit at Antiquaries. See the _Epigrams_ and _Satyre V_. The reign +of Elizabeth witnessed a great revival of antiquarian studies and the +first formation of an Antiquarian society: 'There was a time, most +excellent king,' says a later writer addressing King James, 'when +as well under Queen Elizabeth, as under your majesty, certain +choice gentlemen, men of known proof, were knit together, _statis +temporibus_, by the love of these studies, upon contribution among +themselves: which company consisted of an elective president and of +clarissimi, of other antiquaries and a register.' Oldys, _Life of +Raleigh_, p. 317. He goes on to describe how the society was dissolved +by death. In the list of names he gives there are more than seven, +but it is just possible that Donne refers to some such society in its +early stages. + +l. 22. _Africks monsters, Guianaes rarities._ Africa was famous as the +land of monsters. The second reference is to the marvels described in +Sir Walter Raleigh's _The discoverie of the large, rich and bewtiful +Empire of Guiana, with a relation of the great and golden City of +Manoa which the Spaniards call El Dorado, performed in the year 1595_ +(pub. 1596). Among the monsters were Amazons, Anthropophagi, + + and men whose heads + Do grow beneath their shoulders. + +l. 23. _Stranger then strangers, &c._ The 'Stranger then strangest' +of some MSS. would form a natural climax to the preceding list of +marvels. But 'strangers' is the authoritative reading, and forms the +transition to the next few lines. The reference is to the unpopularity +in London of the numerous strangers whom wars and religious +persecution had collected in England. Strype (_Annals_, iv) prints a +paper of 1568 in which the Lord Mayor gives to the Privy Council +an account of the strangers in London. In 1593 there were again +complaints of their presence and threats to attack them. 'While these +inquiries were making, to incense the people against them there were +these lines in one of their libels: Doth not the world see that +you, beastly brutes, the Belgians, or rather drunken drones and +faint-hearted Flemings; and you fraudulent father (_sic. Query_ +'faitor[s]'), Frenchmen, by your cowardly flight from your own natural +countries, have abandoned the same into the hands of your proud, +cowardly enemies, and have by a feigned hypocrisy and counterfeit show +of religion placed yourself here in a most fertile soil, under a most +gracious and merciful prince; who hath been contented, to the great +prejudice of her own natural subjects, to suffer you to live here in +better case and more freedom then her own people--Be it known to all +Flemings and Frenchmen that it is best for them to depart out of the +realm of England between this and the 9th of July next. If not then to +take that which follows: for that there shall be many a sore stripe. +Apprentices will rise to the number of 2336. And all the apprentices +and journeymen will down with the Flemings and strangers.' + +Another libel was in verse, and after quoting it the official document +proceeds: 'The court upon these seditious motives took the most +prudent measures to protect the poor strangers, and to prevent any +riot or insurrection.' Among other provisions, 'Orders to be given to +appoint a strong watch of merchants and others, and like-handicrafted +masters, to answer for their apprentices' and servants' misdoing.' +Strype's _Annals_, iv. 234-5. + +In the same year a bill was promoted in Parliament _against aliens +selling foreign wares among us by retail_, which Raleigh supported: +'Whereas it is pretended that for strangers it is against charity, +against honour, against profit to expel them: in my opinion it is no +matter of charity to relieve them. For first, such as fly hither have +forsaken their own king: and religion is no pretext for them; for we +have no Dutchmen here, but such as come from those princes where the +gospel is preached; yet here they live disliking our church,' &c. +Birch, _Life of Raleigh_, p. 163. + +I have thought it worth while to note these more recent references as +Grosart refers to the rising against strangers on May-day, 1517. + +l. 29. _by your priesthood, &c._ In 1581 a proclamation was issued +imposing the penalty of death on any Jesuits or seminary priests who +entered the Queen's dominions, and in 1585 Parliament again decreed +that all Jesuits and seminary priests were to leave the kingdom +within forty days under the capital penalty of treason. The detection, +imprisonment, torture, and execution of disguised priests form a +considerable chapter in Elizabethan history. Donne's companion looks +so strange that he runs the risk of arrest as a seminary priest +from Rome, or Douay. See Strype's _Annals_, passim, and Meyer, _Die +Katholische Kirche unter Elisabeth_, 1910. + +PAGE =160=, l. 35. _and saith_: 'saith' is the reading of all the +earlier editions, although Chambers and the Grolier Club editor +silently alter it to an exclamatory 'faith'--turning it into a +statement which Donne immediately contradicts. The 'saith' is a +harshly interpolated 'so he says'. One MS. adds 'he', and possibly the +pronoun in some form has been dropped, e.g. 'sayth a speakes'. + +ll. 37-8. _Made of the Accents, &c._ It is perhaps rash to accept +the 'no language' of _A25_, _Q_, and the Dyce MS. But the last +two represent, I think, an early version of the _Satyres_, and 'no +language' (like 'nill be delayed', _Epithal. made at Lincolns Inn_) +is just the sort of reading that would tend to disappear in repeated +transmission. It is too bold for the average copyist or editor. But +its boldness is characteristic of Donne; it gives a much better sense; +and it is echoed by Jonson in his _Discoveries_: 'Spenser in affecting +the ancients writ no language.' In like manner Donne's companion, in +affecting the accents and best phrases of all languages, spoke none. I +confess that seems to me a more pointed remark than that he spoke one +made up of these. + +l. 48. _Jovius or Surius_: Paolo Giovio, Bishop of Nocera, among many +other works wrote _Historiarum sui temporis Libri XLV. 1553_. Chambers +quotes from the _Nouvelle Biographie Générale_: 'Ses œuvres sont +pleines des mensonges dont profita sa cupidité.' + +Laurentius Surius (1522-78) was a Carthusian monk who wrote +ecclesiastical history. Among his works are a _Commentarius brevis +rerum in orbe gestarum ab anno 1550_ (1568), and a _Vitae Sanctorum, +1570 et seq._ He was accused of inaccuracy by Protestant writers. +It is worth while noting that _Q_ and _O'F_ read 'Sleydan', i.e. +Sleidanus. John Sleidan (1506-56) was a Protestant historian who, +like Surius, wrote both general and ecclesiastical history, e.g. _De +quatuor Summis Imperiis, Babylonico, Persico, Graeco, et Romano_, 1556 +(an English translation appeared in 1635), and _De Statu Religionis et +Reipublicae, Carolo Quinto Caesare Commentarii_ (1555-9). The latter +is a history of the Reformation written from the Protestant point of +view, to which Surius' work is a reply. Sleidan's history did not +give entire satisfaction to the reformers. It is quite possible +that Donne's first sneer was at the Protestant historian and that he +thought it safer later to substitute the Catholic Surius. + +l. 54. _Calepines Dictionarie._ A well-known polyglot dictionary +edited by Ambrose Calepine (1455-1511) in 1502. It grew later to +a _Dictionarium Octolingue_, and ultimately to a _Dictionarium XI +Linguarum_ (Basel, 1590). + +l. 56. _Some other Jesuites._ The 'other' is found only in _HN_, which +is no very reliable authority. Without it the line wants a whole +foot, not merely a syllable. Donne more than once drops a syllable, +compensating for it by the length and stress which is given to +another. Nothing can make up for the want of a whole foot, though in +dramatic verse an incomplete line may be effective. To me, too, it +seems very like Donne to introduce this condensed and sudden stroke at +Beza and nothing more likely to have been dropped later, either by +way of precaution or because it was not understood. No one of the +reformers was more disliked by Catholics than Beza. The licence of +his early life, his loose Latin verses, the scurrilous wit of his own +controversial method--all exposed him to and provoked attack. The _De +Vita et Moribus Theodori Bezae, Omnium Haereticorum nostri temporis +facile principis, &c.: Authore Jacobo Laingaeo Doctore Sorbonico_ +(1585), is a bitter and calumnious attack. There was, too, something +of the Jesuit, both in the character of the arguments used and in the +claim made on behalf of the Church to direct the civil arm, in Beza's +defence of the execution of Servetus. Moreover, the _Vindiciae contra +Tyrannos_ was sometimes attributed to Beza, and the views of the +reformers regarding the rights of kings put forward there, and those +held by the Jesuits, approximate closely. (See _Cambridge Modern +History_, iii. 22, _Political Thought in the Sixteenth Century_, pp. +759-66.) In his subsequent attacks upon the Jesuits, Donne always +singles out the danger of their doctrines and practice to the +authority of kings. Throughout the _Satyres_ Donne's veiled Catholic +prejudices have to be constantly borne in mind. + +PAGE =161=, l. 59. _and so Panurge was._ See Rabelais, _Pantagruel_ +ii. 9. One day that Pantagruel was walking with his friends he met +'un homme beau de stature et elegant en tous lineaments de corps, +mais pitoyablement navré en divers lieux, et tant mal en ordre qu'il +sembloit estre eschappe es chiens'. Pantagruel, convinced from his +appearance that 'il n'est pauvre que par fortune', demands of him his +name and story. He replies; but, to the dismay of Pantagruel and his +friends, his answer is couched first in German, then in Arabic (?), +then in Italian, in English (or what passes as such), in Basque, +in Lanternoy (an Esperanto of Rabelais's invention), in Dutch, in +Spanish, in Danish, in Hebrew, in Greek, in the language of +Utopia, and finally in Latin. '"Dea, mon amy," dist Pantagruel, "ne +sçavez-vous parler françoys?" "Si faict tresbien, Seigneur," respondit +le compaignon; "Dieu mercy! c'est ma langue naturelle et maternelle, +car je suis né et ay esté nourry jeune au jardin de France: c'est +Touraine."--"Doncques," dist Pantagruel, "racomtez nous quel est votre +nom et dont vous venez."... "Seigneur," dist le compagnon, "mon vray +et propre nom de baptesmes est Panurge."' Panurge was not much behind +Calepine's Dictionary, and if Donne's companion spoke in the +'accent and best phrase' of all these tongues he certainly spoke 'no +language'. + +l. 69. _doth not last_: 'last' has the support of several good +MSS., 'taste' (i.e. savour, go down, be acceptable) of some. It is +impossible to decide on intrinsic grounds between them. + +l. 70. _Aretines pictures._ The lascivious pictures of Giulio Romano, +for which Aretino wrote sonnets. + +l. 75. _the man that keepes the Abbey tombes._ See Davies' epigram, +_On Dacus_, quoted in the general note on the _Satyres_. + +l. 80. _Kingstreet._ From Charing Cross to the King's Palace at +Westminster. It was for long the only way to Westminster from the +north. 'The last part of it has now been covered by the new Government +offices in Parliament Street'. Stow's _Survey of London_, ed. Charles +Lethbridge Kingsford (1908), ii. 102 and notes. + +ll. 83-7. I divide the dialogue thus: + + _Companion._ Are not your Frenchmen neat? + + _Donne._ Mine? As you see I have but one Frenchman, look he + follows me. + + _Companion (ignoring this impertinence)._ Certes they (i.e. + Frenchmen) are neatly cloth'd. I of this mind am, Your only + wearing is your grogaram. + + _Donne._ Not so Sir, I have more. + +The joke turns on Donne's pretending to misunderstand the bore's +colloquial, but rather affected, indefinite use of 'your'. Donne +applies it to himself: 'You are mistaken in thinking that I have only +one suit.' Chambers gives the whole speech, from 'He's base' to 'he +follows me', to the bore. This gives 'Certes ... grogaram' to Donne, +and the closing repartee to the bore. Chambers uses inverted commas, +and has, probably by an oversight, omitted to begin a new speech at +'Mine'. + +For 'your' as used by the bore compare Bottom's use of it in +_A Midsummer Nights Dream_: 'I will discharge it in either your +straw-coloured beard, or your orange-tawny beard', and 'there is not +a more fearful wild-fowl than your lion'. In most of the instances +quoted by Schmidt there is the suggestion that Shakespeare is making +fun of an affectation of the moment. That Donne had a French servant +appears from one of his letters: 'therefore I onely send you this +Letter ... and my promise to distribute your other Letters, according +to your addresses, as fast as my Monsieur can doe it.' To Sir G. B., +_Letters_, p. 201. + +PAGE =162=, l. 97. _ten Hollensheads, or Halls, or Stowes._ Every +reader of these old chroniclers knows how they mingle with their +account of the greater events of each year mention of trifling events, +strange births, fires, &c. This characteristic of the Chronicles is +reflected in the History-Plays based on them. Nash complains of these +'lay-chroniclers that write of nothing but of Mayors and Sherifs, and +the deere yere and the great frost'. _Pierce Penniless._ + +ll. 98. _he knowes; He knowes._ I have followed _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ +in thus punctuating. To place the semicolon after 'trash' makes 'Of +triviall household trash' depend rather awkwardly on 'lye'. Donne does +not accuse the chroniclers of lying, but of reporting trivialities. + +PAGE =163=, l. 113-4. _since The Spaniards came, &c._: i.e. from 1588 +to 1597. + +l. 117. _To heare this Makeron talke._ This is the earliest instance +of this Italian word used in English which the O.E.D. quotes, and is +a proof of Donne's Italian travels. The _Vocabolario degli Accademici +della Crusca_ (1747) quotes as an example of the word with this +meaning, _homo crassâ Minerva_, in Italian: + + O maccheron, ben hai la vista corta. + Bellina, _Sonetti_, 29. + +Donne's use of the word attracted attention. It is repeated in one of +the _Elegies to the Author_, and led to the absurd substitution, in +the editions after _1633_, of 'maceron' for 'mucheron' (mushroom) in +the epistle prefixed to _The Progress of the Soule_. + +l. 124. _Perpetuities._ 'Perpetuities are so much impugned because +they will be prejudiciall to the Queenes profitt, which is raised +daily from fines and recoveries.' _Manningham's Diary_, April 22, +1602. Manningham refers probably to real property in which for many +centuries the Judges have ruled there can be no inalienable rights, +i.e. perpetuities. Donne's companion declares that such inalienable +rights are being established in offices. One has but to read Donne's +or Chamberlain's letters (or any contemporaries) to see what a traffic +went on in reversions to offices secular and sacred. + +l. 133. _To sucke me in; for_.... I have, with some of the MSS. and +with Chambers and the later editions, connected 'for hearing him' with +what follows. But _1633_ and the better MSS. read: + + To sucke me in for hearing him. I found.... + +Possibly this is right, but it seems to me better to connect 'for +hearing him' with what follows. It makes the comparison to the +superstition about communicating infection clearer: 'I found that as +... leachers, &c., ... so I, hearing him, might grow guilty and he +free.' 'I should be convicted of treason; he would go free as a spy +who had spoken treason only to draw me out'. See the accounts of +trials of suspected traitors before Walsingham and others. It is on +this passage I base my view that Donne's companion is not merely a +bore, but a spy, or at any rate is ready to turn informer to earn a +crown or two. + +PAGE =164=, l. 148. _complementall thankes._ The word 'complement' +or 'compliment' had a bad sense: 'We have a word now denizened and +brought into familiar use among us, Complement; and for the most part, +in an ill sense; so it is, when the heart of the speaker doth not +answer his tongue; but God forbid but a true heart, and a faire +tongue might very well consist together: As vertue itself receives +an addition, by being in a faire body, so do good intentions of the +heart, by being expressed in faire language. That man aggravates his +condemnation that gives me good words, and meanes ill; but he gives me +a rich Jewell and in a faire Cabinet, he gives me precious wine, +and in a clear glasse, that intends well, and expresses his good +intentions well too.' _Sermons_ 80. 18. 176. + +l. 164. _th'huffing braggart, puft Nobility._ I have followed the MSS. +in inserting 'th'' and taking 'braggart' as a noun. It would be +more easy to omit the article than to insert. Moreover 'braggart' is +commoner as a noun. The O.E.D. gives no example of the adjectival use +earlier than 1613. Compare: + + The huft, puft, curld, purld, wanton Pride. + Sylvester, _Du Bartas_, i. 2. + +PAGE =165=, l. 169. _your waxen garden_ or _yon waxen garden_--it +is impossible to say which Donne wrote. The reference is to the +artificial gardens in wax exhibited apparently by Italian puppet or +'motion' exhibitors. Compare: + + I smile to think how fond the Italians are, + To judge their artificial gardens rare, + When London in thy cheekes can shew them heere + Roses and Lillies growing all the yeere. + Drayton, _Heroical Epistles_ (1597), _Edward IV to Jane Shore_. + +l. 176. _Baloune._ A game played with a large wind-ball or football +struck to and fro with the arm or foot. + +l. 179. _and I, (God pardon mee.)_ This, the reading of the _1633_ +edition, is obviously right. Mr. Chambers, misled by the dropping +of the full stop after 'me' in the editions from _1639_ onwards, has +adopted a reading of his own: + + and aye--God pardon me-- + As fresh and sweet their apparels be, as be + The fields they sold to buy them. + +But what, in this case, does Donne ask God's pardon for? It is not +_his_ fault that their apparels are fresh or costly. 'God pardon +them!' would be the appropriate exclamation. What Donne asks God's +pardon for is, that he too should be found in the 'Presence' again, +after what he has already seen of Court life and 'the wretchedness +of suitors': as though Dante, who had seen Hell and escaped, should +wilfully return thither. + +l. 189. _Cutchannel_: i.e. Cochineal. The ladies' painted faces +suggest the comparison. In or shortly before 1603 an English ship, the +_Margaret and John_, made a piratical attack on the Venetian ship, +_La Babiana_. An indemnity was paid, and among the stolen articles +are mentioned 54 weights of cochineal, valued at £50-7. Our school +Histories tell us of Turkish and Moorish pirates, not so much of +the piracy which was conducted by English merchant ships, not always +confining themselves to the ships of nations at war with their +country. + +PAGE =166=, ll. 205-6. _trye ... thighe._ I have, with the support of +_Ash._ 38, printed thus instead of _tryes ... thighes_. If we retain +'tryes', then we should also, with several MSS., read (l. 204) +'survayes'; and if 'thighes' be correct we should expect 'legges'. +The regular construction keeps the infinitive throughout, 'refine', +'lift', 'call', 'survay', 'trye'. If we suppose that Donne shifted the +construction as he got away from the governing verb, the change would +naturally begin with 'survayes'. + +ll. 215-6. _A Pursevant would have ravish'd him away._ The reading +of three independent MSS., _Q_, _O'F_, and _JC_, of 'Topcliffe' for +'Pursevant' is a very interesting clue to the Catholic point of +view from which Donne's _Satyres_ were written. Richard Topcliffe +(1532-1609) was one of the cruellest of the creatures employed to +ferret out and examine by torture Catholics and Jesuits. It was he who +tortured Southwell the poet. In 1593 he was on the commission against +Jesuits, and in 1594-5 was in prison. John Hammond, the civilist, who +is possibly referred to in _Satyre V_, l. 87, sat with him on several +inquiries. See _D.N.B._ and authorities quoted there; also Meyer, _Die +Katholische Kirche unter Elisabeth_, 1910. + +PAGE =167=, ll. 233-4. _men big enough to throw + Charing Crosse for a barre._ + +Of one of Harvey's pamphlets Nash writes: 'Credibly it was once +rumoured about the Court, that the Guard meant to try masteries with +it before the Queene, and, instead of throwing the sledge or the +hammer, to hurle it foorth at the armes end for a wager.' _Have with +you, &c._ (M^{c}Kerrow, iii, p. 36.) + +ll. 235-6. _Queenes man, and fine + Living, barrells of beefe, flaggons of wine._ + +Compare Cowley's _Loves Riddle_, III. i: + + _Apl._ He shew thee first all the coelestial signs, + And to begin, look on that horned head. + + _Aln._ Whose is't? Jupiters? + + _Apl._ No, tis the Ram! + Next that the spacious Bull fills up the place. + + _Aln._ The Bull? Tis well the fellows of the Guard + Intend not to come thither; if they did + The Gods might chance to lose their beef. + +The name 'beefeater' has, I suppose, some responsibility for the jest. +Nash refers to their size: 'The big-bodied Halbordiers that guard +her Majesty,' Nash (Grosart), i. 102; and to their capacities as +trenchermen: 'Lies as big as one of the Guardes chynes of beefe,' Nash +(M^{c}Kerrow), i. 269. + +'Ascapart is a giant thirty feet high who figures in the legend of Sir +Bevis of Southampton.' Chambers. + +l. 240. _a scarce brooke_. Donne uses 'scarce' in this sense, i.e. +'scanty'. It is not common. See note to l. 4. + +PAGE =168=, l. 242. _Macchabees modestie._ 'And if I have done well, +and as is fitting the story, it is that which I have desired; but +if slenderly and meanly, it is that which I could attain unto.' 2 +Maccabees xv. 38. + + +PAGE =168=. SATYRE V. + +l. 9. _If all things be in all._ 'All things are concealed in all. +One of them all is the concealer of the rest--their corporeal vessel, +external, visible and movable.' Paracelsus, _Coelum Philosophorum: The +First Canon, Concerning the Nature and Properties of Mercury_. + +PAGE =169=, l. 31. _You Sir, &c._: i.e. Sir Thomas Egerton, whose +service Donne entered probably in 1598 and left in 1601-2. Norton says +1596 to 1600. In 1596 Egerton was made Lord Keeper. In 1597 he +was busy with the reform of some of the abuses connected with the +Clerkship of the Star Chamber, and this is probably what Donne has in +view throughout the Satyre. 'For some years the administration of this +office had given rise to complaints. In the last Parliament a bill +had been brought in ... for the reformation of it; but by a little +management on the part of the Speaker had been thrown out on the +second reading. Upon this I suppose the complainants addressed +themselves to the Queen. For it appears that the matter was under +inquiry in 1595, when Puckering was Lord Keeper; and it is certain +that at a later period some of the fees claimed by the Clerk of +Council were by authority of the Lord Keeper Egerton restrained.' +Spedding, _Letters and Life of Francis Bacon_, ii. 56. In the note +Spedding refers to a MS. at Bridgewater House containing 'The humble +petition of the Clerk of the Council concerning his fees restrained +by the Rt. Hon. the Lord Keeper'. Bacon held the reversion to this +Clerkship and in a long letter to Egerton he discusses in detail the +nature of the 'claim'd fees'. The question was not settled till 1605. +It will be noticed that in several editions and MSS. the reading is +'claim'd fees'. + +ll. 37-41. These lines are correctly printed in _1633_, though the old +use of the semicolon to indicate at one time a little less than a +full stop, at another just a little more than a comma, has caused +confusion. I have, therefore, ventured to alter the first (after +'farre') to a full stop, and the second (after 'duties') to a comma. +'_That_', says Donne (the italics give emphasis), 'was the iron age +when justice was sold. Now' (in this 'age of rusty iron') 'injustice +is sold dearer. Once you have allowed all the demands made on you, you +find, suitors (and suitors are gamblers), that the money you toiled +for has passed into other hands, the lands for which you urged your +rival claims has escaped you, as Angelica escaped while Ferrau and +Rinaldo fought for her.' + +To the reading of the editions _1635-54_, which Chambers has adopted +(but by printing in roman letters he makes 'that' a relative pronoun, +and 'iron age' subject to 'did allow'), I can attach no meaning: + + The iron Age _that_ was, when justice was sold (now + Injustice is sold dearer) did allow + All claim'd fees and duties. Gamesters anon. + +How did the iron age allow fees and duties? The text of _1669_ reverts +to that of _1633_ (keeping the 'claim'd fees' of _1635-54_), but does +not improve the punctuation by changing the semicolon after 'farre' to +a comma. + +Mr. Allen (_Rise of Formal Satire, &c._) points out that the allusion +to the age of 'rusty iron', which deserves some worse name, is +obviously derived from Juvenal XIII. 28 ff.: + + Nunc aetas agitur, peioraque saecula ferri + Temporibus: quorum sceleri non invenit ipsa + Nomen, et a nullo posuit natura metallo. + +With Donne's + + so controverted lands + Scape, like Angelica, the strivers hands + +compare Chaucer's + + We strive as did the houndes for the boon + Thei foughte al day and yet hir parte was noon: + Ther cam a kyte, whil that they were so wrothe, + And bar away the boon betwixt hem bothe. + And therfore at the kynges country brother + Eche man for himself, there is noon other. + _Knightes Tale_, ll. 319 ff. + +ll. 45-6. _powre of the Courts below Flow._ Grosart and Chambers +silently alter to 'Flows', but both the editions and MSS. have the +plural form. Franz notes the construction in Shakespeare: + + The venom of such looks, we fairly hope, + Have lost their quality. + _Hen. V_, V. ii. 18. + + All the power of his wits have given way to his impatience. + _Lear_, III. v. 4. + +The last is a very close parallel. The proximity of the plural noun in +the prepositional phrase is the chief determining factor, but in +some cases the combined noun and qualifying phrase has a plural +force--'such venomous looks', 'his mental powers or faculties.' + +PAGE =170=, l. 61. _heavens Courts._ There can be no doubt that the +plural is right: 'so the Roman profession seems to exhale, and refine +our wills from earthly Drugs, and Lees, more then the Reformed, and so +seems to bring us nearer heaven, but then that carries heaven farther +from us, by making us pass so many Courts, and Offices of Saints in +this life, in all our petitions,' &c. _Letters_, 102. + +ll. 65-8. Compare: 'If a Pursevant, if a Serjeant come to thee from +the King, in any Court of Justice, though he come to put thee in +trouble, to call thee to an account, yet thou receivest him, thou +entertainest him, thou paiest him fees.' _Sermons_ 80. 52. 525. +Gardiner, writing of the treatment of Catholics under Elizabeth, says: +'Hard as this treatment was, it was made worse by the misconduct of +the constables and pursevants whose business it was to search for the +priests who took refuge in the secret chambers which were always to +be found in the mansions of the Catholic gentry. These wretches, under +pretence of discovering the concealed fugitives, were in the habit +of wantonly destroying the furniture or of carrying off valuable +property.' _Hist. of England_, i. 97. + +PAGE =171=, l. 91. The right reading of this line must be either (_a_) +that which we have taken from _N_ and _TCD_, which differs only by a +letter from that of _1633-69_; or (_b_) that of _A25_, _B_, and other +MSS.: + + And div'd neare drowning, for what vanished. + +The first refers to the suitor. He, like the dog, dives for what _has_ +vanished; goes to law for what is irrecoverable. The second reading +would refer to the dog and continue the illustration: 'Thou art +the dog whom shadows cozened and who div'd for what vanish'd.' The +ambiguity accounts for the vacillation of the MSS. and editions. The +reading of _1669_ is a conjectural emendation. The 'div'd'st' of some +MSS. is an endeavour to get an agreement of tenses after 'what's' had +become 'what'. + + +PAGE =172=. VPON MR. THOMAS CORYATS CRUDITIES. + +These verses were first published in 1611 with a mass of witty and +scurrilous verses by all the 'wits' of the day, prefixed to Coryats +_Crudities hastily gobbled up in five months travells in France, +Savoy, Italy, Rhaetia ... Newly digested in the hungry aire of +Odcombe, in the County of Somerset, and now dispersed to the +nourishment of the travelling members of this Kingdom_. Coryat was +an eccentric and a favourite butt of the wits, but was not without +ability as well as enterprise. In 1612 he set out on a journey +through the East which took him to Constantinople, Jerusalem, Armenia, +Mesopotamia, Persia, and India. In his letters to the wits at home he +sends greetings to, among others, Christopher Brooke, John Hoskins +(as 'Mr. Ecquinoctial Pasticrust of the Middle Temple'), Ben Jonson, +George Garrat, and 'M. John Donne, the author of two most elegant +Latine Bookes, _Pseudomartyr_ and _Ignatius Conclave_' He died at +Surat in 1617. + +l. 2. _leavened spirit._ This is the reading of _1611_. It was altered +in _1649_ to 'learned', and modern editors have neglected to correct +the error. A glance at the first line shows that 'leavened' is right. +It is leaven which raises bread. A 'leavened spirit' is one easily +puffed up by the 'love of greatness'. There is much more of satire in +such an epithet than in 'learned'. + +l. 17. _great Lunatique_, i.e. probably 'great humourist', whose +moods and whims are governed by the changeful moon. See O.E.D., which +quotes: + + Ther (i.e. women's) hertys chaunge never ... + Ther sect ys no thing lunatyke. + Lydgate. + +'By nativitie they be lunaticke ... as borne under the influence of +Luna, and therefore as firme ... as melting waxe.' Greene, _Mamillia_. + +l. 22. _Munster._ The _Cosmographia Universalis_ (1541) of Sebastian +Munster (1489-1552). + +l. 22. _Gesner._ The _Bibliotheca Universalis, siue Catalogus Omnium +Scriptorum in Linguis Latina, Graeca, et Hebraica_, 1545, by Conrad +von Gesner of Zurich (1516-1565). Norton quotes from Morhof's +_Polyhistor_: 'Conradus Gesner inter universales et perpetuos +Catalogorum scriptores principatum obtinet'; and from Dr. Johnson: +'The book upon which all my fame was originally founded.' + +l. 23. _Gallo-belgicus._ See _Epigrams_. + +PAGE =173=, l. 56. _Which casts at Portescues._ Grosart offers the +only intelligible explanation of this phrase. He identifies the +'Portescue' with the 'Portaque' or 'Portegue', the great crusado of +Portugal, worth £3 12_s._, and quotes from Harrington, _On Playe_: +'Where lords and great men have been disposed to play deep play, and +not having money about them, have cut cards instead of counters, with +asseverance (on their honours) to pay for every piece of card so +lost a portegue.' Donne's reference to the use which is to be made of +Coryat's books shows clearly that he is speaking of some such custom +as this. Chambers asks pertinently, would the phrase not be 'for +Portescues'? but 'to cast at Portescues' may have been a term, perhaps +translated. A greater difficulty is that 'Portescue' is not given as a +form of 'Portague' by the O.E.D., but a false etymology connecting it +with 'escus', crowns, may have produced it. + +The following poem is also found among the poems prefixed to Coryat's +_Crudities_. It may be by Donne, but was not printed in any edition of +his poems: + +_Incipit Ioannes Dones._ + + Loe her's a Man, worthy indeede to trauell; + Fat Libian plaines, strangest Chinas grauell. + For Europe well hath scene him stirre his stumpes: + Turning his double shoes to simple pumpes. + And for relation, looke he doth afford + Almost for euery step he tooke a word; + What had he done had he ere hug'd th'Ocean + With swimming _Drake_ or famous _Magelan_? + And kis'd that _vnturn'd[1] cheeke_ of our old mother, + Since so our Europes world he can discouer? + It's not that _French_[2] which made his _Gyant_[3] see + Those vncouth Ilands where wordes frozen bee, + Till by the thaw next yeare they'r voic't againe; + Whose _Papagauts_, _Andoüelets_, and that traine + Should be such matter for a Pope to curse + As he would make; make! makes ten times worse, + And yet so pleasing as shall laughter moue: + And be his vaine, his game, his praise, his loue. + Sit not still then, keeping fames trump vnblowne: + But get thee _Coryate_ to some land vnknowne. + From whẽce proclaime thy wisdom with those wõders, + Rarer then sommers snowes, or winters thunders. + And take this praise of that th'ast done alreadie: + T'is pitty ere they _flow_ should haue an _eddie_. + _Explicit Ioannes Dones._ + + +PAGE =174=. IN EUNDEM MACARONICUM. + +A writer in _Notes and Queries_, 3rd Series, vii, 1865, gives the +following translation of these lines: + + As many perfect linguists as these two distichs make, + So many prudent statesmen will this book of yours produce. + To me the honour is sufficient of being understood: for I leave + To you the honour of being believed by no one. + + + [Footnote 1: _Terra incognita._] + + [Footnote 2: _Rablais._] + + [Footnote 3: _Pantagruel._] + + [(These notes are given in the margin of the original, + opposite the words explained.)] + + + + +LETTERS TO SEVERALL PERSONAGES. + + +Of Donne's _Letters_ the earliest are the _Storms_ and _Calme_ which +were written in 1597. The two letters to Sir Henry Wotton, 'Sir, More +then kisses' and 'Heres no more newes, then vertue', belong to 1597-8. +The fresh letter here published, _H: W: in Hiber: belligeranti_ (p. +188), was sent to Wotton in 1599. That _To Mr Rowland Woodward_ +(p. 185) was probably written about the same time, and to these +years--1598 to about 1608--belong also, I am inclined to think, the +group of short letters beginning with _To Mr T. W._ at p. 205. There +are very few indications of date. In that to Mr. R. W. (pp. 209-10) +an allusion is made to the disappointment of hopes in connexion with +Guiana: + + Guyanaes harvest is nip'd in the spring, + I feare; And with us (me thinkes) Fate deales so + As with the Jewes guide God did; he did show + Him the rich land, but bar'd his entry in: + Oh, slownes is our punishment and sinne. + +Grosart and Chambers refer this, and 'the Spanish businesse' below, +to 1613-14. The more probable reference is to the disappointment of +Raleigh's hopes, in 1596 and the years immediately following, that the +Government might be persuaded to make a settlement in Guiana, both on +account of its wealth and as a strategic point to be used in harassing +the King of Spain. Coolly received by Burleigh, Raleigh's scheme +excited considerable enthusiasm, and Chapman wrote his _De Guiana: +Carmen Epicum_, prefixed to Lawrence Keymis's _A Relation of the +Second Voyage to Guiana_ (1596), to celebrate Raleigh's achievement +and to promote his scheme. The 'Spanish businesse', i.e. businesses, +which, Donne complains, + + as the Earth between the Moone and Sun + Eclipse the light which Guiana would give, + +are probably the efforts in the direction of peace made by the party +in the Government opposed to Essex. Guiana is referred to in the +_Satyres_ which certainly belong to these years, and in _Elegie +XX: Loves War_, which cannot be dated so late as 1613-14. In 1598 +Chamberlain writes to Carleton: 'Sir John Gilbert, with six or seven +saile, one and other, is gone for Guiana, and I heare that Sir Walter +Raleigh should be so deeply discontented because he thrives no better, +that he is not far off from making that way himself'. Chamberlain's +_Letters_, Camd. Soc. 1861. Compare also: 'The Queene seemede troubled +to-daye; Hatton came out from her presence with ill countenance, and +pulled me aside by the gyrdle and saide in a secrete waie; If you have +any suite to-day praie you put it aside, The sunne doth not shine. +Tis _this accursede Spanish businesse_; so will I not adventure +her Highnesse choler, lest she should collar me also.' Sir John +Harington's _Nugae Antiquae_, i. 176. (Note dated 1598.) All these +letters are found in the Westmoreland MS. (_W_), whose order I +have adopted, and the titles they bear--'To Mr H. W.', 'To Mr C. +B.'--suggest that they belong to a period before either Wotton or +Brooke was well known, at least before Wotton had been knighted. The +tone throughout points to their belonging to the same time. They are +full of allusions now difficult or impossible to explain. They are +written to intimate friends. 'Thou' is the pronoun used throughout, +whereas 'You' is the formula in the letters to noble ladies. Wotton, +Christopher and Samuel Brooke, Rowland and Thomas Woodward are among +the names which can be identified, and they are the names of Donne's +most intimate friends in his earlier years. Probably there were +answers to Donne's letters. He refers to poems which have called forth +his poems. One of these has been preserved in the Westmoreland MS., +though we cannot tell who wrote it. A Bodleian MS. contains another +verse letter written to Donne in the same style as these letters, +a little crabbed and enigmatical, and it is addressed to him as +Secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton. This whole correspondence, then, +I should be inclined to date from 1597 to about 1607-8. The last is +probably the date of the letter _To E. of D._ or _To L. of D._ (so in +_W_), beginning: + + See Sir, how as the Suns hot Masculine flame + Begets strange creatures on Niles durty slime. + +This I have transferred to the _Divine Poems_, and shall give reasons +later for ascribing it to about this year, and for questioning the +identification of its recipient with Viscount Doncaster, later Earl of +Carlisle. + +Of the remaining _Letters_ some date themselves pretty definitely. +Donne formed the acquaintance of Lady Bedford about 1607-8 when she +came to Twickenham, and the two letters to her--'Reason is our Soules +left hand' (p. 189) and 'You have refin'd mee' (p. 191)--probably +belong to the early years of their friendship. The second suggests +that the poet is himself at Mitcham. The long, difficult letter, +'T'have written then' (p. 195), belongs probably to some year +following 1609. There is an allusion to Virginia, in which there was a +quickening of interest in 1609 (see _Elegie XIV_, Note), and the 'two +new starres' sent 'lately to the firmament' may be Lady Markham +(died May 4, 1609) and Mris Boulstred (died Aug. 4, 1609). This is +Chambers's conjecture; but Norton identifies them with Prince Henry +(died Nov. 6, 1612) and the Countess's brother, Lord Harington, who +died early in 1614. Public characters like these are more fittingly +described as stars, so that the poem probably belongs to 1614, +to which year certainly belongs the letter _To the Countesse of +Salisbury_ (p. 224). What New Year called forth the letter to Lady +Bedford, beginning 'This twilight of two years' (p. 198), we do not +know, nor the date of the long letter in triplets, 'Honour is so +sublime perfection' (p. 218). But the latter was most probably written +from France in 1611-12, like the fragmentary letter which follows, and +the letter, similar in verse and in 'metaphysics', _To the Lady Carey +and Mrs Essex Riche_ (p. 221). Donne had a little shocked his noble +lady friends by the extravagance of his adulation of the dead child +Mrs. Elizabeth Drury, in 1611, and these letters are written to make +his peace and to show the pitch he is capable of soaring to in praise +of their maturer virtues. + +To Sir Henry Wotton (p. 214), Donne wrote in a somewhat more elevated +and respectful strain than that of his earlier letters, when the +former set out on his embassy to Venice in 1604. The letter to Sir +Henry Goodyere (p. 183) belongs to the Mitcham days, 1605-8. To Sir +Edward Herbert (p. 193) he wrote 'at Julyers', therefore in 1610. The +letter _To the Countesse of Huntingdon_ (p. 201) was probably written +just before Donne took orders, 1614-15. The date of the letter _To +Mris M. H._ (p. 216), that is, to Mrs. Magdalen Herbert, not yet Lady +Danvers, must have been earlier than her second marriage in 1608--the +exact day of that marriage I do not know--probably in 1604, as the +verse, style and tone closely resemble that of the letter to Wotton of +that year. This suits the tenor of the letter, which implies that she +had not yet married Sir John Danvers. + +The last in the collection of the letters to Lady Bedford, 'You that +are she and you' (p. 227), seems from its position in _1633_ and +several MSS. to have been sent to her with the elegy called _Death_, +and to have been evoked by the death of Lady Markham or Mrs. Boulstred +in 1609. + +The majority of the letters thus belong to the years 1596-7 to 1607-8, +the remainder to the next six years. With the _Funerall Elegies_ and +the earlier of the _Divine Poems_ they represent the middle and on the +whole least attractive period of Donne's life and work. The _Songs and +Sonets_ and _Elegies_ are the expression of his brilliant and stormy +youth, the _Holy Sonnets_ and the hymns are the utterance of his +ascetic and penitent last years. In the interval between the two, the +wit, the courtier, the man of the world, and the divine jostle each +other in Donne's works in a way that is not a little disconcerting to +readers of an age and temper less habituated to strong contrasts. + + +PAGE =175=. THE STORME. + +After the Cadiz expedition in 1596, the King of Spain began the +preparation of a second Armada. With a view to destroying this +Elizabeth fitted out a large fleet under the command of Essex, Howard, +and Raleigh. The storm described in Donne's letter so damaged the +fleet that the larger purpose was abandoned and a smaller expedition, +after visiting the Spanish coast, proceeded to the Azores, with a +view to intercepting the silver fleet returning from America. Owing to +dissensions between Raleigh and Essex, it failed of its purpose. This +was the famous 'Islands Expedition'. + +The description of the departure and the storm which followed was +probably written in Plymouth, whither the ships had to put back, +and whence they sailed again about a month later; therefore in +July-August, 1597. 'We imbarked our Army, and set sayle about the +ninth of July, and for two dayes space were accompanied with a faire +leading North-easterly wind.' (Mildly it kist our sailes, &c.)...... +'Wee now being in this faire course, some sixtie leagues onwards our +journey with our whole Fleet together, there suddenly arose a fierce +and tempestuous storme full in our teethe, continuing for foure dayes +with so great violence, as that now everyone was inforced rather to +looke to his own safetie, and with a low saile to serve the Seas, +then to beate it up against the stormy windes to keep together, or to +follow the directions for the places of meeting.' _A larger Relation +of the said Iland Voyage written by Sir Arthur Gorges, &c. Purchas +his Pilgrimes._ Glasg. MCMVII. While at Plymouth Donne wrote a prose +letter, to whom is not clear, preserved in the Burley Commonplace +Book. There he speaks of 'so very bad wether y^t even some of y^e +mariners have been drawen to think it were not altogether amiss to +pray, and myself heard one of them say, God help us'. + +_To Mr. Christopher Brooke._ Donne's intimate friend and +chamber-fellow at Lincoln's Inn. He was Donne's chief abetter in his +secret marriage, his younger brother Samuel performing the ceremony. +They were the sons of Robert Brooke, Alderman of and once M.P. for +York, and his wife Jane Maltby. The Alderman had other sons who +followed in his footsteps and figure among the Freemen of York, but +Christopher and Samuel earned a wider reputation. At Lincoln's Inn, +Christopher wrote verses and cultivated the society of the wits. Wood +mentions as his friends and admirers Selden and Jonson, Drayton and +Browne, Wither and Davies of Hereford. Browne sings his praises in the +second song of the second book of _Britannia's Pastorals_, and in _The +Shepherds Pipe_ (1614) urges him to sing a higher strain. His poems, +which have been collected and edited by the late Dr. Grosart, include +an Elegy on Prince Henry, and a long poem of no merit, _The Ghost of +Richard the Third_ (_Miscellanies_ of the _Fuller Worthies Library_, +vol. iv, 1872). In 1614 he became a bencher and Summer Reader at +Lincoln's Inn. He died February 7, 1627/8. + +l. 4. _By Hilliard drawne._ Nicholas Hilliard (1537-1619), the first +English miniature painter. He was goldsmith, carver, and limner to +Queen Elizabeth, and engraved her second great seal in 1586. He drew a +portrait of Mary, Queen of Scots, at eighteen, and executed miniatures +of many contemporaries. He also wrote a treatise on miniature +painting. Mr. Laurence Binyon thinks it is quite possible that the +miniature from which Marshall, about 1635, engraved the portrait of +Donne as a young man, was by Hilliard. It is, he says, quite in his +style. + +l. 13. _From out her pregnant intrailes._ The ancients attributed +winds to the effect of exhalations from the earth. Seneca, +_Quaestiones Naturales_, v. 4, discusses various causes but mentions +this first: 'Sometimes the earth herself emits a great quantity of +air, which she breathes out of her hidden recesses ... A suggestion +has been made which I cannot make up my mind to believe, and yet +I cannot pass over without mention. In our bodies food produces +flatulence, the emission of which causes great offence to ones nasal +susceptibilities; sometimes a report accompanies the relief of the +stomach, sometimes there is more polite smothering of it. In like +manner it is supposed the great frame of things when assimilating +its nourishment emits air. It is a lucky thing for us that nature's +digestion is good, else we might apprehend some less agreeable +consequences.' (_Q. N. translated by John Clarke, with notes by Sir +Archibald Geikie_, 1910.) These exhalations, according to one view, +mounting up were driven back by the violence of the stars, or +by inability to pass the frozen middle region of the air--hence +commotions. (Pliny, _Nat. Hist._ ii. 38, 45, 47, 48.) This explains +Donne's 'middle marble room', where 'marble' may mean 'hard', or +_possibly_ 'blue' referring to the colour of the heavens. It is so +used by Studley in his translations of Seneca's tragedies: 'Whereas +the marble sea doth fleete,' _Hipp._ i. 25; 'When marble skies no +filthy fog doth dim,' _Herc. Oet._ ii. 8; 'The monstrous hags of +marble seas' (monstra caerulei maris), _Hipp._ v. 5, I owe this +suggestion to Miss Evelyn Spearing (_The Elizabethan 'Tenne Tragedies +of Seneca'._ _Mod. Lang. Review_, iv. 4). But the peripatetic view +was that the heavens were made of hard, solid, though transparent, +concentric spheres: 'Tycho will have two distinct matters of heaven +and ayre; but to say truth, with some small modifications, they' +(i.e. Tycho Brahe and Christopher Rotman) 'have one and the self same +opinion about the essence and matter of heavens; that it is not hard +and impenetrable, as Peripateticks hold, transparent, of a _quinta +essentia_, but that it is penetrable and soft as the ayre itself is, +and that the planets move in it', (according to the older view each +was fixed in its sphere) 'as birds in the ayre, fishes in the sea.' +Burton, _Anat. of Melancholy_, part ii, sect. 2, Men. 3. + +'Wind', says Donne elsewhere, 'is a mixt Meteor, to the making +whereof, diverse occasions concurre with exhalations.' _Sermons_ 80. +31. 305. + +The movement which Donne has in view is described by Du Bartas: + + If heav'ns bright torches, from earth's Kidneys, sup + Som somwhat dry and heatfull Vapours up, + Th' ambitious lightning of their nimble Fire + Would suddenly neer th' Azure Cirques aspire: + But scarce so soon their fuming crest hath raught, + Or toucht the Coldness of the middle Vault, + And felt what force their mortall Enemy + In Garrison keeps there continually; + When down again towards their Dam they bear, + Holp by the weight which they have drawn from her. + But in the instant, to their aid arrives + Another new heat, which their heart revives, + Re-arms their hand, and having staied their flight, + Better resolv'd brings them again to fight. + Well fortifi'd then by these fresh supplies, + More bravely they renew their enterprize: + And one-while th' upper hand (with honor) getting, + Another-while disgracefully retreating, + Our lower Aire they tosse in sundry sort, + As weak or strong their matter doth comport. + This lasts not long; because the heat and cold, + Equall in force and fortune, equall bold + In these assaults; to end this sudden brall, + Th' one stops their mounting, th' other stayes their fall: + So that this vapour, never resting stound, + Stands never still, but makes his motion round, + Posteth from Pole to Pole, and flies amain + From _Spain_ to _India_, and from _Inde_ to _Spain_. + Sylvester, _Du Bartas_, First Week, Second Day. + +l. 18. _prisoners, which lye but for fees_, i.e. the fees due to the +gaoler. 'And as prisoners discharg'd of actions may lye for fees; so +when,' &c. + +_Deaths Duell_ (1632), p. 9. Thirty-three years after this poem was +written, Donne thus uses the same figure in the last sermon he ever +preached. + +PAGE =176=, l. 38. _I, and the Sunne._ The 'Yea, and the Sunne' of _Q_ +shows that 'I' here is probably the adverb, not the pronoun, though +the passage is ambiguous. Modern editors have all taken 'I' as the +pronoun. + +ll. 49-50. _And do hear so + Like jealous husbands, what they would not know._ + +Compare: + + Crede mihi; nulli sunt crimina grata marito; + Nec quemquam, quamvis audiat illa, iuvant. + Seu tepet, indicium securas perdis ad aures; + Sive amat, officio fit miser ille tuo. + Culpa nec ex facili, quamvis manifesta, probatur: + Iudicis illa sui tuta favore venit. + Viderit ipse licet, credet tamen ipse neganti; + Damnabitque oculos, et sibi verba dabit. + Adspiciet dominae lacrimas; plorabit et ipse: + Et dicet, poenas garrulus iste dabit. + Ovid, _Amores_, II. ii. 51-60. + +PAGE =177=, l. 60. _Strive._ Later editions and Chambers read +'strives', but 'ordinance' was used as a plural: 'The goodly ordinance +which were xii great Bombardes of brasse', and 'these six small iron +ordinance.' O.E.D. The word in this sense is now spelt 'ordnance'. + +l. 66. _the'Bermuda_. It is probably unnecessary to change this to +'the'Bermudas.' The singular without the article is quite regular. + +l. 67. _Darknesse, lights elder brother._ The 'elder' of the MSS. is +grammatically more correct than the 'eldest' of the editions. 'We must +return again to our stronghold, faith, and end with this, that this +beginning was, and before it, nothing. It is elder than darkness, +which is elder than light; and was before confusion, which is elder +than order, by how much the universal Chaos preceded forms and +distinctions.' _Essays in Divinity_ (ed. Jessop, 1855), p. 46. + + +PAGE =178=. THE CALME. + +l. 4. _A blocke afflicts, &c._ Aesop's _Fables_. Sir Thomas Rowe +recalled Donne's use of the fable, when he was Ambassador at the Court +of the Mogul. Of Ibrahim Khan, the Governor of Surat after Zufilkhar +Khan, he writes: 'He was good but soe easy that he does no good; wee +are not lesse afflicted with a block then before with a storck.' _The +Embassy, &c._ (Hakl. Soc.), i. 82. + +l. 8. _thy mistresse glasse._ This poem, like the last, is _probably_ +addressed to Christopher Brooke, but it is not so headed in any +edition or MS. The Grolier Club editor ascribes the first heading to +both. + +l. 14. _or like ended playes._ This suggests that the Elizabethan +stage was not so bare of furniture as used to be stated, and also that +furniture was not confined to the curtained-off rear-stage. What Donne +recalls is a stage deserted by the actors but cumbered with furniture +and decorations. + +l. 16. _a frippery_, i.e. 'A place where cast-off clothes are sold', +O.E.D. 'Oh, ho, Monster; wee know what belongs to a frippery.' +_Tempest_, IV. i. 225. Here the rigging has the appearance of an +old-clothes shop. + +l. 17. _No use of lanthornes._ The reference is to the lanterns in the +high sterns of the ships, used to keep the fleet together. 'There +is no fear now of our losing one another.' Each squadron of a fleet +followed the light of its Admiral. Essex speaks of having lost, or +missing, 'Sir Walter Raleigh with thirty sailes that in the night +followed his light.' _Purchas_, xx. 24-5. + +l. 18. _Feathers and dust._ 'He esteemeth John Done the first poet in +the world for some things: his verses of the Lost Chaine he hath by +heart; and that passage of the Calme, That dust and feathers doe not +stirre, all was soe quiet. Affirmeth Donne to have written all +his best peeces ere he was twenty-five yeares old.' _Jonson's +Conversations with Drummond._ When Donne wrote _The Calme_ he was in +his twenty-fifth year. + +l. 21. _lost friends._ Raleigh and his squadron lost the main fleet +while off the coast of Spain, before they set sail definitely for +the Azores. He rejoined the fleet at the Islands. Donne's poem was +probably written in the interval. + +The reading of some MSS., 'lefte friends,' is quite a possible one. +Carleton, writing from Venice to Chamberlain, says: 'Let me tell you, +for your comfort (for I imagine what is mine is yours) that my last +news from the left island ... took knowledge of my vigilancy and +diligency.' The 'left island' is Great Britain, and Donne may mean no +more than that 'we can neither get back to our friends nor on to our +enemies.' There may be no allusion to Raleigh's ships. + +l. 23. _the Calenture._ 'A disease incident to sailors within the +tropics, characterized by delirium in which the patient, it is said, +fancies the sea to be green fields, and desires to leap into it.' +O.E.D. Theobald had the Calenture in mind when he conjectured that +Falstaff 'babbled o' green fields'. + +PAGE =179=, l. 33. _Like Bajazet encaged, &c._: an echo of Marlowe's +_Tamburlaine_: + + There whiles he lives shall Bajazet be kept; + And where I go be thus in triumph drawn: + . . . . . . . . + This is my mind, and I will have it so. + Not all the kings and emperors of the earth, + If they would lay their crowns before my feet, + Shall ransom him or take him from his cage: + The ages that shall talk of Tamburlaine, + Even from this day to Plato's wondrous year, + Shall talk how I have handled Bajazet. + +There are frequent references to this scene in contemporary +literature. + +ll. 35-6. _a Miriade Of Ants, &c._ 'Erat ei' (i.e. Tiberius) 'in +oblectamentis serpens draco, quem ex consuetudine manu sua cibaturus, +cum consumptum a formicis invenisset, monitus est ut vim multitudinis +caveret.' Suetonius, _Tib._ 72. + +l. 37. _Sea-goales_, i.e. sea-gaols. 'goale' was a common spelling. +See next poem, l. 52, 'the worlds thy goale.' Strangely enough, +neither the Grolier Club editor nor Chambers seems to have recognized +the word here, in _The Calme_, though in the next poem they change +'goale' to 'gaol' without comment. The Grolier Club editor retains +'goales' and Chambers adopts the reading of the later editions, +'sea-gulls.' A gull would have no difficulty in overtaking the +swiftest ship which ever sailed. Grosart takes the passage correctly. +'Sea-goales' is an accurate definition of the galleys.' Finny-chips' +is a vivid description of their appearance. Compare: + + One of these small bodies fitted so, + This soul inform'd, and abled it to row + Itselfe with finnie oars. + _Progresse of the Soule_, I. 23. + + Never again shall I with finny oar + Put from, or draw unto the faithful shore. + Herrick, _His Tears to Thamesis_. + +l. 38. _our Pinnaces._ 'Venices' is the reading of _1633_ and most of +the MSS., where, as in _1669_, the word is often spelt 'Vinices'. But +I can find no example of the word 'Venice' used for a species of ship, +and Mr. W. A. Craigie of the _Oxford English Dictionary_ tells me that +he has no example recorded. The mistake probably arose in a confusion +of P and V. The word 'Pinnace' is variously spelt, 'pynice', 'pinnes', +'pinace', &c., &c. The pinnaces were the small, light-rigged, +quick-sailing vessels which acted as scouts for the fleet. + +l. 48. _A scourge, 'gainst which wee all forget to pray._ The 'forgot' +of _1669_ and several MSS. is tempting--'a scourge against which we +all in setting out forgot to pray.' I rather think, however, that what +Donne means is 'a scourge against which we all at sea always forget to +pray, for to pray for wind at sea is generally to pray for cold under +the poles, for heat in hell'. The 'forgot' makes the reference too +definite. At the same time, 'forgot' is so obvious a reading that it +is difficult to account for 'forget' except on the supposition that it +is right. + +ll. 51-4. _How little more alas, + Is man now, then before he was? he was + Nothing; for us, wee are for nothing fit; + Chance, or ourselves still disproportion it._ + +Donne is here playing with an antithesis which apparently he owes to +the rhetoric of Tertullian. 'Canst thou choose', says the poet in one +of his later sermons, 'but think God as perfect now, at least as he +was at first, and can he not as easily make thee up againe of nothing, +as he made thee of nothing at first? _Recogita quid fueris antequam +esses._ Think over thyselfe; what wast thou before thou wast anything? +_Meminisses utique, si fuisses_: if thou had'st been anything than, +surely thou would'st remember it now. _Qui non eras, factus es; cum +iterum non eris, fies._ Thou that wast once nothing, wast made this +that thou art now; and when thou shalt be nothing again, thou shalt be +made better then thou art yet.' _Sermons_ 50. 14. 109. A note in the +margin indicates that the quotations are from Tertullian, and Donne is +echoing here the antithetical _Recogita quid fueris antequam esses_. + +This echo is certainly made more obvious to the ear by the punctuation +of _1669_, which Grosart, the Grolier Club editor, and Chambers all +follow. The last reads: + + How little more, alas, + Is man now, than, before he was, he was? + Nothing for us, we are for nothing fit; + Chance, or ourselves, still disproportion it. + +This may be right; but after careful consideration I have retained the +punctuation of _1633_. In the first place, if the _1669_ text be right +it is not clear why the poet did not preserve the regular order: + + Is man now than he was before he was. + +To place 'he was' at the end of the line was in the circumstances to +court ambiguity, and is not metrically requisite. In the second place, +the rhetorical question asked requires an answer, and that is given +most clearly by the punctuation of _1633_. 'How little more, alas, is +man now than [he was] before he was? He was nothing; and as for us, +we are fit for nothing. Chance or ourselves still throw us out of gear +with everything.' To be nothing and to be fit for nothing--there is +all the difference. In the _1669_ version it is not easy to see the +relevance of the rhetorical question and of the line which follows: +'Nothing for us, we are for nothing fit.' This seems to introduce a +new thought, a fresh antithesis. It is not quite true. A breeze would +fit them very well. + +The use of 'for' in 'for us', as I have taken it, is quite idiomatic: + + For me, I am the mistress of my fate. + Shakespeare, _Rape of Lucrece_, 1021. + + For the rest o' the fleet, they all have met again. + Id., _The Tempest_, I. i. 232. + + +PAGE =180=. TO S^r HENRY WOTTON. + +The occasion of this letter was apparently (see my article, _Bacon's +Poem, The World: Its Date And Relation to Certain Other Poems_: _Mod. +Lang. Rev._, April, 1911) a literary _débat_ among some of the wits of +Essex's circle. The subject of the _débat_ was 'Which kind of life is +best, that of Court, Country, or City?' and the suggestion came from +the two epigrams in the Greek Anthology attributed to Posidippus and +Metrodorus respectively. In the first ([Greek: Poiên tis biotoio tamê +tribon?]) each kind of life in turn is condemned; in the second each +is defended. These epigrams were paraphrased in _Tottel's Miscellany_ +(1557) by Nicholas Grimald, and again in the _Arte of English Poesie_ +(1589), attributed to George Puttenham. Stimulated perhaps by the +latter version, in which the Court first appears as one of the +principal spheres of life, or by Ronsard's French version in which +also the 'cours des Roys', unknown to the Greek poet, are introduced, +Bacon wrote his well-known paraphrase: + + The world's a bubble: and the life of man + Less than a span. + +It is just possible too that he wrote a paraphrase, similar in verse, +of the second epigram, which I have printed in the article referred +to. A copy of _The World_ was found among Wotton's papers and was +printed in the _Reliquiae Wottonianae_ (1651) signed 'Fra. Lord +Bacon'. It had already been published by Thomas Farnaby in his +_Florilegium Epigrammatum Graecorum &c._ (1629). Bacon probably gave +Wotton a copy and he appears to have shown it to his friends. Among +these was Thomas Bastard, who, to judge by the numerous epigrams he +addressed to Essex, belonged to the same circle as Bacon, Donne, and +Wotton,--if we may so describe it, but probably every young man of +letters looked to Essex for patronage. Bastard's poem runs: + +Ad Henricum Wottonum. + + Wotton, the country, and the country swayne, + How can they yeeld a Poet any sense? + How can they stirre him up or heat his vaine? + How can they feed him with intelligence? + You have that fire which can a witt enflame + In happy London Englands fayrest eye: + Well may you Poets have of worthy name + Which have the foode and life of Poetry. + And yet the Country or the towne may swaye + Or beare a part, as clownes do in a play. + +Donne was one of those to whom Wotton showed Bacon's poem, and the +result was the present letter which occasionally echoes Bacon's words. +Wotton replied to it in some characteristic verses preserved in _B_ +(Lord Ellesmere's MS.) and _P_ (belonging to Captain Harris). I print +it from the former: + +_To J: D: from M^r H: W:_ + + Worthie Sir: + Tis not a coate of gray or Shepheards life, + Tis not in feilds or woods remote to live, + That adds or takes from one that peace or strife, + Which to our dayes such good or ill doth give: + It is the mind that make the mans estate 5 + For ever happy or unfortunate. + + Then first the mind of passions must be free + Of him that would to happiness aspire; + Whether in Princes Pallaces he bee, + Or whether to his cottage he retire; 10 + For our desires that on extreames are bent + Are frends to care and traitors to content. + + Nor should wee blame our frends though false they bee + Since there are thousands false, for one that's true, + But our own blindness, that we cannot see 15 + To chuse the best, although they bee but few: + For he that every fained frend will trust, + Proves true to frend, but to himself unjust. + + The faults wee have are they that make our woe, + Our virtues are the motives of our joye, 20 + Then is it vayne, if wee to desarts goe + To seek our bliss, or shroud us from annoy: + Our place need not be changed, but our Will, + For every where wee may do good or ill. + + But this I doe not dedicate to thee, 25 + As one that holds himself fitt to advise, + Or that my lines to him should precepts be + That is less ill then I, and much more wise: + Yet 'tis no harme mortality to preach, + For men doe often learne when they do teach. + +The date of the _débat_ is before April 1598, when Bastard's +_Chrestoleros_ was entered on the Stationers' Register, probably +1597-8, the interval between the return of the Islands Expedition and +Donne's entry into the household of Sir Thomas Egerton. Mr. Chambers +has shown that during this interval Donne was occasionally employed +by Cecil to carry letters to and from the Commanders of the English +forces still in France. But it was not till about April 1598 that he +found permanent employment. + +l. 8. _Remoraes_; Browne doubts 'whether the story of the remora be +not unreasonably amplified'. The name is given to any of the fish +belonging to the family Echeneididae, which by means of a suctorial +disk situated on the top of the head adhere to sharks, other large +fishes, vessels, &c., letting go when they choose. The ancient +naturalists reported that they could arrest a ship in full course. See +Bartholomaeus Anglicus, Lib. xiii, _De Aqua et ejus Ornatu_. + +l. 11. _the even line_ is the reading of all the MS. copies, and must +have been taken from one of these by the 1669 editor. The use of the +word is archaic and therefore more probably Donne's than an editor's +emendation. Compare Chaucer's 'Of his stature he was of even length', +i.e. 'a just mean between extremes, of proper magnitude or degree'. +The 'even line' is, as the context shows, the exact mean between +the 'adverse icy poles'. I suspect that 'raging' is an editorial +emendation. There are several demonstrable errors in the 1633 text +of this poem. The 'other' of _P_, and 'over' of _S_, are errors which +point to 'even' rather than 'raging'. + +l. 12. _th'adverse icy poles._ The 'poles' of most MSS. is obviously +necessary if we are to have _two_ temperate regions. The expression is +a condensed one for 'either of the adverse icy poles'. Compare: + + He that at sea prayes for more winde, as well + Under the poles may begge cold, heat in hell. + +One cannot be under both the poles at once. One is 'under' the pole in +Donne's cosmology because the poles are not the termini of the earth's +axis but of the heavens'. 'For the North and Southern Pole, are the +invariable terms of that Axis whereon the Heavens do move.' Browne, +_Pseud. Epidem._ vi. 7. + + Tristior illa + Terra sub ambobus non iacet ulla polis. + Ovid, _Pont._ ii. 7. 64. + +l. 17. _Can dung and garlike, &c._ This is the text of the 1633 +edition made consistent with itself, and it has the support of several +MSS. Clearly if we are to read 'or' in one line we must do so in both, +and adopt the _1635-69_ text. It is tempting at first sight to do so, +but I believe the MSS. are right. What Donne means is, 'Can we procure +a perfume, or a medicine, by blending opposite stenches or poisons?' +This is his expansion of the question, 'Shall cities, built of +both extremes, be chosen?' The change to 'or' obscures the exact +metaphysical point. It would be an improvement perhaps to bracket the +lines as parenthetical. + +According to Donne's medical science the scorpion (probably its flesh) +was an antidote to its own poison: 'I have as many Antidotes as the +Devill hath poisons, I have as much mercy as the Devill hath malice; +There must be scorpions in the world; _but the Scorpion shall cure the +Scorpion_; there must be tentations; but tentations shall adde to mine +and to thy glory, and _Eripiam_, I will deliver thee.' _Sermons_ 80. +52. 527. Obviously Donne could not ask in surprise, 'Can a Scorpion or +Torpedo cure a man?' Each can; it is their combination he deprecates. +In _Ignatius his Conclave_ he writes, 'and two Poysons mingled might +do no harme.' + +In speaking of scent made from dung Donne has probably the statement +of Paracelsus in his mind to which Sir Thomas Browne also refers: 'And +yet if, as Paracelsus encourageth, Ordure makes the best Musk, and +from the most fetid substances may be drawn the most odoriferous +Essences; all that had not Vespasian's nose, might boldly swear, here +was a subject fit for such extractions.' _Pseudodoxia Epidemica_, iii. +26. + + PAGE =181=, ll. 19-20. _Cities are worst of all three; of all three + (O knottie riddle) each is worst equally._ + +This is the punctuation of _1633_ and of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and _W_. +The later punctuation which Chambers has adopted and modernized, is +not found to be an improvement if scrutinized. He reads: + + Cities are worst of all three; of all three? + O knotty riddle! each is worst equally. + +The mark of interrogation after 'three' would be justifiable only if +the poet were going to expatiate upon the badness of cities. 'Of all +three? that is saying very little, &c., &c.' But this is not the tenor +of the passage. From one thought he is led to another. 'Cities are +worst of all three (i.e. Court, City, Country). Nay, each is equally +the worst.' The interjected 'O knottie riddle' does not mean, 'Who is +to say which is the worst?' but 'How can it come that each is worst? +This is a riddle!' Donne here echoes Bacon: + + And where's the citty from foul vice so free + But may be term'd the worst of all the three? + +ll. 25-6. _The country is a desert, &c._ The evidence for this reading +is so overwhelming that it is impossible to reject it. I have modified +the punctuation to bring out more clearly what I take it to mean. 'The +country is a desert where no goodness is native, and therefore rightly +understood. Goodness in the country is like a foreign language, a +faculty not born with us, but acquired with pain, and never thoroughly +understood and mastered.' Only Dr. Johnson could stigmatize in +adequate terms so harsh a construction, but the _1635-54_ emendation +is not less obscure. Does it mean that any good which comes there +quits it with all speed, while that which is native and must stay is +not understood? This is not a lucid or just enough thought to warrant +departure from the better authorized text. + +l. 27. _prone to more evills_; The reading 'mere evils' of several +MSS., including _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, is tempting and _may_ be right. +In that case 'meere' has the now obsolete meaning of 'pure, +unadulterated', 'meere English', 'meere Irish', &c. in O.E.D., or +more fully, 'absolute, entire, sheer, perfect, downright', as in +'Th'obstinacie, willfull disobedience, meere lienge and disceite of +the countrie gentlemen,' _Hist. MSS. Com._ (1600), quoted in O.E.D.; +'the mere perdition of the Turkish fleet,' Shakespeare, _Othello_, +II. ii. 3. Such a strong adjective would however come better after +'devills' in the next line. Placed here it disturbs the climax. What +Donne says here is that men in the country become beasts, and more +prone to evil than beasts because of their higher faculties: + + If lecherous goats, if serpents envious + Cannot be damn'd; Alas; why should I bee? + Why should intent or reason, borne in mee, + Make sinnes, else equall, in mee more heinous? + _Holy Sonnets_, IX, p. 326. + +And in this same letter, ll. 41-2, he develops the thought further. + +PAGE =182=, ll. 59-62. _Only in this one thing, be no Galenist, &c._ +The Galenists perceived in the living body four humours; hot, cold, +moist, and dry, and held that in health these were present in fixed +proportions. Diseases were due to disturbance of these proportions, +and were to be cured by correction of the disproportion by drugs, +these being used as they were themselves hot, cold, moist, or dry; to +add to whichever humours were defective. The chymiques or school of +Paracelsus, held that each disease had an essence which might be got +rid of by being purged or driven from the body by an antagonistic +remedy. + + +PAGE =183=. TO S^r HENRY GOODYERE. + +Goodyere and Walton form between them the Boswell to whom we owe +our fullest and most intimate knowledge of the life of Donne. To +the former he wrote apparently a weekly letter in the years of his +residence at Pyrford, Mitcham, and London. And Goodyere preserved +his letters and his poems. Of the letters published by Donne's son +in 1651-4, the greatest number, as well as the most interesting and +intimate, are addressed to Goodyere. Some appeared with the first +edition of the poems, and it is ultimately to Goodyere that we +probably owe the generally sound text of that edition. + +Sir Henry Goodyere was the son of Sir William Goodyere of Monks Kirby +in Warwickshire, who was knighted by James in 1603, and was the nephew +of Sir Henry Goodyere (1534-95) of Polesworth in Warwickshire. The +older Sir Henry had got into trouble in connexion with one of the +conspiracies on behalf of Mary, Queen of Scots, but redeemed his good +name by excellent service in the Low Countries, where he was knighted +by Leicester. He married Frances, daughter of Hugh Lowther of Lowther, +Westmoreland, and left two daughters, Frances and Anne. The latter, +who succeeded the Countess of Bedford as patroness to the poet Michael +Drayton and as the 'Idea' of his sonnets, married Sir Henry Raynsford. +The former married her cousin, the son of Sir William, and made +him proprietor of Polesworth, to which repeated allusion is made in +Donne's _Letters_. He was knighted, in 1599, in Dublin, by Essex. He +is addressed as a knight by Donne in 1601, and appears as such in +the earliest years of King James. (See Nichol's _Progresses of King +James_.) + +He was a friend of wits and poets and himself wrote occasional +verses in rivalry with his friends. Like Donne he wrote satirical +congratulatory verses for _Coryats Crudities_ (1611) and an elegy +on Prince Henry for the second edition of Sylvester's _Lachrymae +Lachrymarum_ (1613), and there are others in MS., including an +_Epithalamium_ on Princess Elizabeth. + +The estate which Goodyere inherited was apparently encumbered, and he +was himself generous and extravagant. He was involved all his life in +money troubles and frequently petitioned for relief and appointments. +It was to him probably that Donne made a present of one hundred pounds +when his own fortunes had bettered. The date of the present letter was +between 1605 and 1608, when Donne was living at Mitcham. These were +the years in which Goodyere was a courtier. In 1604-5 £120 was stolen +from his chamber 'at Court', and in 1605 he participated in the +jousting at the Barriers. Life at the dissolute and glittering Court +of James I was ruinously extravagant, and the note of warning in +Donne's poem is very audible. Sir Henry Goodyere died in March 1627-8. + +Additional MS. 23229 (_A23_) contains the following: + + Funerall Verses sett on the hearse } of Polesworth. + of Henry Goodere knighte; late } + [March 18. 1627/8 c.] + + Esteemed knight take triumph over deathe, + And over tyme by the eternal fame + Of Natures workes, while God did lende thee breath; + Adornd with witt and skill to rule the same. + But what avayles thy gifts in such degrees + Since fortune frownd, and worlde had spite at these. + + Heaven be thy rest, on earth thy lot was toyle; + Thy private loss, ment to thy countryes gayne, + Bredde grief of mynde, which in thy brest did boyle, + Confyning cares whereof the scarres remayne. + Enjoy by death such passage into lyfe + As frees thee quyte from thoughts of worldly stryfe. + WM. GOODERE. + +Camden transcribes his epitaph: + + An ill yeare of a Goodyere us bereft, + Who gon to God much lacke of him here left; + Full of good gifts, of body and of minde, + Wise, comely, learned, eloquent and kinde. + +The Epitaph is probably by the same author as the _Verses_, a nephew +perhaps. Sir Henry's son predeceased him. + +PAGE =183=, l. 1. It is not necessary to change 'the past' of +_1633-54_ to 'last' with _1669_. 'The past year' is good English for +'last year'. + +PAGE =184=, l. 27. _Goe; whither? Hence; &c._ My punctuation, which +is that of some MSS., follows Donne's usual arrangement in dialogue, +dividing the speeches by semicolons. Chambers's textual note +misrepresents the earlier editions. He attributes to _1633-54_ +the reading, 'Go whither? hence you get'. But they have all 'Goe, +whither?', and _1633_ has 'hence;' _1635-54_ drop this semicolon. +In _1669_ the text runs, 'Goe, whither. Hence you get,' &c. The +semicolon, however, is better than the full stop after 'Hence', as the +following clause is expansive and explanatory: 'Anywhere will do so +long as it is out of this. In such cases as yours, to forget is itself +a gain.' + +l. 34. The modern editors, by dropping the comma after 'asham'd', have +given this line the opposite meaning to what Donne intended. I have +therefore, to avoid ambiguity, inserted one before. Sir Henry Goodyere +is not to be asham'd to imitate his hawk, but is, _through shame_, +to emulate that noble bird by growing more sparing of extravagant +display. 'But the sporte which for that daie Basilius would +principally shewe to Zelmane, was the mounting at a Hearne, which +getting up on his wagling wings with paine ... was now growen to +diminish the sight of himself, and to give example to greate persons, +that the higher they be the lesse they should show.' Sidney's +_Arcadia_, ii. 4. + +Goodyere's fondness for hawking is referred to in one of Donne's prose +letters, 'God send you Hawks and fortunes of a high pitch' (_Letters_, +p. 204), and by Jonson in _Epigram LXXXV_. + +l. 44. _Tables, or fruit-trenchers._ I have let the 'Tables' of +_1633-54_ stand, although 'Fables' has the support of _all_ the MSS. +T is easily confounded with F. In the very next poem _1633-54_ read +'Termers' where I feel sure that 'Farmers' (spelt 'Fermers') is the +correct reading. Moreover, Donne makes several references to the +'morals' of fables: + + The fable is inverted, and far more + A block inflicts now, then a stork before. + _The Calme_, ll. 4-5. + + O wretch, that thy fortunes should moralize + Aesop's fables, and make tales prophesies. + _Satyre V._ + +If 'Tables' is the correct reading, Donne means, I take it, not +portable memorandum books such as Hamlet carried (this is Professor +Norton's explanation), but simply pictures (as in 'Table-book'), +probably Emblems. + + +PAGE =185=. TO M^r ROWLAND WOODWARD. + +Rowland Woodward was a common friend of Donne and Wotton. The fullest +account of Woodward is given by Mr. Pearsall Smith (_The Life and +Letters of Sir Henry Wotton_, 1907). Of his early life unfortunately +he can tell us little or nothing. He seems to have gone to Venice +with Wotton in 1604, at least he was there in 1605. This letter was, +therefore, written probably before that date. One MS., viz. _B_, +states that it was written 'to one that desired some of his papers'. +It is quite likely that Woodward, preparing to leave England, had +asked Donne for copies of his poems, and Donne, now a married man, +and, if not disgraced, yet living in 'a retiredness' at Pyrford or +Camberwell, was not altogether disposed to scatter his indiscretions +abroad. He enjoins privacy in like manner on Wotton when he sends +him some Paradoxes. Donne, it will be seen, makes no reference to +Woodward's going abroad or being in Italy. + +While with Wotton he was sent as a spy to Milan and imprisoned by the +Inquisition. In 1607, while bringing home dispatches, he was attacked +by robbers and left for dead. On Feb. 2, 1608, money was paid to his +brother, Thomas Woodward (the T. W. of several of Donne's _Letters_), +for Rowland's 'surgeons and diets'. In 1608 he entered the service +of the Bishop of London. For subsequent incidents in his career see +Pearsall Smith, op. cit. ii. 481. He died sometime before April 1636. + +It is clear that the MSS. _Cy_, _O'F_, _P_, _S96_ have derived this +poem from a common source, inferior to that from which the _1633_ text +is derived, which has the general support of the best MSS. These MSS. +agree in the readings: 3 'holiness', but _O'F_ corrects, 10 'to use +it,' 13 'whites' _Cy_, _O'F_, 14 'Integritie', but _O'F_ corrects, 33 +'good treasure'. It is clear that a copy of this tradition fell into +the hands of the _1635_ editor. His text is a contamination of the +better and the inferior versions. The strange corruption of 4-6 began +by the mistake of 'flowne' for 'showne'. In _O'F_ and the editions +_1635-54_ the sense is adjusted to this by reading, 'How long loves +weeds', and making the two lines an exclamation. The 'good treasure' +(l. 33) of _1635-69_, which Chambers has adopted, comes from this +source also. The reading at l. 10 is interesting; 'to use it', for 'to +us, it', has obviously arisen from 'to use and love Poetrie' of the +previous verse. In the case of 'seeme but light and thin' we have an +emendation, even in the inferior version, made for the sake of the +metre (which is why Chambers adopted it), for though _Cy_, _O'F_, and +_P_ have it, _S96_ reads: + + Thoughe to use it, seeme and be light and thin. + +l. 2. _a retirednesse._ This reading of some MSS., including _W_, +which is a very good authority for these Letters, is quite possibly +authentic. It is very like Donne to use the article; it was very easy +for a copyist to drop it. Compare the dropping of 'a' before 'span' in +_Crucifying_ (p. 320), l. 8. The use of abstracts as common nouns with +the article, or in the plural, is a feature of Donne's syntax. He does +so in the next line: 'a chast fallownesse'. Again: 'Beloved, it is not +enough to awake out of an ill sleepe of sinne, or of ignorance, or out +of a good sleep, _out of a retirednesse_, and take some profession, if +you winke, or hide your selves, when you are awake.' _Sermons_ 50. +11. 90. 'It is not that he shall have no adversary, nor that that +adversary shall be able to doe him no harm, but that he should have a +refreshing, a respiration, _In velamento alarum_, under the shadow +of Gods wings.' _Sermons_ 80. 66. 670--where also we find 'an +extraordinary sadnesse, a predominant melancholy, a faintnesse of +heart, a chearlessnesse, a joylessnesse of spirit' (Ibid. 672). Donne +does not mean to say that he is 'tied to retirednesse', a recluse. The +letter was not written after he was in orders, but probably, like the +preceding, when he was at Pyrford or Mitcham (1602-8). He is tied to +a degree of retirednesse (compared with his early life) or a period of +retiredness. He does not compare himself to a Nun but to a widow. +Even a third widowhood is not necessarily a final state. 'So all +retirings', he says in a letter to Goodyere, 'into a shadowy life are +alike from all causes, and alike subject to the barbarousnesse and +insipid dulnesse of the Country.' _Letters_, p. 63. But the phrase +here applies primarily to the Nun and the widow. + +l. 3. _fallownesse_; I have changed the full stop of _1633-54_ to a +semicolon here because I take the next three lines to be an adverbial +clause giving the reason why Donne's muse 'affects ... a chast +fallownesse'. The full stop disguises this, and Chambers, by keeping +the full stop here but changing that after 'sown' (l. 6), has thrown +the reference of the clause forward to 'Omissions of good, ill, as ill +deeds bee.'--not a happy arrangement. + +ll. 16-18. _There is no Vertue, &c._ Donne refers here to the Cardinal +Virtues which the Schoolmen took over from Aristotle. There are, +Aquinas demonstrates, four essential virtues of human nature: +'Principium enim formale virtutis, de qua nunc loquimur, est rationis +bonum. Quod quidem dupliciter potest considerari: uno modo secundum +quod in ipsa consideratione consistit; et sic erit una virtus +principalis, quae dicitur _prudentia_. Alio modo secundum quod circa +aliquid ponitur rationis ordo; et hoc vel circa operationes, et sic +est _justitia_; vel circa passiones, et sic necesse est esse duas +virtutes. Ordinem enim rationis necesse est ponere circa passiones, +considerata repugnantia ipsarum ad rationem. Quae quidem potest +esse dupliciter: uno modo secundum quod passio impellit ad aliquid +contrarium rationi; et sic necesse est quod passio reprimatur, et ab +hoc denominatur _temperantia_; alio modo secundum quod passio retrahit +ab eo quod ratio dictat, sicut timor periculorum vel laborum; et sic +necesse est quod homo firmetur in eo quod est rationis, ne recedat; et +ab hoc denominatur _fortitudo_.' _Summa, Prima Secundae_, 61. 2. +Since the Cardinal Virtues thus cover the whole field, what place is +reserved for the Theological Virtues, viz., Faith, Hope, and Charity? +Aquinas's reply is quite definite: 'Virtutes theologicae sunt +supra hominem ... Unde non proprie dicuntur virtutes _humanae_ sed +_suprahumanae_, vel _divinae_.' Ibid., 61. 1. Donne here exclaims that +the cardinal virtues themselves are non-existent without religion. +They are, isolated from religion, habits which any one can assume +who has the discretion to cover his vices. Religion not only gives us +higher virtues but alone gives sincerity to the natural virtues. Donne +is probably echoing St. Augustine, _De Civ. Dei_, xviiii. 25: '_Quod +non possint ibi verae esse virtutes, ubi non est vera religio_. +Quamlibet enim videatur animus corpori et ratio vitiis laudibiliter +imperare, si Deo animus et ratio ipsa non servit, sicut sibi esse +serviendum ipse Deus precepit, nullo modo corpori vitiisque recte +imperat. Nam qualis corporis atque vitiorum potest esse mens domina +veri Dei nescia nec eius imperio subjugata, sed vitiosissimis +daemonibus corrumpentibus prostituta? Proinde virtutes quas habere +sibi videtur per quas imperat corpori et vitiis, ad quodlibet +adipiscendum vel tenendum rettulerit nisi ad Deum, etiam ipsae vitia +sunt potius quam virtutes. Nam licet a quibusdam tunc verae atque +honestae esse virtutes cum referentur ad se ipsas nec propter +aliud expetuntur: etiam tunc inflatae et superbae sunt, et ideo non +virtutes, sed vitia iudicanda sunt. Sicut enim non est a carne sed +super carnem quod carnem facit vivere; sic non est ab homine sed super +hominem quod hominem facit beate vivere: nec solum hominem, sed etiam +quamlibet potestatem virtutemque caelestem.' + +PAGE =186=, ll. 25-7. _You know, Physitians, &c._ Paracelsus refers +more than once to the heat of horse-dung used in 'separations', e.g. +_On the Separations of the Elements from Metals_ he enjoins that when +the metal has been reduced to a liquid substance you must 'add to +one part of this oil two parts of fresh _aqua fortis_, and when it +is enclosed in glass of the best quality, set it in horse-dung for a +month'. + +l. 31. _Wee are but farmers of our selves._ The reading of _1633_ is +'termers', and as in 'Tables' 'Fables' of the preceding poem it is not +easy to determine which is original. 'Termer' of course, in the sense +of 'one who holds for a term' (see O.E.D.), would do. It is the more +general word and would include 'Farmer'. A farmer generally is a +'termer' in the land which he works. I think, however, that the rest +of the verse shows that 'farmer' is used in a more positive sense +than would be covered by 'termer'. The metaphor includes not only +the terminal occupancy but the specific work of the farmer--stocking, +manuring, uplaying. + +Donne's metaphor is perhaps borrowed by Benlowes when he says of the +soul: + + She her own farmer, stock'd from Heav'n is bent + To thrive; care 'bout the pay-day's spent. + Strange! she alone is farmer, farm, and stock, and rent. + +Donne in a sermon for the 5th of November speaks of those who will +have the King to be 'their Farmer of his Kingdome.' _Sermons_ 50. 43. +403. + +It must be remembered that in MS. 'Fermer' and 'Termer' would be +easily interchanged. + +l. 34. _to thy selfe be approv'd._ There is no reason to prefer the +_1669_ 'improv'd' here. To be 'improv'd to oneself' is not a very +lucid phrase. What Donne bids Woodward do is to seek the approval +of his own conscience. His own conscience is contrasted with 'vaine +outward things'. Donne has probably Epictetus in mind: 'How then may +this be attained?--Resolve now if never before, to approve thyself to +thyself; resolve to show thyself fair in God's sight; long to be pure +with thine own pure self and God.' _Golden Sayings_, lxxvi., trans. by +Crossley. + + +PAGE =187=. TO S^r HENRY WOOTTON. + +The date of this letter is given in two MSS. as July 20, 1598. Its +tone is much the same as that of the previous letter (p. 180) and +of both the fourth and fifth _Satyres_. The theme of them all is the +Court. + +l. 2. _Cales or St Michaels tale._ The point of this allusion was +early lost and has been long in being recovered. The spelling 'Calis' +is a little misleading, as it was used both for Calais and for +Cadiz. In Sir Francis Vere's _Commentaries_ (1657) he speaks of 'The +Calis-journey' and the 'Island voiage'. I have taken 'Cales' from some +MSS. as less ambiguous. All the modern editors have printed 'Calais', +and Grosart considers the allusion to be to the Armada, Norton to the +'old wars with France'. The reference is to the Cadiz expedition +and the Island voyage: 'Why should I tell you what we both know?' In +speaking of 'St. Michaels tale' Donne may be referring to the attack +on that particular island, which led to the loss of the opportunity +to capture the plate-fleet. But the 'Islands of St. Michael' was a +synonym for the Azores. 'Thus the ancient Cosmographers do place the +division of the East and Western Hemispheres, that is, the first term +of longitude, in the _Canary_ or fortunate Islands; conceiving these +parts the extreamest habitations Westward: But the Moderns have +altered that term, and translated it unto the _Azores_ or Islands +of St Michael; and that upon a plausible conceit of the small or +insensible variation of the Compass in those parts,' &c. Browne, +_Pseud. Epidem._ vi. 7. + +ll. 10-11. _Fate, (Gods Commissary)_: i.e. God's Deputy or Delegate. +Compare: + + Fate, which God made, but doth not control. + _The Progresse of the Soule_, p. 295, l. 2. + + Great Destiny the Commissary of God + That hast mark'd out a path and period + For every thing ... + Ibid., p. 296, ll. 31 f. + +The idea that Fate or Fortune is the deputy of God in the sphere of +external goods ([Greek: ta ektos agatha], i beni del mondo) is very +clearly expressed by Dante in the _Convivio_, iv. 11, and in the +_Inferno_, vi. 67 f.: '"Master," I said to him, "now tell me also: +this Fortune of which thou hintest to me; what is she, that has the +good things of the world thus within her clutches?" And he to me, "O +foolish creatures, how great is this ignorance that falls upon ye! +Now I wish thee to receive my judgement of her. He whose wisdom +is transcendent over all, made the heavens" (i.e. the nine moving +spheres) "and gave them guides" (Angels, Intelligences); "so that +every part may shine to every part equally distributing the light. In +like manner, for worldly splendours, he ordained a general minister +and guide (ministro e duce); to change betimes the vain possessions, +from people to people, and from one kindred to another, beyond +the hindrance of human wisdom. Hence one people commands, another +languishes; obeying her sentence, which is hidden like the serpent in +the grass. Your knowledge cannot withstand her. She provides, +judges, and maintains her kingdom, as the other gods do theirs. Her +permutations have no truce. Necessity makes her be swift; so oft come +things requiring change. This is she, who is so much reviled, even by +those who ought to praise her, when blaming her wrongfully, and with +evil words. But she is in bliss, and hears it not. With the other +Primal Creatures joyful, she wheels her sphere, and tastes her +blessedness."' Dante finds in this view the explanation of the want of +anything like distributive justice in the assignment of wealth, power, +and worldly glory. Dante speaks here of Fortune, but though in +its original conception at the opposite pole from Fate, Fortune is +ultimately included in the idea of Fate. 'Necessity makes her be +swift.' 'Sed talia maxime videntur esse contingentia quae Fato +attribuuntur.' Aquinas. The relation of Fate or Destiny to God or +Divine Providence is discussed by Boethius, _De Cons. Phil._ IV. +_Prose_ III, whom Aquinas follows, _Summa_, I. cxvi. Ultimately the +immovable Providence of God is the cause of all things; but viewed in +the world of change and becoming, accidents or events are ascribed to +Destiny. 'Uti est ad intellectum ratiocinatio; ad id quod est, id quod +gignitur; ad aeternitatem, tempus; ad punctum medium, circulus; ita +est fati series mobilis ad Providentiae stabilem simplicitatem.' +Boethius. This is clearly what Donne has in view when he calls Destiny +the Commissary of God or declares that God made but doth not control +her. The idea of Fate in Greek thought which Christian Philosophy +had some difficulty in adjusting to its doctrines of freedom +and providence came from the astronomico-religious ideas of the +Chaldaeans. The idea of Fate 'arose from the observation of the +regularity of the sidereal movements'. Franz Cumont, _Astrology and +Religion among the Greeks and Romans_, 1912, pp. 28, 69. + +l. 14. _wishing prayers._ This may be a phrase corresponding to +'bidding prayers', but 'wishing' is comma'd off as a noun in some MSS. +and 'wishes' may be the author's correction. + +PAGE =188=, l. 24. _dull Moralls of a game at Chests._ The comparison +of life and especially politics to a game of chess is probably an old +one. Sancho Panza develops it with considerable eloquence. + + +PAGE =188=. H: W: IN HIBER: BELLIGERANTI. + +This poem is taken from the Burley MS., where it is found along with +a number of poems some of which are by Donne, viz.: the _Satyres_, one +of the _Elegies_, and several of the _Epigrams_. Of the others this +alone has the initials 'J. D.' added in the margin. There can +be little doubt that it is by Donne,--a continuation of the +correspondence of the years 1597-9 to which the last letter and +'Letters more than kisses' belong. In _Life and Letters of Sir Henry +Wotton_ Mr. Pearsall Smith prints what he takes to be a reply to this +letter and the charge of indolence. 'Sir, It is worth my wondering +that you can complain of my seldom writing, when your own letters come +so fearfully as if they tread all the way upon a bog. I have received +from you a few, and almost every one hath a commission to speak of +divers others of their fellows, like you know who in the old comedy +that asks for the rest of his servants. But you make no mention of +any of mine, yet it is not long since I ventured much of my experience +unto you in a long piece of paper, and perhaps not of my credit; it is +that which I sent you by A. R., whereof till you advertise me I shall +live in fits or agues.' After referring to the malicious reports in +circulation regarding the Irish expedition he concludes in the style +of the previous letters: 'These be the wise rules of policy, and of +courts, which are upon earth the vainest places.' + +l. 11. _yong death_: i.e. early death, death that comes to you while +young. + +ll. 13-15. These lines are enough of themselves to prove Donne's +authorship of this poem. Compare _To S^r Henry Goodyere_, p. 183, ll. +17-20. + + +PAGE =189=. TO THE COUNTESSE OF BEDFORD. + +Lucy, Countess of Bedford, occupies the central place among Donne's +noble patrons and friends. No one was more consistently his friend; to +none does he address himselfe in terms of sincerer and more respectful +eulogy. + +The eldest child of John Harington, created by James first Baron +Harington of Exton, was married to Edward, third Earl of Bedford, in +1594 and was a lady in waiting under Elizabeth. She was one of the +group of noble ladies who hastened north on the death of the Queen +to welcome, and secure the favour of, James and Anne of Denmark. Her +father and mother were granted the tutorship of the young Princess +Elizabeth, and she herself was admitted at once as a Lady of the +Chamber. Her beauty and talent secured her a distinguished place +at Court, and in the years that Donne was a prisoner at Mitcham the +Countess was a brilliant figure in more than one of Ben Jonson's +masques. 'She was "the crowning rose" in that garland of English +beauty which the Spanish ambassador desired Madame Beaumont, the Lady +of the French ambassador, to bring with her to an entertainment on the +8th of December, 1603: the three others being Lady Rich, Lady Susan +Vere, and Lady Dorothy (Sidney); "and", says the Lady Arabella +Stewart, "great cheer they had."' Wiffen, _Historical Memoirs of the +House of Russell_, 1833. She figured also in Daniel's Masque, _The +Vision of the Twelve Goddesses_, which was published (1604) with an +explanatory letter addressed to her. In praising her beauty Donne +is thus echoing 'the Catholic voice'. The latest Masque in which she +figured was the _Masque of Queens_, 2nd of February, 1609-10. + +In Court politics the Countess of Bedford seems to have taken some +part in the early promotion of Villiers as a rival to the Earl of +Somerset; and in 1617 she promoted the marriage of Donne's patron Lord +Hay to the youngest daughter of the Earl of Northumberland, against +the wish of the bride's father. Match-making seems to have been a +hobby of hers, for in 1625 she was an active agent in arranging the +match between James, Lord Strange, afterwards Earl of Derby, and Lady +Charlotte de la Trémouille, the heroic Countess of Derby who defended +Lathom House against the Roundheads. + +An active and gay life at Court was no proof of the want of a more +serious spirit. Lady Bedford was a student and a poet, and the patron +of scholars and poets. Sir Thomas Roe presented her with coins and +medals; and Drayton, Daniel, Jonson, and Donne were each in turn among +the poets whom she befriended and who sang her praises. She loved +gardens. One of Donne's finest lyrics is written in the garden of +Twickenham Park, which the Countess occupied from 1608 to 1617; and +the laying out of the garden at Moore Park in Hertfordshire, where she +lived from 1617 to her death in 1627, is commended by her successor in +that place, Sir William Temple. + +Donne seems to have been recommended to Lady Bedford by Sir Henry +Goodyere, who was attached to her household. He mentions the death +of her son in a letter to Goodyere as early as 1602, but his intimacy +with the Countess probably began in 1608, and most of his verse +letters were written between that date and 1614. Donne praises her +beauty and it may be that in some of his lyrics he plays the part +of the courtly lover, but what his poems chiefly emphasize is the +religious side of her character. If my conjecture be right that she +herself wrote 'Death be not proud', her religion was probably of +a simpler, more pietistic cast than Donne's own was in its earlier +phase. + +In 1612 the Countess had a serious illness which began on November +22-3 (II. p. 10). She recovered in time to take part in the ceremonies +attending the wedding of the Princess Elizabeth (Feb. 14, 1612/3), +but Chamberlain in his letters to Carleton notes a change in her +behaviour. After mentioning an accident to the Earl of Bedford he +continues: 'His lady who should have gone to the Spa but for lack of +money, shows herself again in court, though in her sickness she in a +manner vowed never to come there; but she verifies the proverb, _Nemo +ex morbo melior_. Marry, she is somewhat reformed in her attire, and +forbears painting, which, they say, makes her look somewhat strangely +among so many vizards, which together with their frizzled, powdered +hair, makes them look all alike, so that you can scant know one from +another at the first view.' Birch, _The Court and Times of James the +First_, i. 262. Donne makes no mention of this illness, but it seems +to me probable that the first two of these letters, with the emphasis +which they lay on beauty, were written before, the other more serious +and pious verses after this crisis. + +See notes on _Twicknam Garden_ and the _Nocturnall on St. Lucies Day_. + +PAGE =189=, ll. 4-5. _light ... faire faith._ I have retained the +'light' and 'faire faith' of the editions, but the MS. readings +'sight' and 'farr Faith' are quite possibly correct. There is not much +to choose between 'light' and 'sight', but 'farr' is an interesting +reading. Indeed at first sight 'fair' is a rather otiose epithet, a +vaguely complimentary adjective. There is, however, probably more +in it than that. 'Fair' as an epithet of 'Faith' is probably +an antithesis to the 'squint ungracious left-handedness' of +understanding. If 'farr' be the right reading, then Donne is +contrasting faith and sight: 'Now faith is the substance of things +hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.' Heb. xi. 1. The use of +'far' as an adjective is not uncommon: 'Pulling far history nearer,' +Crashaw; 'His own far blood,' Tennyson; 'Far travellers may lie by +authority,' Gataker (1625), are some examples quoted in the O.E.D. +But there is no parallel to Donne's use of 'far faith' for 'faith +that lays hold on things at a distance'. 'These all died in faith, not +having received the promises, but having seen them afar off', Heb. xi. +13, is probably the source of the phrase. Such a condensed elliptical +construction is quite in Donne's manner. Compare 'Neere death', p. 28, +l. 63. Both versions may be original. The variants in l. 19 point to +some revision of the poem. + +PAGE =190=, l. 22. _In every thing there naturally grows, &c._ +'Every thing hath in it as, as Physicians use to call it, _Naturale +Balsamum_, a naturall Balsamum, which, if any wound or hurt which that +creature hath received, be kept clean from extrinseque putrefaction, +will heal of itself. We are so far from that naturall Balsamum, as +that we have a naturall poyson in us, Originall sin:' &c. _Sermons_ +80. 32. 313. + +'Now Physitians say, that man hath in his Constitution, in his +Complexion, a naturall Vertue, which they call _Balsamum suum_, his +owne Balsamum, by which, any wound which a man could receive in +his body, would cure itself, if it could be kept cleane from the +annoiances of the aire, and all extrinseque encumbrances. Something +that hath some proportion and analogy to this Balsamum of the body, +there is in the soul of man too: The soule hath _Nardum suum_, her +Spikenard, as the Spouse says, _Nardus mea dedit odorem suum_, she +hath a spikenard, a perfume, a fragrancy, a sweet savour in her +selfe. For _virtutes germanius attingunt animam, quam corpus sanitas_, +vertuous inclinations, and disposition to morall goodness, is more +naturall to the soule of man, and nearer of kin to the soule of man, +then health is to the body. And then if we consider bodily health, +_Nulla oratio, nulla doctrinae formula nos docet morbum odisse_, sayes +that Father: There needs no Art, there needs no outward Eloquence, to +persuade a man to be loath to be sick: _Ita in anima inest naturalis +et citra doctrinam mali evitatio_, sayes he: So the soule hath a +naturall and untaught hatred, and detestation of that which is evill,' +&c. _Sermons_ 80. 51. 514. + +Paracelsus has a great deal to say about this natural balsam, though +he declares that 'the spirit is _most_ truly the life and balsome of +all Corporeal things'. It was to supply the want of this balsam that +mummy was used as a medicine. Of a man suddenly slain Paracelsus says: +'His whole body is profitable and good and may be prepared into a most +precious Mummie. For, although the spirit of life went out of such a +Body, yet the Balsome, in which lies the Life, remains, which doth as +Balsome preserve other mens.' + +l. 27. _A methridate_: i.e. an antidote. See note to p. 255, l. 127. + +ll. 31-2. _The first good Angell, &c._ 'Our first consideration +is upon the persons; and those we finde to be Angelicall women and +Evangelicall Angels: ... And to recompense that observation, that +never good Angel appeared in the likenesse of woman, here are good +women made Angels, that is, Messengers, publishers of the greatest +mysteries of our Religion.' _Sermons_ 80. 25. 242. + + ll. 35-6. _Make your returne home gracious; and bestow + This life on that; so make one life of two._ + +'Make a present of this life to the next, by living now as you will +live then; and so make this life and the next one'--or, as another +poet puts it: + + And so make life, death, and that vast forever + One grand, sweet song. + +This I take to be Donne's meaning. The 'This' of _1635-69_ and +the MSS., which Chambers also has adopted, seems required by the +antithesis. If one recalls that 'this' is very commonly written +'thys', and that final 's' is little more than a tail, it is easy to +account for 'Thy' in _1633_. The meaning too is not clear at a glance, +and 'Thy' might seem to an editor to make it easier. The thought is +much the same as in the _Obsequies to the Lord Harrington_, p. 279. + + And I (though with paine) + Lessen our losse, to magnifie thy gaine + Of triumph, when I say, It was more fit, + That all men should lacke thee, then thou lack it. + +Compare also: 'Sir, our greatest businesse is more in our power then +the least, and we may be surer to meet in heaven than in any place +upon earth.' _Letters_, p. 188. And see the quotation in note to p. +112, l. 44, 'this and the next are not two worlds,' &c. + + +PAGE =191=. TO THE COUNTESSE OF BEDFORD. + +ll. 1-6. The sense of this verse, carefully and correctly printed in +the 1633 edition, was obscured if not corrupted by the insertion of +a semicolon after 'Fortune' in the later editions. The correct +punctuation was restored in 1719, which was followed in subsequent +editions until Grosart returned to that of the 1635-39 editions (which +the Grolier Club editor also adopts), and Chambers completed the +confusion by printing the lines thus, + + You have refined me, and to worthiest things-- + Virtue, art, beauty, fortune. + +Even Mr. Gosse has been misled into quoting this truncated and +enigmatical compliment to Lady Bedford, regarding it, I presume, as of +the same nature as Shakespeare's lines, + + Spirits are not finely touch'd, + But to fine issues. + +But this has a meaning; what meaning is there in saying that a man is +refined to 'beauty and fortune'? Poor Donne was not likely to boast +of either at this time. What he says is something quite different, and +strikes the key-note of the poem. 'You have refined and sharpened my +judgement, and now I see that the worthiest things owe their value +to rareness or use. Value is nothing intrinsic, but depends on +circumstances.' This, the next two verses add, explains why at Court +it is your virtue which transcends, in the country your beauty. To +Donne the country is always dull and savage; the court the focus of +wit and beauty, though not of virtue. On the relative nature of all +goodness he has touched in the _Progresse of the Soule_, p. 316, ll. +518-20: + + There's nothing simply good nor ill alone; + Of every quality Comparison + The only measure is, and judge, Opinion. + +With the sentiment regarding Courts compare: 'Beauty, in courts, is +so necessary to the young, that those who are without it, seem to be +there to no other purpose than to wait on the triumphs of the fair; to +attend their motions in obscurity, as the moon and stars do the sun +by day; or at best to be the refuge of those hearts which others have +despised; and by the unworthiness of both to give and take a miserable +comfort.' Dryden, Dedication of the _Indian Emperor_. + +ll. 8-9. (_Where a transcendent height, (as lownesse mee) + Makes her not be, or not show_) + +I have completed the enclosure of (Where ... show) in brackets which +_1633_ began but forgot to carry out. The statement is parenthetical, +and it is of the essence of Donne's wit to turn aside in one +parenthesis to make another, dart from one distracting thought to +a further, returning at the end to the main track. He has left the +Countess for a moment to explain why the Court 'is not Vertues clime'. +She is too transcendent to be, or at any rate to be seen there, as +I (he adds, quite irrelevantly) am too low. Then taking up again the +thought of the first line he continues: 'all my rhyme is claimed +there by your vertues, for _there_ rareness gives them value. I am the +comment on what _there_ is a dark text; the usher who announces one +that is a stranger.' + +For brackets within brackets compare: 'And yet it is imperfect which +is taught by that religion which is most accommodate to sense (I dare +not say to reason (though it have appearance of that too) because +none may doubt but that that religion is certainly best which is +reasonablest) That all mankinde hath one protecting Angel; all +Christians one other, all English one other, all of one Corporation +and every civill coagulation or society one other; and every man one +other.' _Letters_, p. 43. + +l. 13. _To this place_: i.e. Twickenham. _O'F_ heads the poem _To the +Countesse of Bedford, Twitnam_. The poem is written to welcome her +home. See l. 70. + +The development of Donne's subtle and extravagant conceits is a little +difficult. The Countess is the sun which exhales the sweetness of the +country when she comes thither (13-18). Apparently the Countess +has returned to Twickenham in Autumn, perhaps arriving late in the +evening. When she emerges from her chariot it is the breaking of a new +day, the beginning of a new year or new world. Both the Julian and the +Gregorian computations are thus falsified (19-22). It shows her truth +to nature that she will not suffer a day which begins at a stated +hour, but only one that begins with the actual appearance of the light +(23-4: a momentary digression). Since she, the Sun, has thus come to +Twickenham, the Court is made the Antipodes. While the 'vulgar sun' is +an Autumnal one, this Sun which is in Spring, receives our sacrifices. +Her priests, or instruments, we celebrate her (25-30). Then Donne +draws back from the religious strain into which he is launching. He +will not sing Hymns as to a Deity, but offer petitions as to a King, +that he may view the beauty of this Temple, and not as Temple, but as +Edifice. The rest of the argument is simpler. + +l. 60. _The same thinge._ The singular of the MSS. seems to be +required by 'you cannot two'. The 's' of the editions is probably +due to the final 'e'. But 'things' is the reading of _Lec_, the MS. +representing most closely that from which _1633_ was printed. + +ll. 71-2. _Who hath seene one, &c._ 'Who hath seen one, e.g. +Twickenham, which your dwelling there makes a Paradise, would fain see +you too, as whoever had been in Paradise would not have failed to seek +out the Cherubim.' The construction is elliptical. Compare: + + Wee'had had a Saint, have now a holiday. + + P. 286, l. 44. + +The Cherubim are specially mentioned (although the Seraphim are the +highest order) because they are traditionally the beautiful angels: +'The Spirit of Chastity ... in the likenesse of a faire beautifull +Cherubine.' Bacon, _New Atlantis_ (1658), 22 (O.E.D.). + + +PAGE =193=. TO S^r EDWARD HERBERT. AT IULYERS. + +Edward Herbert, first Baron of Cherbury (1563-1648), the eldest son of +Donne's friend Mrs. Magdalen Herbert, had not long returned from his +first visit to France when he set out again in 1610 with Lord Chandos +'to pass to the city of Juliers which the Prince of Orange resolved to +besiege. Making all haste thither we found the siege newly begun; the +Low Country army assisted by 4,000 English under the command of +Sir Edward Cecil. We had not long been there when the Marquis de +la Chartre, instead of Henry IV, who was killed by that villain +Ravaillac, came with a brave French army thither'. _Autobiography_, +ed. Sidney Lee. The city was held by the Archduke Leopold for the +Emperor. The Dutch, French, and English were besieging the town in the +interest of the Protestant candidates, the Elector of Brandenburg, and +the Palatine of Neuburg. The siege marked the beginning of the Thirty +Years' War. Herbert was a man of both ability and courage but of +a vanity which outweighed both. Donne's letter humours both his +Philosophical pose and his love of obscurity and harshness in poetry. +His own poems with a few exceptions are intolerably difficult and +unmusical, and Jonson told Drummond that 'Donne said to him he wrote +that Epitaph upon Prince Henry, _Look to me Faith_, to match Sir Ed. +Herbert in obscureness'. (Jonson's _Conversations_, ed. Laing.) The +poems have been reprinted by the late Professor Churton Collins. In +1609 when Herbert was in England he and Donne both wrote Elegies on +Mistress Boulstred. + +l. 1. _Man is a lumpe, &c._ The image of the beasts Donne has borrowed +from Plato, _The Republic_, ix. 588 B-E. + +PAGE =194=, ll. 23-6. A food which to chickens is harmless poisons +men. Our own nature contributes the factor which makes a food into a +poison either corrosive or killing by intensity of heat or cold: +'Et hic nota quod tantus est ordo naturae, ut quod est venenosum et +inconveniens uni est utile et conveniens alteri; sicut jusquiamus +qui est cibus passeris licet homini sit venenosus; et sicut napellus +interficit hominem solum portatus, et mulierem praegnantem non laesit +manducatus, teste Galieno; et mus qui pascitur napello est tiriaca +contra napellum.' Benvenuto on Dante, _Div. Comm._: _Paradiso_, i. The +plants here mentioned are henbane and aconite. Concerning hemlock the +O.E.D. quotes Swan, _Spec. M._ vi. § 4 (1643), 'Hemlock ... is meat to +storks and poison to men.' Donne probably uses the word 'chickens' as +equivalent to 'young birds', not for the young of the domestic +fowl. For the cold of the hemlock see Persius, _Sat._ v. 145; Ovid, +_Amores_, iii. 7. 13; and Juvenal, _Sat._ vii. 206, a reference to +Socrates' gift from the Athenians of 'gelidas ... cicutas'. + +ll. 31-2. _Thus man, that might be'his pleasure, &c._ These lines +are condensed and obscure. The 'his' must mean 'his own'. 'Man who in +virtue of that gift of reason which makes him man might be to himself +a source of joy, becomes instead, by the abuse of reason, his own rod. +Reason which should be the God directing his life becomes the devil +which misleads him.' Chambers prints 'His pleasure', 'His rod', +referring 'his' to God--which seems hardly possible. + +ll. 34-8. _wee'are led awry, &c._ Chambers's punctuation of this +passage is clearly erroneous: + + we're led awry + By them, who man to us in little show, + Greater than due; no form we can bestow + On him, for man into himself can draw + All; + +This must mean that we are led astray by those who, in their +abridgement of man, still show him to us greater than he really is. +But this is the opposite of what Donne says. 'Greater than due' goes +with 'no form'. Compare: + +'And therefore the Philosopher draws man into too narrow a table, when +he says he is _Microcosmos_, an Abridgement of the world in little: +_Nazianzen_ gives him but his due, when he calls him _Mundum Magnum_, +a world to which all the rest of the world is but subordinate: For +all the world besides, is but God's Foot-stool; Man sits down upon his +right-hand,' &c. _Sermons_ 26. 25. 370. + +'It is too little to call Man a little world; Except God, Man is a +diminutive to nothing. Man consists of more pieces, more parts, than +the world; than the world doth, nay than the world is.' _Devotions +upon Emergent Occasions, &c._ (1624), p. 64. + +On the other hand the Grolier Club editor has erroneously followed +_1635-69_ in altering the full stop after 'chaw' to a comma; and has +substituted a semicolon for the comma after 'fill' (l. 39), reading: + + for man into himself can draw + All; all his faith can swallow or reason chaw, + All that is filled, and all that which doth fill; + +But 'All that is fill'd,' &c. is not _object_ to 'can draw'. It is +_subject_ (in apposition with 'All the round world') to 'is but a +pill'. + +PAGE =195=, l. 47. _This makes it credible._ I have changed the comma +after 'credible' to a semicolon to avoid the misapprehension, into +which the Grolier Club editor seems to have fallen, that what is +credible is 'that you have dwelt upon all worthy books'. It is because +Lord Herbert has dwelt upon all worthy books that it is credible that +he knows man. + + +PAGE =195=. TO THE COUNTESSE OF BEDFORD. + +l. 1. _T'have written then, &c._ This is one of the most difficult of +Donne's poems. With his usual strain of extravagant compliment Donne +has interwoven some of his deepest thought and most out-of-the-way +theological erudition and scientific lore. Moreover the poem is one +of those for which the MS. resembling _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ was not +available. The text of _1633_ was taken from a MS. belonging to the +group _A18_, _N_, _TCC_, _TCD_, and contains several errors. Some of +these were corrected in _1635_ from _O'F_ or a MS. resembling it, +but in the most vital case what was a right but difficult reading in +_1633_ was changed for an apparently easier but erroneous reading. + +The emendations which I have accepted from _1635_ are-- + +l. 5. 'debt' for 'doubt'. + +l. 7. '_nothings_' for '_nothing_'. + +l. 20. 'or all It; You.' for 'or all, in you.' There is not much +to choose between the two, but 'the world's best all' is not a very +logical expression. But the _1633_ reading may mean 'the world's +best part, or the world's all,--you.' The alteration of _1635_ is not +necessary, but looks to me like the author's own emendation. + +l. 4. _Then worst of civill vices, thanklessenesse._ 'Naturall and +morall men are better acquainted with the duty of gratitude, of +thankesgiving, before they come to the Scriptures, then they are +with the other duty of repentance which belongs to Prayer; for in all +_Solomons_ bookes, you shall not finde halfe so much of the duty of +thankefulnesse, as you shall in _Seneca_ and in _Plutarch_. No book of +Ethicks, of moral doctrine, is come to us, where there is not, almost +in every leafe, some detestation, some Anathema against ingratitude.' +_Sermons_ 80. 55. 550. + +PAGE =197=, l. 54. _Wee (but no forraine tyrants could) remove._ +Following the hint of _O'F_, I have bracketed all these words to show +that the verb to 'Wee' is 'remove', not 'could remove'. + +ll. 57-8. _For, bodies shall from death redeemed bee, + Soules but preserved, not naturally free._ + +Here the later editions change 'not' to 'borne', and the correction +has been accepted by Grosart and Chambers. But _1633_ is right. If +'not' be changed, the force of the antithesis is lost. What is 'borne +free' does not need to be preserved. What Donne expresses is a form +of the doctrine of conditional immortality. In a sermon on the +Penitential Psalms (_Sermons_ 80. 53. 532) he says: 'We have a full +cleerenesse of the state of the soule after this life, not only above +those of the old Law, but above those of the Primitive Christian +Church, which, in some hundreds of years, came not to a cleere +understanding in that point, whether the soule were immortall by +nature, or but by preservation, whether the soule could not die +or only should not die,' &c. Here the antithesis between 'being +preserved' and 'being naturally free' (i.e. immortal) is presented as +sharply as in this line of the verse _Letter_. But Donne states +the doctrine tentatively 'because that perchance may be without any +constant cleerenesse yet'. Elsewhere he seems to accept it: 'And for +the Immortality of the Soule, it is safelier said to be immortall by +preservation, then immortal, by nature; That God keepes it from dying, +then, that it cannot dye.' _Sermons_ 80. 27. 269. This makes the +correct reading of the line quite certain. + +The tenor of Donne's thought seems to me to be as follows: He is +speaking of the soul's eclipse by the body (ll. 40-2), by the body +which should itself be an organ of the soul's life, of prayer as well +as labour (ll. 43-8). He returns in ll. 49-52 to the main theme of the +body's corrupting influence, and this leads him to a new thought. It +is not only the soul which suffers by this absorption in the body, but +the body itself: + + What hate could hurt our bodies like our love? + +By this descent of the soul into the body we deprive the latter of +its proper dignity, to be the Casket, Temple, Palace of the Soul. +Then Donne turns aside to enforce the dignity of the Body. It will be +redeemed from death, and the Soul is only preserved. No more than +the Body is the Soul naturally immortal. These lines are almost +a parenthesis. The poet returns once more to his main theme, the +degradation of the soul by our exclusive regard for the body. + +Thus the deepest thought of Donne's poetry, his love poetry and +his religious poetry, emerges here again. He will not accept the +antithesis between soul and body. The dignity of the body is hardly +less than that of the soul. But we cannot exalt the body at the +expense of the soul. If we immerse the soul in the body it is not the +soul alone which suffers but the body also. In the highest spiritual +life, as in the fullest and most perfect love, body and soul are +complementary, are merged in each other; and after death the life +of the soul is in some measure incomplete, the end for which it was +created is not obtained until it is reunited to the body. 'Yet have +not those Fathers, nor those Expositors, who have in this text, +acknowledged a Resurrection of the soule, mistaken nor miscalled the +matter. Take _Damascens_ owne definition of Resurrection: _Resurrectio +est ejus quod cecidit secunda surrectio_: A Resurrection is a second +rising to that state, from which anything is formerly fallen. Now +though by death, the soule do not fall into any such state, as that it +can complaine, (for what can that lack, which God fils?) yet by death, +the soule fals from that, for which it was infused, and poured into +man at first; that is to be the forme of that body, the King of that +Kingdome; and therefore, when in the generall Resurrection, the soule +returns to that state, for which it was created, and to which it hath +had an affection, and a desire, even in the fulnesse of the Joyes of +Heaven, then, when the soule returns to her office, to make up +the man, because the whole man hath, therefore the soule hath a +Resurrection: not from death, but from a deprivation of her former +state; that state which she was made for, and is ever enclined to.' +_Sermons_ 80. 19. 189. + +Here, as before, Donne is probably following St. Augustine, who +combats the Neo-Platonic view (to which mediaeval thought tended to +recur) that a direct source of evil was the descent of the soul into +the body. The body is not essentially evil. It is not the body as such +that weighs down the soul (aggravat animam), but the body corrupted +by sin: 'Nam corruptio corporis ... non peccati primi est causa, sed +poena; nec caro corruptibilis animam peccatricem, sed anima peccatrix +fecit esse corruptibilem carnem.' In the Resurrection we desire not +to escape from the body but to be clothed with a new body,--'nolumus +corpore exspoliari, sed ejus immortalitate vestiri.' Aug. _De Civ. +Dei_, xiv. 3, 5. He cites St. Paul, 2 Cor. v. 1-4. + +l. 59. _As men to our prisons, new soules to us are sent, &c._: 'new' +is the reading of _1633_ only, 'now' followed or preceded by a comma +of the other editions and the MSS. It is difficult to decide between +them, but Donne speaks of 'new souls' elsewhere: 'The Father creates +new souls every day in the inanimation of Children, and the Sonne +creates them with him.' _Sermons_ 50. 12. 100. 'Our nature is +Meteorique, we respect (because we partake so) both earth and heaven; +for as our bodies glorified shall be capable of spirituall joy, so +our souls demerged into those bodies, are allowed to partake earthly +pleasure. Our soul is not sent hither, only to go back again; we have +some errand to do here; nor is it sent into prison, because it comes +innocent; and he which sent it, is just.' _Letters_ (1651), p. 46. + +l. 68. _Two new starres._ See Introductory Note to _Letters_. + +PAGE =198=, l. 72. _Stand on two truths_: i.e. the wickedness of the +world and your goodness. You will believe neither. + + +PAGE =198=. TO THE COUNTESSE OF BEDFORD. + ON NEW-YEARES DAY. + +l. 3. _of stuffe and forme perplext_: i.e. whose matter and form are a +perplexed, intricate, difficult question: + + Whose _what_, and _where_ in disputation is. + +Donne cannot mean that the matter and form are 'intricately +intertwined or intermingled', using the words as in Bacon: 'The +formes of substances (as they are now by compounding and transplanting +multiplied) are so perplexed.' Bacon, _Adv. Learn._ ii. 7. § 5. The +question of meteors in all their forms was one of great interest and +great difficulty to ancient science. Seneca, who gathers up most of +what has been said before him, recurs to the subject again and again. +See the _Quaestiones Naturales_, i. 1, and elsewhere. Aristotle, he +says, attributes them to exhalations from the earth heated by the +sun's rays. They are at any rate not falling stars, or parts of stars, +but 'have their origin below the stars, and--being without solid +foundation or fixed abode--quickly perish'. But there was great +uncertainty as to their _what_ and _where_. Donne compares himself to +them in the uncertainty of his position and worldly affairs. 'Wind is +a mixt Meteor, to the making whereof divers occasions concurre with +exhalations.' _Sermons_ 80. 31. 305. + +PAGE =199=, l. 19. _cherish, us doe wast._ The punctuation of _1633_ +is odd at the first glance, but accurate. If with all the later +editions one prints 'cherish us, doe wast', the suggestion is that +'wast' is intransitive--'in cherishing us they waste themselves,' +which is not Donne's meaning. It is us they waste. + +PAGE =200=, l. 44. _Some pitty._ I was tempted to think that Lowell's +conjecture of 'piety' for 'pitty' must be right, the more so that the +spelling of the two words was not always differentiated. But it is +improbable that Donne would say that 'piety' in the sense of piety +to God could ever be out of place. What he means is probably that at +Court pity, which elsewhere is a virtue, may not be so if it induces a +lady to lend a relenting ear to the complaint of a lover. + + Beware faire maides of musky courtiers oathes + Take heed what giftes and favors you receive, + . . . . . . . . . + Beleeve not oathes or much protesting men, + Credit no vowes nor no bewayling songs. + Joshua Sylvester (_attributed to_ Donne). + +What follows is ambiguous. As punctuated in _1633_ the lines run: + + some vaine disport, + On this side, sinne: with that place may comport. + +This must mean, practically repeating what has been said: 'Some vain +amusements which, on this side of the line separating the cloister +from the Court, would be sin; are on that side, in the Court, +becoming--amusements, sinful in the cloister, are permissible at +Court.' The last line thus contains a sharp antithesis. But can 'on +this side' mean 'in the cloister'? Donne is not writing from the +cloister, and if he had been would say 'In this place'. 'Faith', +he says elsewhere, 'is not on this side Knowledge but beyond it.' +_Sermons_ 50. 36. 325. This is what he means here, and I have so +punctuated it, following _1719_ and subsequent editions: 'Some vain +disport, so long as it falls short of actual sin, is permissible at +Court.' + +l. 48. _what none else lost_: i.e. innocence. Others never had it. + + +PAGE =201=. TO THE COUNTESSE OF HUNTINGDON. + +Elizabeth Stanley, daughter of Ferdinando, fifth Earl of Derby, +married Henry Hastings, fifth Earl of Huntingdon, in 1603. Her +mother's second husband was Sir Thomas Egerton, whom Lady Derby +married in 1600. Donne was then Egerton's secretary, and in lines +57-60 he refers to his early acquaintance with her, then Lady Alice +Stanley. If the letter in _Appendix A_, p. 417, 'That unripe side', +&c., be also by Donne, and addressed to the Countess of Huntingdon, +it must have been written earlier than this letter, which belongs +probably to the period immediately before Donne's ordination. + +l. 13. _the Magi._ The MSS. give _Magis_, and in _The First +Anniversary_ (l. 390) Donne writes, 'The Aegyptian Mages'. The +argument of the verse is: 'As such a miraculous star led the Magi to +the infant Christ, so may the beams of virtue transmitted by your fame +guide fit souls to the knowledge of virtue; and indeed none are so bad +that they may not be thus led. Your light can illumine and guide the +darkest.' + +l. 18. _the Sunnes fall._ In Autumn? or does Donne refer to the fall +of the sun to the centre in the new Astronomy? In the _Letters_, p. +102, he says that 'Copernicisme in the Mathematiques hath carried +earth farther up from the stupid Center; and yet not honoured it, +because for the necessity of appearances, it hath carried heaven so +much higher from it'. Compare _An Anatomie of the World_, l. 274. + +PAGE 202, l. 25. _She guilded us: But you are gold, and Shee;_ +The _1633_ reading is the more pregnant, and therefore the more +characteristic of Donne. 'She guilded us, but you she changed into +_her own_ substance.' The _1635_ reading implies transubstantiation, +but does not indicate so clearly the identity of the new substance +with virtue's own essence. + +ll. 33-6. _Else being alike pure, &c._ This verse follows in the +closest way on what has gone before, and should not be separated from +it by a full stop as in Chambers and Grolier. The last line of this +stanza concludes the whole argument which began at l. 29. 'The high +grace of virginity indeed is not yours, because virtue, having made +you one with herself, wished in you to reveal herself. Virtue and +Virginity are each too pure for earthly vision. As air and aqueous +vapour are each invisible till both are changed into thickened air or +cloud, so virtue becomes manifest in you as mother and wife. It is for +_our_ sake you take these low names.' + +ll. 41-4. _So you, as woman, one doth comprehend, &c._ 'One, your +husband, comprehends your being. To others it is revealed, but under +the veil of kindred; to still others of friendship; to me, who stand +more remote, under the relationship of prince to subject.' + +l. 47. _I, which doe soe._ The edition of 1633 reads, 'I, which to +you', making a logical and grammatical construction of the sentence +impossible. The editor has failed to note that the personal reference +of 'owe' is supplied in l. 45, 'To whom'. 'I, which doe so' means 'I, +who contemplate you'. + + +PAGE =203=. TO M^r T. W. + +_To M^r T. W._ The group of letters which begins with this I have +arranged according to the order in which they are found in _W_, Mr. +Gosse's Westmoreland MS. In this MS. a better text of these poems is +given than that of _1633_; lines are supplied which have been dropped, +and a few whole letters. The series contains also a reply to one of +Donne's letters. For these reasons it seems to me preferable to follow +an order which _may_ correspond to the order of composition. + +In _1633_, which follows _A18_, _N_, _TCC_, _TCD_, the letters are +headed M. T. W., M. R. W., &c., 'M' standing, as often, for 'Mr.' +Seeing, however, that 'Mr.' is the general form in _W_, I have used it +as clearer. + +The first of the letters has been headed hitherto To M. I. W., and +Mr. Chambers conjectured that the person addressed _might_ be Izaak +Walton. It is clear from the other MSS. that _A18_, _N_, _TC_, which +_1633_ follows, is wrong and that I. W. should be T. W., Thomas +Woodward. The T and I of this MS. are very similar, though +distinguishable. Unfortunately we know nothing more of Thomas Woodward +than that he was Rowland's brother and Donne's friend. The 'sweet +Poet' must not be taken too seriously. Donne and his friends were +corresponding with one another in verse, and complimenting each other +in the polite fashion of the day. + +PAGE =204=, ll. 13-16. _But care not for me, &c._ These lines form a +crux in the textual criticism of Donne's poetry. I shall print them as +they stand in _W_: + + But care not for mee: I y^t ever was + In natures & in fortunes guifts alas + Before thy grace got in the Muses schoole + A monster & a begger, am now a foole. + +Some copies of the 1633 edition (including those used by myself and by +the Grolier Club editor) print these words, but obscure the meaning +by bracketing 'alas ... schoole'. Other copies (e.g. that used by +Chambers) insert after 'Before' a 'by', which the Grolier Club editor +also does as a conjecture. The 1635 editor, probably following _O'F_, +resorted to another device to clear up the sense and changed 'Before' +to 'But for', which Grosart and Chambers follow. The majority of +the MSS., however, agree with _W_, and the case illustrates well the +difficulties which beset an eclectic use of the editions. + +If the bracket in _1633_ is dropt, or rearranged as in the text, the +reading is correct and intelligible. The printers and editors have +been misled by Donne's phrase, 'In Natures, and in Fortunes gifts'. +They took this to go with 'A monster and a beggar': 'I that ever was +a monster and a beggar in Natures and in Fortunes gifts.' This is a +strange expression, taken, I suppose, to mean that Donne never enjoyed +the blessings either of Nature or of Fortune. But what Donne says +is somewhat different. The phrase 'I that ever was in Natures and +in Fortunes gifts' means 'I that ever was the Almsman of Nature and +Fortune'. Donne is using metaphorically a phrase of which the O.E.D. +quotes a single instance: 'I live in Henry the 7th's Gifts' (i.e. +his Almshouses). T. Barker, _The Art of Angling_ (1651). The whole +sentence might be paraphrased thus: 'I, who was ever the Almsman of +Nature and Fortune, am now a fool.' Parenthetically he adds, 'Till +thy grace begot me, a monster and a beggar, in the Muses' school'. +Possibly 'and a beggar' should be left outside the brackets and taken +with 'In Natures and in Fortunes gifts': 'I, that _was_ an almsman +and beggar, was by you begotten a poet, though a monstrous one;' +('monster' goes properly with 'got') 'and am now a fool'--possibly the +last allusion is to his rash marriage. Donne's prose and verse of +the years following 1601 are full of this melancholy depreciation of +himself and his lot. Daniel calls himself the + + Orphan of Fortune, borne to be her scorne. + _Delia_, 26. + +Compare also: + + O I am fortune's fool. + Shakespeare, _Romeo and Juliet_, III. i. 129. + + Let your study + Be to content your lord, who hath received you + At fortune's alms. + Shakespeare, _King Lear_, I. i. 277-9. + + So shall I clothe me in a forced content, + And shut myself up in some other course, + To fortune's alms. + Shakespeare, _Othello_, III. iv. 120-2. + +In _W_ 'All haile sweet Poet' is followed at once by these lines, +presumably written by Thomas Woodward and possibly in reply to the +above. They are found standing by themselves in _B_, _O'F_, _P_, +_S96_. In these they are apparently ascribed to Donne. I print from +_W_: + +TO M^r J. D. + + Thou sendst me prose and rimes, I send for those + Lynes, which, being neither, seem or verse or prose. + They'are lame and harsh, and have no heat at all + But what thy Liberall beams on them let fall. + The nimble fyre which in thy braynes doth dwell + Is it the fyre of heaven or that of hell? + It doth beget and comfort like Heavens eye, + And like hells fyre it burnes eternally. + And those whom in thy fury and judgment + Thy verse shall skourge like hell it will torment. + Have mercy on mee and my sinfull Muse + Which rub'd and tickled with thine could not chuse + But spend some of her pith, and yeild to bee + One in that chaste and mistique Tribadree. + Bassaes adultery no fruit did Leave, + Nor theirs, which their swollen thighs did nimbly weave, + And with new armes and mouths embrace and kiss, + Though they had issue was not like to this. + Thy muse, Oh strange and holy Lecheree + Being a mayde still, gott this song on mee. + +l. 25. _Now if this song, &c._ By interchanging the stops at 'evill' +and at 'passe' the old editions have obscured these lines. Mr. +Chambers, accepting the full stop at 'evill', prints:-- + + If thou forget the rhyme as thou dost pass, + Then write; + +The reason for writing is not clear. 'If thou forget,' &c. explains +''Twill be good prose'. 'Read this without attending to the rhymes +and you will find it good prose.' If we drop the epithet 'good', this +criticism will apply to a considerable portion of metaphysical poetry. + +PAGE =205=, l. 30. _thy zanee_, i.e. thy imitator, as the Merry-Andrew +imitates the Mountebank: + + He's like the Zani to a tumbler + That tries tricks after him to make men laugh. + Jonson, _Every Man out of his Humour_, IV. i. + + +PAGE =205=. TO M^r T. W. + +l. 1. _Haste thee, &c._ By the lines 5-6, supplied from _W_, this poem +is restored to the compass of a sonnet, though a very irregular one in +form. The letter is evidently written from London, where the plague is +prevalent. The letter is to be (l. 14) Donne's pledge of affection if +he lives, his testament if he dies. + + +PAGE =206=. TO M^r T. W. + +l. 5. _hand and eye_ is the reading of all the MSS., including _W_. +It is written in the latter with a contraction which could easily be +mistaken for 'or'. + + +TO M^r T. W. + +l. 3. _I to the Nurse, they to the child of Art._ The 'Nurse of Art' +is probably Leisure, 'I to my soft still walks': + + And add to these retired Leisure, + That in trim gardens takes his pleasure. + +According to Aristotle, all the higher, more intellectual arts, as +distinct from those which supply necessities or add to the pleasures +of life, are the fruits of leisure: 'At first he who invented any art +that went beyond the common perceptions of man was naturally admired +by men, not only because there was something useful in the inventions, +but because he was thought wise and superior to the rest. But as more +arts were invented, and some were directed to the necessities of life, +others to its recreation, the inventors of the latter were naturally +always regarded as wiser than the inventors of the former, because +their branches of knowledge did not aim at utility. Hence when all +such inventions were already established, the sciences which do not +aim at giving pleasure or at the necessities of life were discovered, +and first in the places where men first began to have leisure. This +is why the mathematical arts were founded in Egypt; for there +the priestly caste was allowed to be at leisure.' _Met._ A. 981^b +(translated by W. D. Ross). + +l. 12. _a Picture, or bare Sacrament._ The last word would seem to be +used in the legal sense: 'The _sacramentum_ or pledge which each of +the parties deposited or became bound for before a suit.' O.E.D. The +letter is a picture of his mind or pledge of his affection. + + +PAGE =207=. TO M^r R. W. + +_Muse not that by, &c._ l. 7. _a Lay Mans Genius_: i.e. his Guardian +Angel. The 'Lay Man' is opposed to the 'Poet'. Donne is very familiar +with the Catholic doctrine of Guardian Angels and recurs to it +repeatedly. Compare Shakespeare, _Macbeth_, III. i. 55. + +l. 11. _Wright then._ The version of this poem in _W_ is probably +made from Donne's autograph. One of his characteristic spellings is +'wright' for 'write'. The _Losely Manuscripts_ (ed. Kempe, 1836), in +which some of Donne's letters are printed from the originals, show +this spelling on every page. It is perhaps worth noting that the +irregular past participle similarly spelt, i.e. 'wrought', has +occasionally misled editors by its identity of form with the past +participle of the verb 'work', which has 'gh' legitimately. Thus Mr. +Beeching (_A Selection from the Poetry of Samuel Daniel and Michael +Drayton_, 1899) prints: + + Read in my face a volume of despairs, + The wailing Iliads of my tragic woe, + Drawn with my blood, and painted with my cares, + Wrought by her hand that I have honoured so. + +Here 'wrought' should be 'wrote', used, as frequently, for 'written'. +In Professor Saintsbury's _Patrick Carey_ (Caroline Poets, II.) we +read: + + Who writ this song would little care + Although at the end his name were wrought. + +i.e. 'wrote'. + +See also Donne's _The Litanie_, i. p. 342, l. 112. + + +PAGE =208=. TO M^r C. B. + +Pretty certainly Christopher Brooke, to whom _The Storme_ and _The +Calme_, are addressed. Chambers takes 'the Saint of his affection' to +be Donne's wife, and dates the letter after 1600. But surely the +last two lines would not have been written of a wife. They are in the +conventional tone of the poet to his cruel Mistress. If Ann More is +the 'Saint' referred to, she was not yet Donne's wife. Possibly it is +some one else. Writing from Wales in 1599, Wotton says (in a letter +which Mr. Pearsall Smith thinks is addressed to Donne, but this is not +at all certain), 'May I after these, kiss that fair and learned +hand of your mistress, than whom the world doth possess nothing more +virtuous.' (_Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton_, i. 306.) + +l. 10. _Heavens liberall and earths thrice fairer Sunne._ I prefer the +_1633_ and _1669_ reading, amended from _W_ which reads 'fairer', to +that of the later editions, 'the thrice faire Sunne', which Chambers +adopts. There are obviously _two_ suns in question--the Heavens' +liberal sun, and the earth's thrice-fairer one, i.e. the lady. Exiled +from both, Donne carries with him sufficient fire to melt the ice of +the wintry regions he must visit--not 'that which walls her heart'. +Commenting on a similar conceit in Petrarch: + + Ite caldi sospiri al freddo core, + Rompete il ghiaccio, che pietà contende, + +Tassoni tells how while writing he found himself detained at an Inn +by a severe frost, and that sighs were of little use to melt it. +_Considerazioni, &c._ (1609), p. 228. + + +TO M^r E. G. + +Gosse conjectures that the person addressed is Edward Guilpin, or +Gilpin, author of _Skialetheia_ (1598), a collection of epigrams and +satires. Guilpin imitates one of Donne's _Satyres_, which may imply +acquaintance. He makes no traceable reference to Donne in his works, +and we know so little of Guilpin that it is impossible to affirm +anything with confidence. Whoever is meant is in Suffolk. There were +Gilpins of Bungay there in 1664. It is worth noting that Sir Henry +Goodyere begins one of his poems (preserved in MS. at the Record +Office, _State Papers Dom._, 1623) with the line: 'Even as lame things +thirst their perfection.' Goodyere's poem was written before the +issue of Donne's poems in 1633, and that edition does not contain this +letter. One suspects that E. G. may be a Goodyere. + +ll. 5-6. _oreseest ... overseene._ Donne is probably punning: 'Thou +from the height of Parnassus lookest down upon London; I in London am +too much overlooked, disregarded.' But it is not clear. He may mean +'am too much in men's eye, or kept too strictly under observation'. +The first meaning seems to me the more probable. + + +PAGE =209=. TO M^r R. W. + +l. 3. _brother._ _W_ reads 'brethren', and Morpheus _had_ many +brothers; but of these only two had with himself the power of assuming +what form they would, and of these two Phantasus took forms that lack +life. Donne, therefore, probably means Phobetor, but a friend copying +the poem thought to amend his mythology. See Ovid, _Metam._ xi. +635-41. + + +PAGE =210=. TO M^r R. W. + +l. 18. _Guyanaes harvest is nip'd in the spring._ See introductory +note to the _Letters_. + +l. 23. _businesse._ The use of 'businesse' as a trisyllable with +plural meaning is quite legitimate: 'Idle and discoursing men, that +were not much affected, how businesse went, so they might talke of +them.' _Sermon_, Judges XX. 15. p. 7. + + +PAGE =211=. TO M^r S. B. + +Probably Samuel Brooke, the brother of Christopher. He officiated at +Donne's marriage and was imprisoned. He was later Chaplain to Prince +Henry, to James I, and to Charles I; professor of Divinity at Gresham +College (1612-29) and Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, 1629. He +wrote Latin plays, poems, and religious treatises. The tone of Donne's +letter implies that he is a student at Cambridge. It was written +therefore before 1601, probably, like several of these letters, while +Donne was Egerton's secretary, and living in chambers with Christopher +Brooke. A poem by Samuel Brooke, _On Tears_, is printed in Hannah's +_Courtly Poets_. + + +PAGE =212=. TO M^r J. L. + +Of the J. L. of this and the letter which follows the next, nothing +has been unearthed. He clearly belonged to the North of England, +beyond the Trent. + + +TO M^r B. B. + +Grosart conjectures that this was Basil Brooke (1576-1646?), a +Catholic, who was knighted in 1604. In 1644 he was committed to the +Tower by Parliament and in 1646 imprisoned in the King's Bench. He +translated _Entertainments for Lent_ from the French. He was not +a brother of Christopher and Samuel. The identification is only a +conjecture. The tenor of the poem is very similar to that addressed to +Mr. S. B. + +PAGE =213=, l. 18. _widowhed._ _W_ here clearly gives us the form +which Donne used. The rhyme requires it and the poet has used it +elsewhere: + + And call chast widowhead Virginitie. + _The Litanie_, xii. 108. + +ll. 19-22. As punctuated in the old editions these lines are somewhat +ambiguous: + + My Muse, (for I had one) because I'am cold, + Divorc'd her self, the cause being in me, + That I can take no new in Bigamye, + Not my will only but power doth withhold. + +Chambers and the Grolier Club editor, by putting a full stop or +semi-colon after 'the cause being in me', connect these words with +what precedes. This makes the first two lines verbose ('the cause +being in me' repeating 'because I'am cold') and the last two obscure. +I regard 'the cause being in me' as an explanatory participial phrase +qualifying what follows. 'My Muse divorc'd me because of my coldness. +The cause of this divorce, coldness, being in me, the divorced one, +I lack not only the will but the power to contract a new marriage'. I +have therefore, following _W_, placed a colon after 'selfe'. + + +PAGE =213=. TO M^r I. L. + +l. 2. _My Sun is with you._ Here, as in the letter 'To Mr. C. B.' (p. +208), reference is made to some lady whose 'servant' Donne is. See the +note to that poem and the quotation from Sir Henry Wotton. It seems to +me most probable that the person referred to was neither Ann More nor +any predecessor of her in Donne's affections, but some noble lady to +whom the poet stood in the attitude of dependence masking itself in +love which Spenser occupied towards Lady Carey, and so many other +poets towards their patronesses. But in regard to all the references +in these letters we can only grope in darkness. As Professor +Saintsbury would say, we do not _really know_ to whom one of the +letters was addressed. + +PAGE =214=, ll. 11-12. These lines from _W_ make the sense more +complete and the transition to the closing invocation less abrupt. +'Sacrifice my heart to that beauteous Sunne; and since being with her +you are in Paradise where joy admits of no addition, think of me +at the sacrifice'; and then begins the prayer to his friend as an +interceding saint. See note to p. 24, l. 22. + +The lines seem to have been dropped, not in printing, but at some +stage in transcription, for I have found them in no MS. but _W_. + +l. 20. _Thy Sonne ne'r Ward_: i.e. 'May thy son never become a royal +ward, to be handed over to the guardianship of some courtier who will +plunder his estate.' Sir John Roe's father, in his will, begs his wife +to procure the wardship of his son that he be not utterly ruined. + +The series of letters which this to Mr. I. L. closes was probably +written during the years 1597 to 1608 or 1610. Donne's first Letters +were _The Storme_ and _The Calme_. These were followed by Letters to +Wotton before and after he went to Ireland, and this series continues +them during the years of Donne's secretaryship and his subsequent +residence at Pyrford and Mitcham. They are written to friends of his +youth, some still at college. Clearly too, what we have preserved is +Donne's side of a mutual correspondence. Of Letters to Donne I have +printed one, probably from Thomas Woodward. Chance has preserved +another probably in the form in which it was sent. Mr. Gosse has +printed it (_Life, &c._, i, p. 91). I reproduce it from the original +MS., Tanner 306, in the Bodleian Library: + + To my ever to be respected friend + M^r John Done secretary to my + Lord Keeper give these. + + As in tymes past the rusticke shepheards sceant + Thir Tideast lambs or kids for sacrefize + Vnto thir gods, sincear beinge thir intent + Thoughe base thir gift, if that shoulde moralize + thir loves, yet noe direackt discerninge eye + Will judge thir ackt but full of piety. + Soe offir I my beast affection + Apparaled in these harsh totterd rimes. + Think not they want love, though perfection + or that my loves noe truer than my lyens + Smothe is my love thoughe rugged be my years + Yet well they mean, thoughe well they ill rehears. + + What tyme thou meanst to offir Idillnes + Come to my den for heer she always stayes; + If then for change of howers you seem careles + Agree with me to lose them at the playes. + farewell dear freand, my love, not lyens respeackt, + So shall you shewe, my freandship you affeckt. + + Yours + William Cornwaleys. + +The writer is, Mr. Gosse says, Sir William Cornwallis, the eldest +son of Sir Charles Cornwallis of Beeston-in-Sprouston, Norfolk. Like +Wotton, Goodyere, Roe, and others of Donne's circle he followed Essex +to Ireland and was knighted at Dublin in 1599. The letter probably +dates from 1600 or 1601. I have reproduced the original spelling, +which is remarkable. + +This letter and that to Mr. E. G. show that Donne was a frequenter +of the theatre in these interesting years, 1593 to 1610, the greatest +dramatic era since the age of Pericles. Sir Richard Baker, in his +_Chronicle of the Kings of England_ (1730, p. 424), recalls his 'Old +Acquaintance ... Mr. John Dunne, who leaving Oxford, liv'd at the Inns +of Court, not dissolute but very neat: a great Visiter of Ladies, a +great Frequenter of Plays, a great Writer of conceited Verses'. But of +the Elizabethan drama there is almost no echo in Donne's poetry. The +theatres are an amusement for idle hours: 'Because I am drousie, I +will be kept awake with the obscenities and scurrilities of a Comedy, +or the drums and ejulations of a Tragedy.' _Sermons_ 80. 38. 383. + + +PAGE =214=. TO SIR H. W. AT HIS GOING AMBASSADOR TO VENICE. + +On July 8 O.S., 1604, Wotton was knighted by James, and on the 13th +sailed for Venice. 'He is a gentleman', the Venetian ambassador +reported, 'of excellent condition, wise, prudent, able. Your serenity, +it is to be hoped, will be very well pleased with him.' Mr. Pearsall +Smith adds, 'It is worth noting that while Wotton was travelling to +Venice, Shakespeare was probably engaged in writing his great Venetian +tragedy, _Othello_, which was acted before James I in November of this +year.' + +PAGE =215=, ll. 21-4. _To sweare much love, &c._ The meaning of this +verse, accepting the 1633 text, is: 'Admit this honest paper to swear +much love,--a love that will not change until with your elevation to +the peerage (or increasing eminence) it must be called _honour_ rather +than _love_.' (We _honour_, not _love_, those who are high above us.) +'But when that time comes I shall not more honour your fortune, +the rank that fortune gives you, than I have honoured your honour +["nobleness of mind, scorn of meanness, magnanimity" (Johnson)], your +high character, magnanimity, without it, i.e. when yet unhonoured.' +Donne plays on the word 'honour'. + +Walton's version, and the slight variant of this in _1635-69_, give +a different thought, and this is perhaps the correct reading, more +probably either another (perhaps an earlier) version of the poet or an +attempt to correct due to a failure to catch the meaning of the rather +fanciful phrase 'honouring your honour'. The meaning is, 'I shall not +then more honour your fortune than I have your wit while it was still +unhonoured, or (_1635-69_) unennobled.' The 1633 version seems to me +the more likely to be the correct or final form of the text, because +a reference to character rather than 'wit' or intellectual ability is +implied by the following verse: + + But 'tis an easier load (though both oppresse) + To want then governe greatnesse, &c. + +This stress on character, too, and indifference to fortune, is quite +in the vein of Donne's and Wotton's earlier verse correspondence and +all Wotton's poetry. + +For the distinction between love and honour compare Lyly's _Endimion_, +V. iii. 150-80: + + '_Cinthia._ Was there such a time when as for my love thou + did'st vow thyself to death, and in respect of it loth'd thy + life? Speake Endimion, I will not revenge it with hate ... + + _Endimion._ My unspotted thoughts, my languishing bodie, my + discontented life, let them obtaine by princelie favour that, + which to challenge they must not presume, onelie wishing of + impossibilities: with imagination of which I will spend my + spirits, and to myselfe that no creature may heare, softlie + call it love. And if any urge to utter what I whisper, then + will I name it honor.... + + ... _Cinthia._ Endimion, this honourable respect of thine, + shalbe christened love in thee, and my reward for it favor.' + +With the lines, + + Nor shall I then honour your fortune, &c., + +compare in the same play: + + 'O Endimion, Tellus was faire, but what availeth Beautie + without wisdom? Nay, Endimion, she was wise, but what availeth + wisdom without honour? She was honourable, Endimion, belie her + not. I, but how obscure is honour without fortune?' + II. iii. 11-17. + +The antithesis here between 'honour' and 'fortune' is exactly that +which Donne makes. + +If we may accept 'noble-wanting-wit' as Donne's own phrase (and +Walton's authority pleads for it) and interpret it as 'wit that yet +wants ennoblement' it forms an interesting parallel to a phrase of +Shakespeare's in _Macbeth_, when Banquo addresses the witches: + + My noble partner + You greet with present grace and great prediction, + Of noble having and of royal hope. + _Macbeth_, I. iii. 55-7. + +Some editors refer 'present grace' to the first salutation, 'Thane +of Glamis'. This is unlikely as there is nothing startling in a +salutation to which Macbeth was already entitled. The Clarendon Press +editors refer the line, more probably, to the two prophecies, 'thane +of Cawdor' and 'that shalt be King hereafter'. The word 'having' is +then not _quite_ the same as in the phrases 'my having is not great', +&c., which these editors quote, but is simply opposed to 'hope'. +You greet him with 'nobility in possession', with 'royalty in +expectation', as being already thane of Cawdor, as to be king +hereafter. Shakespeare's 'noble having' is the opposite of Donne's +'noble wanting'. + +One is tempted to put, as Chambers does, an emphasizing comma after +'honour' as well as 'fortune'; but the antithesis is between 'fortune' +and 'honour wanting fortune'. + +'Sir Philip Sidney is none of this number; for the greatness which he +affected was built upon true Worth, esteeming Fame more than Riches, +and Noble actions far above Nobility it self.' Fulke Greville's _Life +of Sidney_, c. iii. p. 38 (_Tudor and Stuart Library_). + + +PAGE =216=. TO M^{rs} M. H. + +I.e. Mrs. Magdalen Herbert, daughter of Sir Richard Newport, mother of +Sir Edward Herbert (Lord Herbert of Cherbury), and of George Herbert +the poet. For her friendship with Donne, see Walton's _Life of Mr. +George Herbert_ (1670), Gosse's _Life and Letters of John Donne_, i. +162 f., and what is said in the _Introduction_ to this volume and +the Introductory Note to the _Elegies_. In 1608 she married Sir John +Danvers. Her funeral sermon was preached by Donne in 1627. + +PAGE =217=, l. 27. _For, speech of ill, and her, thou must abstaine._ +The O.E.D. gives no example of 'abstain' thus used without 'from' +before the object, and it is tempting with _1635-69_ and all the MSS. +to change 'For' to 'From'. But none of the MSS. has great authority +textually, and the 'For' in _1633_ is too carefully comma'd off to +suggest a mere slip. Probably Donne wrote the line as it stands. One +does not miss the 'from' so much when the verb comes so long after the +object. 'Abstain' acquires the sense of 'forgo'. + +ll. 31-2. _And since they'are but her cloathes, &c._ Compare: + + For he who colour loves and skinne, + Loves but their oldest clothes. + _The Undertaking_, p. 10. + + +PAGE =218=. TO THE COUNTESSE OF BEDFORD. + +l. 13. _Care not then, Madam,'how low your praysers lye._ I cannot but +think that the 'praysers' of the MSS. is preferable to the 'prayses' +of the editions. It is difficult to construe or make unambiguous sense +of 'how low your prayses lie'. Donne does not wish to suggest that the +praise is poor in itself, but that the giver is a 'low person'. The +word 'prayser' he has already used in a letter to the Countess +(p. 200), and there also it has caused some trouble to editors and +copyists. + +ll. 20-1. _Your radiation can all clouds subdue; + But one, 'tis best light to contemplate you._ + +Grosart and the Grolier Club editor punctuate these lines so as to +connect 'But one' with what precedes. + + Your radiation can all clouds subdue + But one; 'tis best light to contemplate you. + +I suppose 'death' in this reading is to be regarded as the one +cloud which the radiation of the Countess cannot dispel. There is +no indication, however, that this is the thought in Donne's mind. +As punctuated (i.e. with a comma after 'subdue', which I have +strengthened to a semicolon), 'But one' goes with what follows, and +refers to God: 'Excepting God only, you are the most illuminating +object we can contemplate.' + +PAGE =219=, l. 27. _May in your through-shine front your hearts +thoughts see._ All the MSS. agree in reading 'your hearts thoughts', +which is obviously correct. _N_, _O'F_, and _TCD_ give the line +otherwise exactly as in the editions. _B_ drops the 'shine' after +'through'; and _S96_ reads: + + May in you, through your face, your hearts thoughts see. + +Donne has used 'through-shine' already in '_A Valediction: of my name +in the window_': + + 'Tis much that glasse should bee + As all confessing, and through-shine as I, + 'Tis more that it shewes thee to thee, + And cleare reflects thee to thine eye. + But all such rules, loves magique can undoe, + Here you see mee, and I am you. + +If there were any evidence that Donne was, as in this lyric, playing +with the idea of the identity of different souls, there would be +reason to retain the 'our hearts thoughts' of the editions; but there +is no trace of this. He is dwelling simply on the thought of the +Countess's transparency. Donne is fond of compounds with 'through'. +Other examples are 'through-light', 'through-swome', 'through-vaine', +'through-pierc'd'. + +ll. 36-7. _They fly not, &c._ Chambers and the Grolier Club editor +have here injured the sense by altering the punctuation. 'Nature's +first lesson' does not complete the previous statement about the +relation of the different souls, but qualifies 'discretion'. 'Just as +the souls of growth and sense do not claim precedence of the rational +soul, so the first lesson taught us by Nature, viz. _discretion_, must +not grudge a place to zeal.' 'Anima rationalis est perfectior quam +sensibilis, et sensibilis quam vegetabilis,' Aquinas, _Summa_, ii. 57. +2. + +PAGE =220=, l. 46. _In those poor types, &c._ The use of the circle +as an emblem of infinity is very old. 'To the mystically inclined the +perpendicular was the emblem of unswerving rectitude and purity; but +the circle, "the foremost, richest, and most perfect of curves" was +the symbol of completeness and eternity, of the endless process of +generation and renascence in which all things are ever becoming new.' +W. B. Frankland, _The Story of Euclid_, p. 70. God was described +by St. Bonaventura as 'a circle whose centre is everywhere, whose +circumference nowhere'. See also supplementary note. + + +PAGE =221=. A LETTER TO THE LADY CAREY, AND M^{rs} ESSEX RICHE, FROM +AMYENS. + +Probably written when Donne was abroad with Sir Robert Drury in +1611-12. 'The two ladies', Mr. Chambers says, 'were daughters of +Robert, third Lord Rich, by Penelope Devereux, daughter of Walter, +Earl of Essex, the Stella of Sidney's _Astrophel and Stella_.' Lady +Rich abandoned her husband after five years' marriage and declared +that the true father of her children was Charles Blount, Earl of +Devonshire, to whom, after her divorce in 1605, she was married by +Laud. Lettice, the eldest daughter, married Sir George Carey, of +Cockington, Devon. Essex, the younger, was married, subsequently to +this letter, to Sir Thomas Cheeke, of Pirgo, Essex. + +ll. 10-12. _Where, because Faith is in too low degree, &c._ Donne +refers to the Catholic doctrine of good works as necessary to +salvation in opposition to the Protestant doctrine of Justification by +Faith. He is fond of the antithesis. Compare: + + My faith I give to Roman Catholiques; + All my good workes unto the Schismaticks + Of Amsterdam;... + Thou Love taughtst mee, by making mee + Love her that holds my love disparity, + Onely to give to those that count my gifts indignity. + _The Will_, p. 57. + +PAGE =222=, l. 14. _where no one is growne or spent._ Like the stars +in the firmament your virtues neither grow nor decay. According to +Aquinas the heavenly bodies are neither temporal nor eternal; not +temporal because they are subject neither to growth nor decay; not +eternal because they change their position. They are 'Aeonical', their +life is measured by ages. + +l. 19. _humilitie_ has such general support that the 'humidity' of +_1669_ seems to be merely a conjecture. + + +PAGE =224=. TO THE COUNTESSE OF SALISBURY. 1614. + +Catharine Howard, daughter of Thomas, first Earl of Suffolk, married +in 1608 William Cecil, second Earl of Salisbury, son of the greater +earl and grandson of Burghley, 'whose wisdom and virtues died with +them, and their children only inherited their titles'. Clarendon. + +It is not impossible, considering the date of this letter, that the +Countess of Salisbury may be 'the Countesse' referred to in Donne's +letter to Goodyere quoted in my introduction on the canon of Donne's +poems. There is a difficulty in applying to the Countess of Huntingdon +the words 'that knowledge which she hath of me, was in the beginning +of a graver course, then of a Poet'. _Letters, &c._, p. 103. Donne +made the acquaintance of Lady Elizabeth Stanley when he was Sir Thomas +Egerton's secretary. She must have known him as a wit before his +graver days. Nor would he have apologized for writing to such an old +friend whose prophet he had been in her younger days. + +The punctuation of this poem repays careful study. The whole is a +fine example of that periodic style, drawn out from line to line, and +forming sonorous and impressive verse-paragraphs, in which Donne more +than any other poet anticipated Milton. The first sentence closes only +at the thirty-sixth line. The various clauses which lead up to the +close are separated from one another by the full-stop (ll. 8, 24), +the colon (ll. 2, 7 (sonnets:), 34), and the semicolon (ll. 18, 21, 30 +where the old edition had a colon), all with distinct values. The only +change I have made (and recorded) is at l. 30 (fantasticall), where +a careful consideration of the punctuation throughout shows that a +semicolon is more appropriate than a colon. The clause which begins +with 'Since' in l. 25 does not close till l. 34, 'understood'. + +In the rest of the poem the punctuation is also careful. The only +changes I have made are--ll. 42 'that day;' and 46 'yesterday;' (a +semi-colon for a colon in each case), 61 'mee:' (a colon for a full +stop), and 63 'good;' (a semicolon for a comma). + + +PAGE =227=. TO THE LADY BEDFORD. + +l. 1. _You that are she and you, that's double shee_: The old +punctuation suggests absurdly that the clause 'and you that's double +she' is an independent co-ordinate clause. + +l. 7. _Cusco._ I note in a catalogue, 'South America, a very early +Map, with view of Cusco, the capital of Peru'. + +l. 44. _of Iudith._ 'There is not such a woman from one end of the +earth to the other, both for beauty of face and wisdom of words.' +Judith xi. 21. + + +AN ANATOMIE OF THE WORLD. + +The _Anatomie of the World_ and _Of The Progresse of the Soule_ were +the first poems published in Donne's lifetime. The former was +issued in 1611. It is exceedingly rare. The copy preserved in Lord +Ellesmere's library at Bridgewater House is a small octavo volume +of 26 pages (_Praise of the Dead, &c._ 3 pp., _Anatomy_ 19 pp., and +_Funerall Elegie_ 4 pp., all unnumbered), with title-page as given on +the page opposite. + +In 1612 the poem was reissued along with the _Second Anniversary_. A +copy of this rare volume was sold at the Huth sale on the thirteenth +of June this year. With the kind permission of Mr. Edward Huth and +Messrs. Sotheby, Mr. Godfrey Keynes made a careful collation for +me, the results of which are embodied in my notes. The separate +title-pages of the two poems which the volume contains are here +reproduced. + +Mr. Keynes supplies the following description of the volume: _A_ first +title, _A-A4 To the praise of the Dead_ (in italics), _A5-D2_ (pp. +1-44) _The First Anniversary_ (in roman), _D3-D7_ (pp. 45-54) _A +funerall Elegie_ (in italics), _D8_ blank except for rules in margins; +_E1_ second title, _E2-E4_ recto _The Harbinger_ (in italics), _E4_ +verso blank, _E5-H5_ recto (pp. 1-49) _The Second Anniversarie_ (in +roman), _H5_ verso--_H6_ blank except for rules in margins. A fresh +title-page introduces the second poem. + +In 1611 the introductory verses entitled _To the praise of the Dead, +and the Anatomy_, and the _Anatomy_ itself, are printed in italic, _A +Funerall Elegie_ following in roman type. This latter arrangement +was reversed in 1612. In the second part, only the poem entitled _The +Harbinger to the Progresse_ is printed throughout in italic. Donne's +own poem is in roman type. + +The reason of the variety of arrangement is, I suppose, this: The +_Funerall Elegie_ was probably, as Chambers suggests, the first part +of the poem, composed probably in 1610. When it was published in +1611 with the _Anatomie_, the latter was regarded as introductory and +subordinate to the _Elegie_, and accordingly was printed in italic. +Later, when the idea of the Anniversary poems emerged, and _Of The +Progresse of the Soule_ was written as a complement to _An Anatomy +of the World_, these became the prominent parts of the whole work in +honour of Elizabeth Drury, and the _Funerall Elegie_ fell into the +subordinate position. + +The edition of 1612 does not strike one as a very careful piece of +printing. It was probably printed while Donne was on the Continent. It +supplies only two certain emendations of the later text. + +The reprints of this volume made in 1621 and 1625 show increasing +carelessness. They were issued after Donne took orders and probably +without his sanction. The title-pages of the editions are here +reproduced. + + + + +[Illustration: title encapsulated in Doric frame:] + + + _AN_ + ANATOMY + of the World. + + WHEREIN, + BY OCCASION OF + the vntimely death of Mistris + ELIZABETH DRVRY + the frailty and the decay + of this whole world + is represented. + + + LONDON, + Printed for _Samuel Macham_. + and are to be solde at his shop in + Paules Church-yard, at the + signe of the Bul-head. + + AN. DOM. + 1611. + + + + +[Illustration of title page, containing:] + + + _The First Anniuersarie._ + + AN + ANATOMIE + of the VVorld. + + _Wherein_, + BY OCCASION OF + _the vntimely death of Mistris_ + ELIZABETH DRVRY, + the frailtie and the decay of + this whole World is + represented. + + [Illustration] + + LONDON, + + Printed by _M. Bradwood_ for _S. Macham_, and are + to be sold at his shop in Pauls Church-yard at the + signe of the Bull-head. 1612. + + + + +[Illustration of title page, containing:] + + + _The Second Anniuersarie._ + + OF + THE PROGRES + of the Soule. + + _Wherein_: + + By Occasion Of The + Religious Death of Mistris + + ELIZABETH DRVRY, + + the incommodities of the Soule + _in this life and her exaltation in_ + the next, are Contem- + _plated_. + + + LONDON, + + Printed by M. _Bradwood_ for _S. Macham_, and are + to be sould at his shop in Pauls Church-yard at + the signe of the Bull-head. + + 1612. + + + The above title is not an exact facsimile. + + + + +[Illustration of title page, containing:] + + + _The First Anniuersarie._ + + AN + ANATOMIE + of the World. + + _Wherein_, + + BY OCCASION OF + _the vntimely death of Mistris_ + + ELIZABETH DRVRY, + + the frailtie and the decay of + this whole World is + represented. + + [Illustration] + + LONDON, + + Printed by _A. Mathewes_ for _Tho: Dewe_, and are + to be sold at his shop in Saint _Dunstons_ Church-yard in + Fleetestreete. 1621. + + + + +[Illustration of title page, containing:] + + + _The Second Anniuersarie._ + + OF + THE PROGRES + of the Soule. + + _Wherein_, + + BY OCCASION OF + + _the Religious death of Mistris_ + + ELIZABETH DRVRY, + + the incommodities of the Soule + _in this life, and her exaltation in_ + the next, are Contem- + _plated_. + + [Illustration] + + LONDON, + + Printed by _A. Mathewes_ for _Tho: Dewe_, and are + to be sold at his shop in Saint _Dunstons_ Church-yard + in Fleetestreete. 1621. + + + + +[Illustration of title page, containing:] + + + AN + ANATOMIE + OF THE + _World._ + + WHEREIN, + + _By occasion of the vn_- + timely death of Mistris + Elizabeth Drvry, + _the frailtie and the decay_ + of this whole World is + _represented_. + + The first Anniuersarie. + + LONDON + + Printed by _W. Stansby_ for _Tho. Dewe_, + and are to be sold in S. _Dunstanes_ + Church-yard. 1625 + + + + +[Illustration of title page, containing:] + + + OF + THE PROGRES + of the + _SOVLE_ + + WHEREIN, + + _By occasion of the_ Re- + ligious death of Mistris + ELIZABETH DRVRY, + the incommodities of the _Soule_ in + this life, and her exaltation in the + _next, are Contemplated_. + + The second Anniuersarie. + + + LONDON + + Printed by _W. Stansby_ for _Tho. Dewe_, + and are to be sold in S. _Dunstanes_ + Church-yard. 1625. + + +The symbolic figures in the title-pages of 1625 probably represent the +seven Liberal Arts. A feature of the editions of _1611_, _1612,_ and +_1625_ is the marginal notes. These are reproduced in _1633_, but a +little carelessly, for some copies do not contain them all. They are +omitted in the subsequent editions. + +The text of the _Anniversaries_ in _1633_ has been on the whole +carefully edited. It is probable, judging from several small +circumstances (e.g. the omission of the first marginal note even in +copies where all the rest are given), that _1633_ was printed from +_1625_, but it is clear that the editor compared this with earlier +editions, probably those of _1611-12_, and corrected or amended +the punctuation throughout. My collation of _1633_ with _1611_ has +throughout vindicated the former as against _1621-5_ on the one hand +and the later editions on the other.[1] Of mistakes other than of +punctuation I have noted only three: l. 181, thoughts _1611-12_; +thought _1621-33_. This was corrected, from the obvious sense, in +later editions (_1635-69_), and Grosart, Chambers, and Grolier make +no note of the error in _1621-33_. l. 318, proportions _1611-12_; +proportion _1621_ and all subsequent editions without comment. l. 415, +Impressions _1611_; Impression _1612-25_: impression _1633_ and all +subsequent editions. All three cases are examples of the same error, +the dropping of final 's'. + +In typographical respects _1611_ shows the hand of the author more +clearly than the later editions. Donne was fastidious in matters of +punctuation and the use of italics and capital letters, witness the +_LXXX Sermons_ (1640), printed from MSS. prepared for the press by the +author. But the printer had to be reckoned with, and perfection was +not obtainable. In a note to one of the separately published sermons +Donne says: 'Those Errors which are committed in mispointing, or +in changing the form of the Character, will soone be discernd, and +corrected by the Eye of any deliberate Reader'. The _1611_ text shows +a more consistent use in certain passages of emphasizing capitals, +and at places its punctuation is better than that of _1633_. My +text reproduces _1633_, corrected where necessary from the earlier +editions; and I have occasionally followed the typography of _1611_. +But every case in which _1633_ is modified is recorded. + +Of the _Second Anniversarie_, in like manner, my text is that of +_1633_, corrected in a few details, and with a few typographical +features borrowed, from the edition of _1612_. The editor of _1633_ +had rather definite views of his own on punctuation, notably a +predilection for semicolons in place of full stops. The only certain +emendations which _1612_ supplies are in the marginal note at p. +234 and in l. 421 of the _Second Anniversarie_ 'this' for 'his'. The +spelling is less ambiguous in ll. 27 and 326. + + + [Footnote 1: _1621-25_ abound in misplaced full stops which + are not in _1611_ and are generally corrected in _1633_. The + punctuation of the later editions (_1635-69_) is the work of + the printer. Occasionally a comma is dropped or introduced + with advantage to the sense, but in general the punctuation + grows increasingly careless. Often the correction of one error + leads to another.] + + +The subject of the _Anniversaries_ was the fifteen-year-old Elizabeth +Drury, who died in 1610. Her father, Sir Robert Drury, of Hawsted in +the county of Suffolk, was a man of some note on account of his great +wealth. He was knighted by Essex when about seventeen years old, at +the siege of Rouen (1591-2). He served in the Low Countries, and at +the battle of Nieuport (1600) brought off Sir Francis Vere when +his horse was shot under him. He was courtier, traveller, member of +Parliament, and in 1613 would have been glad to go as Ambassador to +Paris when Sir Thomas Overbury refused the proffered honour and was +sent to the Tower. Lady Drury was the daughter of Sir Nicholas Bacon, +the eldest son of Queen Elizabeth's Lord Keeper. She and her brother, +Sir Edmund Bacon, were friends and patrons of Joseph Hall, Donne's +rival as an early satirist. From 1600 to 1608 Hall was rector of +Hawsted, and though he was not very kindly treated by Sir Robert +he dedicated to him his _Meditations Morall and Divine_. This tie +explains the fact, which we learn from Jonson's conversations with +Drummond, that Hall is the author of the _Harbinger to the Progresse_. +As he wrote this we may infer that he is also responsible for _To the +praise of the dead, and the Anatomie_. + +Readers of Donne's _Life_ by Walton are aware of the munificence with +which Sir Robert rewarded Donne for his poems, how he opened his +house to him, and took him abroad. Donne's letters, on the other hand, +reveal that the poem gave considerable offence to the Countess of +Bedford and other older patrons and friends. In his letters to Gerrard +he endeavoured to explain away his eulogies. In verse-letters to the +Countess of Bedford and others he atoned for his inconstancy by subtle +and erudite compliments. + +_The Funerall Elegie_ was doubtless written in 1610 and sent to Sir +Robert Drury. He and Donne may already have been acquainted through +Wotton, who was closely related by friendship and marriage with Sir +Edmund Bacon. (See Pearsall Smith, _Life and Letters of Sir Henry +Wotton_ (1907). _The Anatomie of the World_ was composed in 1611, _Of +the Progresse of the Soule_ in France in 1612, at some time prior to +the 14th of April, when he refers to his _Anniversaries_ in a letter +to George Gerrard. + +Ben Jonson declared to Drummond 'That Donnes Anniversaries were +profane and full of blasphemies: that he told Mr. Done if it had +been written of the Virgin Marie it had been something; to which he +answered that he described the Idea of a Woman, and not as she was'. +This is a better defence of Donne's poems than any which he advances +in his letters, but it is not a complete description of his work. +Rather, he interwove with a rapt and extravagantly conceited laudation +of an ideal woman two topics familiar to his catholic and mediaeval +learning, and developed each in a characteristically subtle and +ingenious strain, a strain whose occasional sceptical, disintegrating +reflections belong as obviously to the seventeenth century as the +general content of the thought is mediaeval. + +The burden of the whole is an impassioned and exalted _meditatio +mortis_ based on two themes common enough in mediaeval devotional +literature--a _De Contemptu Mundi_, and a contemplation of the Glories +of Paradise. A very brief analysis of the two poems, omitting the +laudatory portions, may help a reader who cannot at once see the wood +for the trees, and be better than detailed notes. + + +_The Anatomie of the World._ + +_l. 1._ The world which suffered in her death is now fallen into the +worse lethargy of oblivion. _l. 60._ I will anatomize the world for +the benefit of those who still, by the influence of her virtue, lead a +kind of glimmering life. _l. 91._ There is no health in the world. We +are still under the curse of woman. _l. 111._ How short is our life +compared with that of the patriarchs! _l. 134._ How small is our +stature compared with that of the giants of old! _l. 147._ How +shrunken of soul we are, especially since her death! _l. 191._ And +as man, so is the whole world. The new learning or philosophy has +shattered in fragments that complete scheme of the universe in which +we rested so confidently, and (_l. 211_) in human society the same +disorder prevails. _l. 250._ There is no beauty in the world, for, +first, the beauty of proportion is lost, alike in the movements of the +heavenly bodies, and (_l. 285_) in the earth with its mountains and +hollows, and (_l. 302_) in the administration of justice in society. +_l. 339._ So is Beauty's other element, Colour and Lustre. _l. 377._ +Heaven and earth are at variance. We can no longer read terrestrial +fortunes in the stars. But (_l. 435_) an Anatomy can be pushed too +far. + +_The Progresse of the Soule._ + +_l. 1._ The world's life is the life that breeds in corruption. Let +me, forgetting the rotten world, meditate on death. _l. 85._ Think, +my soul, that thou art on thy death-bed, and consider death a release. +_l. 157._ Think how the body poisoned the soul, tainting it with +original sin. Set free, thou art in Heaven in a moment. _l. 250._ Here +all our knowledge is ignorance. The new learning has thrown all in +doubt. We sweat to learn trifles. In Heaven we know all we need to +know. _l. 321._ Here, our converse is evil and corrupting. There our +converse will be with Mary; the Patriarchs; Apostles, Martyrs and +Virgins (compare _A Litany_). Here in the perpetual flux of things is +no essential joy. Essential joy is to see God. And even the accidental +joys of heaven surpass the essential joys of earth, were there such +joys here where all is casual: + + Only in Heaven joys strength is never spent, + And accidental things are permanent. + +One of the most interesting strands of thought common to the twin +poems is the reflection on the disintegrating effect of the New +Learning. Copernicus' displacement of the earth, and the consequent +disturbance of the accepted mediaeval cosmology with its concentric +arrangement of elements and heavenly bodies, arrests and disturbs +Donne's imagination much as the later geology with its revelation +of vanished species and first suggestion of a doctrine of evolution +absorbed and perturbed Tennyson when he wrote _In Memoriam_ and +throughout his life. No other poet of the seventeenth century known +to me shows the same sensitiveness to the consequences of the new +discoveries of traveller, astronomer, physiologist and physician as +Donne. + + +TO THE PRAISE OF THE DEAD. + +PAGE =231=, l. 43. _What high part thou bearest in those best songs._ +The contraction of 'bearest' to 'bear'st' in the earliest editions +(_1611-25_) led to the insertion of 'of' after 'best' in the later +ones (_1633-69_). + + +AN ANATOMIE OF THE WORLD. + +PAGE =235=, ll. 133-6. Chambers alters the punctuation of these lines +in such a way as to connect them more closely: + + So short is life, that every peasant strives, + In a torn house, or field, to have three lives; + And as in lasting, so in length is man, + Contracted to an inch, who was a span. + +But the punctuation of _1633_ is careful and correct. A new paragraph +begins with 'And as in lasting, so, &c.' From length of years Donne +passes to physical stature. The full stop is at 'lives', the semicolon +at 'span'. Grosart and the Grolier Club editor punctuate correctly. + +l. 144. _We'are scarce our Fathers shadowes cast at noone_: Compare: + + But now the sun is just above our head, + We doe those shadowes tread; + And to brave clearnesse all things are reduc'd. + _A Lecture upon the Shadowe._ + +PAGE =236=, l. 160. _And with new Physicke_: i.e. the new mineral +drugs of the Paracelsians. + +PAGE =237=, l. 190. _Be more then man, or thou'rt lesse then an Ant._ +Compare _To M^r Rowland Woodward_, p. 185, ll. 16-18 and note. + +l. 205. _The new Philosophy calls all in doubt, &c._ The philosophy +of Galileo and Copernicus has displaced the earth and discredited +the concentric arrangement of the elements,--earth, water, air, +fire. Norton quotes: 'The fire is an element most hot and dry, pure, +subtill, and so clear as it doth not hinder our sight looking through +the same towards the stars, and is placed next to the Spheare of the +Moon, under the which it is turned about like a celestial Spheare'. +_M. Blundeville His Exercises_, 1594. + +When the world was formed from Chaos, then-- + + Earth as the Lees, and heavie dross of All + (After his kinde) did to the bottom fall: + Contrariwise, the light and nimble Fire + Did through the crannies of th'old Heap aspire + Unto the top; and by his nature, light + No less than hot, mounted in sparks upright: + But, lest the Fire (which all the rest imbraces) + Being too near, should burn the Earth to ashes; + As Chosen Umpires, the great All-Creator + Between these Foes placed the Aire and Water: + For, one suffiz'd not their stern strife to end. + Water, as Cozen did the Earth befriend: + Aire for his Kinsman Fire, as firmly deals &c. + Du Bartas, _The second Day of the first Week_ + (trans. Joshua Sylvester). + +Burton, in the _Anatomy of Melancholy_, Part 2, Sect. 2, Mem. 3, +tells how the new Astronomers Tycho, Rotman, Kepler, &c. by their new +doctrine of the heavens are 'exploding in the meantime that element of +fire, those fictitious, first watry movers, those heavens I mean above +the firmament, which Delrio, Lodovicus Imola, Patricius and many of +the fathers affirm'. They have abolished, that is to say, the fire +which surrounded the air, as that air surrounded the water and +the earth (all below the moon); and they have also abolished the +Crystalline Sphere and the Primum Mobile which were supposed to +surround the sphere of the fixed stars, or the firmament. + +PAGE =238=, l. 215. _Prince, Subject, Father, Sonne are things +forgot._ Donne has probably in mind the effect of the religious wars +in Germany, France, the Low Countries, &c. + +l. 217. _that then can be._ This is the reading of all the editions +before _1669_, and there is no reason to change 'then' to 'there': +'Every man thinks he has come to be a Phoenix (preferring private +judgement to authority) and that then comparison ceases, for there +is nothing of the same kind with which to compare himself. There is +nothing left to reverence.' + +PAGE =239=, l. 258. _It teares + The Firmament in eight and forty sheires._ + +Norton says that in the catalogue of Hipparchus, preserved in +the Almagest of Ptolemy, the stars were divided into forty-eight +constellations. + +l. 260. _New starres._ Norton says: 'It was the apparition of a new +star in 1572, in the constellation of Cassiopeia, that turned Tycho +Brahe to astronomy: and a new bright star in Ophiuchus, in 1604, had +excited general wonder, and afforded Galileo a text for an attack on +the Ptolemaic system'. + +At p. 247, l. 70, Donne notes that the 'new starres' went out again. + +PAGE =240=, l. 286. _a Tenarif, or higher hill._ 'Tenarif' is +the _1611_ spelling, 'Tenarus' that of _1633-69_. Donne speaks of +'Tenarus' elsewhere, but it is not the same place. + +It is not probable that Donne ever saw the Peak of Teneriffe, although +biographers speak of this line as a descriptive touch drawn from +memory. The Canary Isles are below the 30th degree of latitude. +The fleet that made the Islands Exhibition was never much if at all +further south than 43 degrees. After coasting off Corunna 43° N. 8° +W., and some leagues south of that port, the fleet struck straight +across to the Azores, 37° N. 25° W. Donne was somewhat nearer in the +previous year when he was at Cadiz, 36° N. 6° W., but too far off to +descry the Peak. His description, though vivid, is 'metaphysical', +like that of Hell which follows: 'The Pike of Teneriff, how high is +it? 79 miles or 52, as Patricius holds, or 9 as Snellius demonstrates +in his Eratosthenes'. Burton, _Anatomy of Melancholy_, Part 2, Sec. 2, +Mem. 3. + + On the other side, Satan, alarm'd, + Collecting all his might, dilated stood, + Like Teneriff or Atlas, unremov'd. + Milton, _Par. Lost_, iv. 985-7. + +ll. 295 f. _If under all, a Vault infernall bee, &c._ Hell, according +to mediaeval philosophy, was in the middle of the earth. 'If this +be true,' says Donne, 'and if at the same time the Sea is in places +bottomless, then the earth is neither solid nor round. We use these +words only approximately. But you may hold, on the other hand, that +the deepest seas we know are but pock-holes, the highest hills but +warts, on the face of the solid earth. Well, even in that case you +must admit that in the moral sphere at any rate the world's proportion +is disfigured by the want of all proportioning of reward and +punishment to conduct.' The sudden transition from the physical to the +moral sphere is very disconcerting. Compare: 'Or is it the place of +hell, as Virgil in his Aeneides, Plato, Lucian, Dante, and others +poetically describe it, and as many of our divines think. In good +earnest, Antony Rusca, one of the society of that Ambrosian college in +Millan, in his great volume _de Inferno_, lib. i, cap. 47, is stiffe +in this tenent.... Whatsoever philosophers write (saith Surius) there +be certaine mouthes of Hell, and places appointed for the punishment +of mens souls, as at Hecla in Island, where the ghosts of dead men are +familiarly seen, and sometimes talk with the living. God would have +such visible places, that mortal men might be certainly informed, that +there be such punishments after death, and learn hence to fear God,' +&c. Burton, _Anat. of Melancholy_, Part 2, Sec. 2, Mem. 3. + +ll. 296-8. _Which sure is spacious, &c._ 'Franciscus Ribera will +have hell a materiall and locall fire in the centre of the earth, 200 +Italian miles in diameter, as he defines it out of those words _Exivit +sanguis de terra ... per stadia mille sexcenta, &c._ But Lessius +(lib. 13, _de moribus divinis_, cap. 24) will have this locall +hell far less, one Dutch mile in diameter, all filled with fire and +brimstone; because, as he there demonstrates, that space, cubically +multiplied, will make a sphere able to hold eight hundred thousand +millions of damned bodies (allowing each body six foot square); which +will abundantly suffice, '_cum certum sit, inquit, facta subductione, +non futuros centies mille milliones damnandorum_.' Burton, _Anat. of +Melancholy_, _ut sup._ Eschatology was the 'dismal science' of those +days and was studied with astonishing gusto and acumen. 'For as one +Author, who is afraid of admitting too great a hollownesse in the +Earth, lest then the Earth might not be said to be solid, pronounces +that Hell cannot possibly be above three thousand miles in compasse, +(and then one of the torments of Hell will be the throng, for their +bodies must be there in their dimensions, as well as their soules) so +when the Schoole-men come to measure the house in heaven (as they will +measure it, and the Master, God, and all his Attributes, and tell us +how Allmighty, and how Infinite he is) they pronounce that every soule +in that house shall have more roome to it selfe, then all this world +is.' _Sermons_ 80. 73. 747. The reference in the margin is to Munster. + +l. 311. _that Ancient, &c._ 'Many erroneous opinions are about the +essence and originall of it' (i.e. the rational soul), 'whether it be +fire, as Zeno held; harmony, as Aristoxenus; number, as Xenocrates,' +&c. Burton, _Anat. of Melancholy_, Part i, Sec. 1, Mem. 2, Subsec. +9. Probably Donne has the same 'Ancient' in view. It is from Cicero +(_Tusc. Disp._ i. 10) that we learn that Aristoxenus held the soul to +be a harmony of the body. Though a Peripatetic, Aristoxenus lived +in close communion with the latest Pythagoreans, and the doctrine is +attributed to Pythagoras as a consequence of his theory of numbers. +Simmias, the disciple of the Pythagorean Philolaus, maintains the +doctrine in Plato's _Phaedo_, and Socrates criticizes it. Aristotle +states and examines it in the _De Anima_, 407b. 30. Two classes of +thinkers, Bouillet says (Plotinus, _Fourth Ennead_, _Seventh Book_, +note), regarded the soul as a harmony, doctors as Hippocrates and +Galen, who considered it a harmony of the four elements--the hot, the +cold, the dry and the moist (as the definition of health Donne refers +to this more than once, e.g. _The good-morrow_, l. 19, and _The +Second Anniversary_, ll. 130 f.); and musicians like Aristoxenus, who +compared the soul to the harmony of the lyre. Donne leaves the sense +in which he uses the word quite vague; but l. 321 suggests the medical +sense. + +l. 312. _at next._ This common Anglo-Saxon construction is very +rare in later English. The O.E.D. cites no instance later than 1449, +Pecock's _Repression_. The instance cited there is prepositional in +character rather than adverbial: 'Immediatli at next to the now bifore +alleggid text of Peter this proces folewith.' Donne's use seems to +correspond exactly to the Anglo-Saxon: 'Johannes ða ofhreow þaēre +mēden and ðaera licmanna drēorignysse, and āstrehte his +licaman tō eorðan on langsumum gebēde, and ða _aet nēxtan_ +āras, and eft upahafenum handum langlice baed.' Aelfric (Sweet's +_Anglo-Saxon Reader_, 1894, p. 67). But 'at next' in the poem possibly +does not mean simply 'next', but 'immediately', i.e. 'the first thing +he said would have been ...' + +l. 314. _Resultances_: i.e. productions of, or emanations from, her. +'She is the harmony from which proceeds that harmony of our bodies +which is their soul.' Donne uses the word also in the sense of +'the sum or gist of a thing': 'He speakes out of the strength and +resultance of many lawes and Canons there alleadged.' _Pseudo-martyr_, +p. 245; and Walton says that Donne 'left the resultance of 1400 +Authors, most of them abridged and analysed with his own hand.' _Life_ +(1675), p. 60. He is probably using Donne's own title. + +PAGE =241=, l. 318. _That th'Arke to mans proportions was made._ The +following quotation from St. Augustine will show that the plural +of _1611-12_ is right, and what Donne had in view. St. Augustine is +speaking of the Ark as a type of the Church: 'Procul dubio figura est +peregrinantis in hoc seculo Civitatis Dei, hoc est Ecclesiae, quae fit +salva per lignum in quo pependit Mediator Dei et hominum, homo +Iesus Christus. (1 Tim. ii. 5.) Nam et mensurae ipsae longitudinis, +altitudinis, latitudinis eius, significant corpus humanum, in cuius +veritate ad homines praenuntiatus est venturus, et venit. Humani +quippe corporis longitudo a vertice usque ad vestigia sexies tantum +habet, quam latitudo, quae est ab uno latere ad alterum latus, et +decies tantum, quam altitudo, cuius altitudinis mensura est in latere +a dorso ad ventrem: velut si iacentem hominem metiaris supinum, seu +pronum, sexies tantum longus est a capite ad pedes, quam latus a +dextra in sinistram, vel a sinistra in dextram, et decies, quam altus +a terra. Unde facta est arca trecentorum in longitudine cubitorum, et +quinquaginta in latitudine, et triginta in altitudine.' _De Civitate +Dei_, XV. 26. + +PAGE =242=, ll. 377-80. _Nor in ought more, &c._ 'The father' is the +Heavens, i.e. the various heavenly bodies moving in their spheres; +'the mother', the earth: + + As the bright Sun shines through the smoothest Glasse + The turning Planets influence doth passe + Without impeachment through the glistering Tent + Of the tralucing (_French_ diafane) Fiery Element, + The Aires triple Regions, the transparent Water; + But not the firm base of this faire Theater. + And therefore rightly may we call those Trines + (Fire, Aire and Water) but Heav'ns Concubines: + For, never Sun, nor Moon, nor Stars injoy + The love of these, but only by the way, + As passing by: whereas incessantly + The lusty Heav'n with Earth doth company; + And with a fruitfull seed which lends All life, + With childes each moment, his own lawfull wife; + And with her lovely Babes, in form and nature + So divers, decks this beautiful Theater. + Sylvester, _Du Bartas, Second Day, First Week._ + +PAGE =243=, l. 389. _new wormes_: probably serpents, such as were +described in new books of travels. + +l. 394. _Imprisoned in an Hearbe, or Charme, or Tree._ Compare _A +Valediction: of my name, in the window_, p. 27, ll. 33-6: + + As all the vertuous powers which are + Fix'd in the starres, are said to flow + Into such characters, as graved bee + When these starres have supremacie. + +l. 409. _But as some Serpents poyson, &c._ Compare: 'But though all +knowledge be in those Authors already, yet, as some poisons, and some +medicines, hurt not, nor profit, except the creature in which they +reside, contribute their lively activitie and vigor; so, much of the +knowledge buried in Books perisheth, and becomes ineffectuall, if it +be not applied, and refreshed by a companion, or friend. Much of their +goodnesse hath the same period which some Physicians of _Italy_ have +observed to be in the biting of their _Tarentola_, that it affects no +longer, then the flie lives.' _Letters_, p. 107. + +PAGE =245=, l. 460. _As matter fit for Chronicle, not verse._ Compare +_The Canonization_, p. 15, ll. 31-2: + + And if no peece of Chronicle wee prove + We'll build in sonnets pretty roomes ... + +God's 'last, and lasting'st peece, a song' is of course Moses' song in +Deuteronomy xxxii: 'Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak,' &c. + +l. 467. _Such an opinion (in due measure) made, &c._ The bracket of +_1611_ makes the sense less ambiguous than the commas of _1633_: + + Such an opinion, in due measure, made. + +According to the habits of old punctuation, 'in due measure' thus +comma'd off might be an adjunct of 'made me ... invade'. The bracket +shows that the phrase goes with 'opinion'. 'Such an opinion (with +all due reverence spoken),' &c. Donne finds that he is attributing to +himself the same thoughts as God. + + +A FUNERALL ELEGIE. + +l. 2. _to confine her in a marble chest._ The 'Funerall Elegie' was +probably the first composed of these poems. Elizabeth Drury's parents +erected over her a very elaborate marble tomb. + +PAGE =246=, l. 41. _the Affrique Niger._ Grosart comments on this: 'A +peculiarity generally given to the Nile; and here perhaps not spoken +of our Niger, but of the Nile before it is so called, when, according +to Pliny (_N. H._ v. 9), after having twice been underground, and the +second time for twenty days' journey, it issues at the spring Nigris.' +Probably Donne had been reading 'A Geographical Historie of Africa +written in Arabicke by John Leo a More, borne in Granada, and brought +up in Barbarie ... Translated and collected by Iohn Porie, late of +Gonevill and Caius College in Cambridge, 1600.' Of the Niger he says: +'This land of Negros hath a mighty river, which taking his name of the +region is called Niger: this river taketh his originall from the east +out of a certain desert called by the foresaide Negros _Sen_ ... Our +Cosmographers affirme that the said river of Niger is derived out of +Nilus, which they imagine for some certaine space to be swallowed up +of the earth, and yet at last to burst forth into such a lake as +is before mentioned.' Pory is mentioned occasionally in Donne's +correspondence. + +PAGE =247=, l. 50. _An Angell made a Throne, or Cherubin._ See _Elegy +XI_, ll. 77-8 and note. Donne, like Shakespeare, uses 'Cherubin' as a +singular. There can be no doubt that the lines in _Macbeth_, I. vii. +21-3, should read: + + And pity, like a naked new-born babe + Striding the blast, or heavens cherubins horsed + Upon the sightless couriers of the air, &c. + +It is an echo of: + + He rode upon the cherubins and did fly; + He came flying upon the wings of the wind. + Psalm xviii. 10. + +'Cherubin' is a singular in Shakespeare, and 'cherubim' as a plural he +did not know. + +l. 73. _a Lampe of Balsamum_, i.e. burning balsam instead of ordinary +oil: 'And as _Constantine_ ordained, that upon this day' (Christmas +Day), 'the Church should burne no Oyle, but Balsamum in her Lamps, so +let us ever celebrate this day, with a thankfull acknowledgment, that +Christ who is _unctus Domini_, The Anointed of the Lord, hath anointed +us with the Oyle of gladnesse above our fellowes.' _Sermons_ 80. 7. +72. + +ll. 75-7. _Cloath'd in, &c._ Chambers's arrangement of these lines is +ingenious but, I think, mistaken because it alters the emphasis of the +sentences. The stress is not laid by Donne on her purity, but on her +early death: 'She expir'd while she was still a virgin. She went away +before she was a woman.' Line 76: + + For marriage, though it doe not staine, doth dye. + +is a sudden digression. Dryden filches these lines: + + All white, a Virgin-Saint, she sought the skies + For Marriage, tho' it sullies not, it dies. + + _The Monument of a Faire Maiden Lady._ + +PAGE =248=, l. 83. _said History_ is a strange phrase, but it has the +support of all the editions which can be said to have any authority. + +l. 92. _and then inferre._ Compare: 'That this honour might be +inferred on some one of the blood and race of their ancient king.' +Raleigh (O.E.D.). Donne's sense of 'commit', 'entrust', is not far +from Raleigh's of 'confer', 'bestow', and both are natural extensions +of the common though now obsolete sense, 'bring on, occasion, cause': + + Inferre faire Englands peace by this Alliance. + Shakespeare, _Rich. III_, IV. iv. 343. + +l. 94. _thus much to die._ To die so far as this life is concerned. + + +OF THE PROGRESSE OF THE SOULE. + +THE SECOND ANNIVERSARIE. + +PAGE =252=, l. 43. + + _These Hymnes thy issue, may encrease so long, + As till Gods great Venite change the song_. + +This is the punctuation of the editions _1612_ to _1633_. Grosart, +Chambers, and the Grolier Club editor follow the later editions, +_1635-69_, in dropping the comma after 'issue', which thus becomes +object to 'encrease'. 'These hymns may encrease thy issue so long, +&c.' This does not seem to me to harmonize so well with l. 44 as the +older punctuation of l. 43. 'These Hymns, which are thy issue, +may encrease'(used intransitively, as in the phrase 'increase and +multiply') 'so long as till, &c.' This suggests that the Hymns +themselves will live and sound in men's ears, quickening in them +virtue and religion, till they are drowned in the greater music of +God's _Venite_. The modern version is compatible with the death of the +hymns, but the survival of their issue. + +l. 48. _To th'only Health, to be Hydroptique so._ Here again Grosart, +Chambers, and the Grolier Club editor have agreed in following the +editions _1625-69_ against the earlier ones, _1612_ and _1621_. These +have connected 'to be Hydroptic so' with what follows: + + to be hydroptic so, + Forget this rotten world ... + +But surely the full stop after 'so' in _1612_ is right, and 'to be +Hydroptique so' is Donne's definition of 'th'only Health'. 'Thirst is +the symptom of dropsy; and a continual thirst for God's safe-sealing +bowl is the best symptom of man's spiritual health.' + +'Gods safe-sealing bowl' is of course the Eucharist: 'When thou +commest to this seal of thy peace, the Sacrament, pray that God will +give thee that light, that may direct and establish thee, in necessary +and fundamentall things: that is the light of faith to see, that the +Body and Blood of Christ is applied to thee in that action; But +for the manner, how the Body and Bloud of Christ is there, wait his +leisure if he have not yet manifested that to thee.' _Sermons, &c._ + +PAGE =253=, l. 72. _Because shee was the forme, that made it live_: +i.e. the soul of the world. Aquinas, after discussion, accepts the +Aristotelian view that the soul is united to the body as its form, +that in virtue of which the body lives and functions. 'Illud enim quo +primo aliquid operatur, est forma eius cui operatio attribuitur ... +Manifestum est autem quod primum quo corpus vivit, est anima. Et cum +vita manifestetur secundum diversas operationes, in diversis gradibus +viventium, id quo primo operamur unumquodque horum operum vitae, est +anima. Anima enim est primum quo nutrimur, et sentimus, et movemur +secundum locum, et similiter quo primo intelligimus. Hoc ergo +principium quo primo intelligimus, sive dicatur intellectus, sive +anima intellectiva, est forma corporis. Et haec est demonstratio +Aristotelis in 2 de Anima, text. 24.' Aquinas goes on to show that +any other relation as of part to whole, or mover to thing moved, is +unthinkable, _Summa_ I. lxxvi. i. Elizabeth Drury in like manner +was the form of the world, that in virtue of which it lived and +functioned. + +PAGE =254=, l. 92. _Division_: a series of notes forming one melodic +sequence: + + and streightway she + Carves out her dainty voice as readily, + Into a thousand sweet distinguish'd Tones, + And reckons up in soft divisions + Quicke volumes of wild Notes. + Crashaw, _Musicks Duell_. + +l. 102. _Satans Sergeants_, i.e. bailiffs, watching to arrest for +debt. Compare: + + as this fell Sergeant, Death, + Is strict in his arrest. + Shakespeare, _Hamlet_, V. + +l. 120. _but a Saint Lucies night._ Compare p. 44. 'Saint Lucies +night' is the longest in the year, yet it too passes, is only a night. +Death is a long sleep, yet a sleep from which we shall awaken. So the +Psalmist compares life to 'a watch in the night', which _seems_ so +long and _is_ so short. + +ll. 123-6. _Shee whose Complexion, &c._: i.e. 'in whose temperaments +the humours were in such perfect equilibrium that no one could +overgrow the others and bring dissolution': + + What ever dyes, was not mixt equally. + _The good-morrow._ + +And see the note to p. 182, ll. 59-62. + +PAGE =255=, l. 127. _Mithridate_: a universal antidote or preservative +against poison and infectious diseases, made by the compounding +together of many ingredients. It was also known as 'Theriaca' and +'triacle': 'As it is truly and properly said, that there are more +ingredients, more simples, more means of restoring in our dram of +triacle or mithridate then in an ounce of any particular syrup, in +which there may be 3 or 4, in the other perchance, so many hundred.' +_Sermons_ 26. 20. 286-7. Vipers were added to the other ingredients by +Andromachus, physician to the Emperor Nero, whence the name 'theriaca' +or 'triacle': 'Can an apothecary make a sovereign triacle of Vipers +and other poysons, and cannot God admit offences and scandalls into +his physick.' _Sermons_ 50. 17. 143. See _To S^r Henry Wotton_, p. +180, l. 18 and note. + +ll. 143-6. Compare p. 269, ll. 71-6. + +l. 152. _Heaven was content, &c._ 'And from the days of John the +Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the +violent take it by force.' Matthew xi. 12. + +l. 158. _wast made but in a sinke._ Compare: 'Formatus est homo ... de +spurcissimo spermate.' Pope Innocent, _De Contemptu Mundi_; and + + With Goddes owene finger wroght was he, + And nat begeten of mannes sperme unclene. + Chaucer, _Monkes Tale_. + +PAGE =256=, ll. 159-62. _Thinke that ... first of growth._ According +to Aquinas, who follows Aristotle, the souls of growth, of sense, and +of intelligence are not in man distinct and (as Plato had suggested) +diversely located in the liver, heart, and brain, but are merged in +one: 'Sic igitur anima intellectiva continet in sua virtute quidquid +habet anima sensitiva brutorum et nutritiva plantarum,' _Summa_ I. +lxxvi. 3. He cites Aristotle, _De Anima_, ii. 30-1. + +l. 190. _Meteors._ See note to _The Storme_, l. 13. A meteor was +regarded as due to the effect of the air's cold region on exhalations +from the earth: + + If th'Exhalation hot and oily prove, + And yet (as feeble) giveth place above + To th'Airy Regions ever-lasting Frost, + Incessantly th'apt-tinding fume is tost + Till it inflame: then like a Squib it falls, + Or fire-wing'd shaft, or sulphry Powder-Balls. + But if this kind of Exhalation tour + Above the walls of Winters icy bowr + 'T-inflameth also; and anon becomes + A new strange Star, presaging wofull dooms. + Sylvester's _Du Bartas. Second Day of the First Weeke._ + +i.e. a Meteor below the middle region, it becomes a Comet above. + +l. 189 to PAGE =257=, l. 206. Donne summarizes in these lines the old +concentric arrangement of the Universe as we find it in Dante. Leaving +the elements of earth and water the soul passes through the regions of +the air (including the central one where snow and hail and meteors +are generated), and through the element of fire to the Moon, thence +to Mercury, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and the Firmament of the +fixed stars. He has already indicated (p. 237, ll. 205 f.) how this +arrangement is being disturbed by 'the New Philosophy'. + +l. 192. _Whether th'ayres middle region be intense._ Compare: + + th'ayres middle marble roome. + _The Storme_, p. 175, l. 14. + +PAGE =257=, ll. 219-20. _This must, my Soule, &c._ This is the +punctuation of _1612-25_: _1633_ and all the later editions change +as in the note. Chambers and Grolier follow suit. It is clearly a +corruption. The 'long-short Progresse' is the passage to heaven +which has been described. A new thought begins with 'T'advance these +thoughts'. Grosart puts a colon after (l. 219) 'bee', but as he also +places a semicolon after (l. 220) 'T'advance these thoughts' it is not +quite clear how he reads the lines. The mistake seems to have arisen +from forgetting that the 'she' whose progress has been described is +not Elizabeth Drury but the poet's own soul emancipated by death. + +PAGE =258=, ll. 236-40. _The Tutelar Angels, &c._ 'And it is as +imperfect which is taught by that religion which is most accommodate +to sense ... That all mankinde hath one protecting Angel; all +Christians one other, all English one other, all of one Corporation +and every civill coagulation of society one other; and every man one +other.' _Letters_, p. 43. Aquinas insists (_Summa_ I. cxiii) on the +assignment of a guardian angel to every individual. He mentions also, +following St. Gregory, the guardian angel assigned to the Kingdom of +the Persians (Dan. x. 13). + +l. 242. _Her body was the Electrum._ 'The ancient Electrum', Bacon +says, 'had in it a fifth of silver to the Gold.' Her body, then, is +not pure gold, but an alloy in which are many degrees of gold. In +Paracelsus' works, Electrum is the middle substance between ore and +metal, neither wholly perfect nor altogether imperfect. It is on +the way to perfection. _The Hermetic and Alchemical Writings of ... +Paracelsus_, Arthur E. Waite, 1894. 'Christ is not that Spectrum that +_Damascene_ speaks of, nor that Electrum that _Tertullian_ speakes of +... a third metall made of two other metals.' Donne, _Sermons_ 80. 40. +397. + +PAGE =259=, l. 270. _breake._ Here--as at p. 260, l. 326, 'choose'--I +have reverted to the spelling of _1612_. + +l. 292. _by sense, and Fantasie_: i.e. by sense and the phantasmata +which are conveyed by the senses to the intellect to work upon. See +Aristotle, _De Anima_, iii. and Aquinas, _Summa_ I. lxxxv. i. Angels +obtain their knowledge of material things through immaterial, i.e. +through Ideas. Their knowledge is immediate, not as ours mediate, by +sense and ratiocination, 'collections'. + +PAGE =261=, l. 342. _Joy in not being that, which men have said_ 'Joy +in not being "sine labe concepta", for then she would have had no +virtue in being good.' Norton. Her own goodness has gained for her a +higher exaltation than the adventitious honour of being the Mother of +God. + + ll. 343-4. _Where she is exalted more for being good, + Then for her interest of Mother-hood._ + +'Scriptum est in Evangelio, quod mater et fratres Christi, hoc +est consanguinei carnis eius, cum illi nuntiati fuissent, et foris +exspectarent, quia non possent eum adire prae turba, ille respondit: +_Quae est mater mea, aut qui sunt fratres mei? Et extendens manum +super discipulos suos, ait: Hi sunt fratres mei; et quicumque fecerit +voluntatem Patris mei, ipse mihi frater, et mater, et soror est_ +(Matt. xii. 46-50). Quid aliud nos docens, nisi carnali cognationi +genus nostrum spirituale praeponere; nec inde beatos esse homines, +si iustis et sanctis carnis propinquitate iunguntur, sed si eorum +doctrinae ac moribus obediendo atque imitando cohaerescunt? _Beatior +ergo Maria percipiendo fidem Christi, quam concipiendo carnem +Christi._ Nam et dicenti cuidam, _Beatus venter qui te portavit_; ipse +respondit, _Imo beati qui audiunt verbum Dei, et custodiunt_' (Luc. +xi. 27, 28), Augustini _De Sancta Virginitate_, I. 3. (Migne, 40. +397-8.) If a Protestant in the previous two lines, Donne is here as +sound a Catholic as St. Augustine. + +l. 354. _joyntenants with the Holy Ghost._ 'We acknowledge the Church +to be the house _onely_ of God, and that we admit no Saint, no Martyr, +to be a _Iointenant_ with him.' _Sermons_ 50. 21. 86. + +l. 360. _royalties_: i.e. the prerogatives, rights, or privileges +pertaining to the sovereign. Donne here enumerates them as the power +to make war and conclude peace, uncontrolled authority ('the King +can do no wrong'), the administration of justice, the dispensing of +pardon, coining money, and the granting of protection against legal +arrest. + +PAGE =262=, l. 369. _impressions._ The plural of the first edition +must, I think, be accepted. Her stamp is set upon each of our acts as +the impression of the King's head on a coin: 'Ignoraunce maketh him +unmeete metall for the impressions of vertue.' Fleming, _Panopl. +Epist._ 372 (O.E.D.). + + Your love and pitty doth th'impression fill, + Which vulgar scandall stampt upon my brow. + Shakespeare, _Sonnets_ cxii. + + ll. 397-9. _So flowes her face, and thine eyes, neither now + That Saint, nor Pilgrime, which your loving vow + Concern'd, remaines ..._ + +I have kept the comma after 'eyes' of _1621_ (_1612_ seems to have +no stop) rather than change it with later and modern editions to a +semicolon, because I take it that the clauses are _not_ co-ordinate; +the second is a subordinate clause of degree after 'so'. 'Her face and +thine eyes so flow that now neither that Saint nor that Pilgrim which +your loving vow concern'd remains--neither you nor the lady you adore +remain the same.' The lady is the Saint, the lover the Pilgrim, as in +_Romeo and Juliet_: + + _Rom._ If I profane with my unworthiest hand + This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this, + My lips two blushing pilgrims ready stand + To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss. + + _Jul._ Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, + Which mannerly devotion shows in this; + For saints have hands that pilgrims hands do touch, + And palm to palm is holy palmers kiss. + +Punctuated as the sentence is in modern editions 'so' must mean 'in +like manner', referring back to the statement about the river. + +PAGE =263=, l. 421. _this Center_, is the reading of the first edition +and is doubtless correct, the 't' having been dropped accidentally +in _1621_ and so in all subsequent editions. 'This Center' is 'this +Earth.' The Earth could neither support such a tower nor provide +material with which to build it. Compare: + + The Heavens themselves, the Planets, and this Center, + Observe degree, priority, and place. + Shakespeare, _Troil. and Cress._ I. iii. 85. + + As far remov'd from God and light of Heav'n + As from the Center thrice to th' utmost Pole. + Milton, _Par. Lost_, i. 74. + +PAGE =264=, l. 442. _For it is both the object and the wit._ God, the +Idea of Good, is the source of both being and knowing--the ultimate +object of knowledge and the source of the knowledge by which Himself +is known. + + ll. 445-6. _'Tis such a full, and such a filling good; + Had th' Angels once look'd on him they had stood._ + +After discussion Aquinas concludes (I. lxiii. 5) that the devil was +not evil through fault of his own will in the first instant of +his creation, because this would make God the cause of evil: 'Illa +operatio quae simul incipit cum esse rei est ei ab agente a quo habet +esse ... Agens autem quod Angelos in esse produxit, scilicet Deus, non +potest esse causa peccati.' He then considers whether there was any +delay between his creation and his fall, and concludes that the most +probable conclusion and most consonant with the words of the Saints +is that there was none, otherwise by his first good act he would have +acquired the merit whose reward is the happiness which comes from +the sight of God and is enduring: 'Si diabolus in primo instanti, +in gratiâ creatus, meruit, statim post primum instans _beatitudinem_ +accepisset, nisi statim impedimentum praestitisset peccando.' This +'beatitudo' is the sight of God: 'Angeli beati sunt per hoc quod +Verbum vident.' And endurance is of the essence of this blessedness: +'Sed contra de ratione beatitudinis est stabilitas, sive confirmatio +in bono.' Thus, as Donne says, 'Had th' Angells,' &c. _Summa_ lxii. 1, +5; lxiii. 6. + +PAGE =265=, l. 479. _Apostem_: i.e. Imposthume, deep-seated abscess. + +PAGE =266=, l. 509. _Long'd for, and longing for it, &c._ So Dante of +Beatrice: + + Angelo chiama in divino intelletto, + E dice: 'Sire, nel mondo si vede + Meraviglia nell' atto, che procede + Da un' anima, che fin quassù risplende. + Lo cielo, che non have altro difetto + Che d'aver lei, al suo Signor la chiede, + E ciascun santo ne grida mercede.' + + An Angel, of his blessed knowledge, saith + To God: 'Lord, in the world that Thou hast made, + A miracle in action is display'd + By reason of a soul whose splendors fare + Even hither: and since Heaven requireth + Nought saving her, for her it prayeth Thee, + Thy Saints crying aloud continually.' + +and again: + + Madonna è desiata in l'alto cielo. + + My lady is desired in the high Heaven. + +Donne, one thinks, must have read the _Vita Nuova_ as well as the +_Divina Commedia_. It is possible that in the eulogy of Elizabeth +Drury he is following its transcendental manner without fully +appreciating the transfiguration through which Beatrice passed in +Dante's mind. + +ll. 511-18. _Here in a place, &c._ These lines show that _The Second +Anniversary_ was written while Donne was in France with Sir Robert and +Lady Drury. Compare _A Letter to the Lady Carey, &c._, p. 221: + + Here where by All All Saints invoked are, &c. + + + + +EPICEDES AND OBSEQUIES, &c. + +Of all Donne's poems these are the most easy to date, at least +approximately. The following are the dates of the deaths which called +forth the poems, arranged in chronological order: + + Lady Markham (p. 279), May 4, 1609. + Mris Boulstred (pp. 282, 284), Aug. 4, 1609. + Prince Henry (p. 267), Nov. 6, 1612. + Lord Harington (p. 271), Feb. 27, 1614. + Marquis Hamilton (p. 288), March 22, 1625. + +Those about whose date and subject there is uncertainty are that +entitled in 1635 _Elegie on the L. C._ and that headed _Death_. If +with Chambers and Norton we assume that the former poem is an Elegy on +the death of the Lord Chancellor, Baron Ellesmere, it will have been +written in 1617. The conjecture is a natural one and may be correct, +but there are difficulties, (1) This title is affixed to _Elegie_ in +_1635_ for the first time. The poem bears no such heading in _1633_ or +in any MS. in which I have found it. Probably 'L. C.' stands for Lord +Chancellor (though this is not certain); but on what authority was +the poem given this reference? (2) The position which it occupies in +_1633_ is due to its position in the MS. from which it was printed. +Now in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and in _W_, it is included among the +_Elegies_, i.e. Love Elegies. But in the last of these, _W_, it +appears with a collection of poems (Satyres, Elegies, the Lincoln's +Inn Epithalamium, and a series of letters to Donne's early friends) +which has the appearance of being, or being derived from, an early +collection, a collection of poems written between 1597 and 1608 to +1610 at the latest. (3) The poem is contained, but again without any +title, in _HN_, the Hawthornden MS. in Edinburgh. Now we know that +Drummond was in London in 1610, and there is no poem, of those which +he transcribed from a collection of Donne's, that is demonstrably +later than 1609, though the two _Obsequies_, 'Death, I recant' and +'Language, thou art too narrowe and too weak', must have been written +in that year. Drummond _may_ have been in London at some time between +1625 and 1630, during which years his movements are undetermined +(David Masson: _Drummond of Hawthornden_, ch. viii), but if he had +made a collection of Donne's poems at this later date it would have +been more complete, and would certainly have contained some of the +religious poems. At a later date he seems to have been given a copy of +the _Hymn to the Saints and to Marquesse Hamylton_, for a MS. of +this poem is catalogued among the books presented to the Edinburgh +University Library by Drummond. Unfortunately it has disappeared +or was never actually handed over. Most probably, Drummond's small +collection of poems by Donne, Pembroke, Roe, Hoskins, Rudyerd, and +other 'wits' of King James's reign, now in the library of the Society +of Antiquaries, was made in 1610. + +All this points to the _Elegie_ in question being older than 1617. It +is very unlikely that a poem on the death of his great early patron +would have been allowed by him to circulate without anything to +indicate in whose honour it was written. Egerton was as great a man +as Lord Harington or Marquis Hamilton, and if hope of reward from the +living was the efficient cause of these poems quite as much as sorrow +for the dead, Lord Ellesmere too left distinguished and wealthy +successors. Yet the MS. of Donne's poems which belonged to the first +Earl of Bridgewater contains this poem without any indication to whom +it was addressed. + +In 1610 Donne sent to the Lord Chancellor a copy of his +_Pseudo-Martyr_, and the following hitherto unpublished letter shows +in what high esteem he held him: + +'As Ryvers though in there Course they are content to serve publique +uses, yett there end is to returne into the Sea from whence they +issued. So, though I should have much Comfort that thys Booke might +give contentment to others, yet my Direct end in ytt was, to make it a +testimony of my gratitude towards your Lordship and an acknowledgement +that those poore sparks of Vnderstandinge or Judgement which are in +mee were derived and kindled from you and owe themselves to you. All +good that ys in ytt, your Lordship may be pleased to accept as yours; +and for the Errors I cannot despayre of your pardon since you have +long since pardond greater faults in mee.' + +If Donne had written an _Elegie_ on the death of Lord Ellesmere it +would have been as formally dedicated to his memory as his Elegies to +Lord Harington and Lord Hamilton. But by 1617 he was in orders. His +Muse had in the long poem on Lord Harington, brother to the Countess +of Bedford, 'spoke, and spoke her last'. It was only at the express +instance of Sir Robert Carr that he composed in 1625 his lines on the +death of the Marquis of Hamilton, and he entitled it not an Elegy but +_A Hymn to the Saints and to Marquesse Hamylton_. + +It seems to me probable that the _Elegie_, 'Sorrow, who to this +house', was an early and tentative experiment in this kind of poetry, +on the death of some one, we cannot now say whom, perhaps the father +of the Woodwards or some other of his earlier correspondents and +friends. + +The _Elegie_ headed _Death_ is also printed in a somewhat puzzling +fashion. In _1633_ it follows the lyrics abruptly with the bald +title _Elegie_. It is not in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, nor was it in the MS. +resembling this which _1633_ used for the bulk of the poems. In _HN_ +also it bears no title indicating the subject of the poem. The +other MSS. all describe it as an _Elegie upon the death of M^{ris} +Boulstred_, and from _1633_ and several MSS. it appears that it was +sent to the Countess of Bedford with the verse _Letter_ (p. 227), 'You +that are shee and you, that's double shee'. It is possible that the +MSS. are in error and that the dead friend is not Miss Bulstrode +but Lady Markham, for the closing line of the letter compares her to +Judith: + + Yet but of _Judith_ no such book as she. + +But Judith was, like Lady Markham, a widow. The tone of the poem too +supports this conclusion. The Elegy on Miss Bulstrode lays stress on +her youth, her premature death. In this and the other Elegy +(whose title assigns it to Lady Markham) the stress is laid on the +saintliness and asceticism of life becoming a widow. + + +PAGE =267=. ELEGIE UPON ... PRINCE HENRY. + +The death of Prince Henry (1594-1612) evoked more elegiac poetry Latin +and English than the death of any single man has probably ever done. +See Nichols's _Progresses of James I_, pp. 504-12. He was the hope of +that party, the great majority of the nation, which would fain have +taken a more active part in the defence of the Protestant cause in +Europe than James was willing to venture upon. Donne's own _Elegie_ +appeared in a collection edited by Sylvester: '_Lachrymae Lachrymarum, +or The Spirit of Teares distilled from the untimely Death of the +Incomparable Prince Panaretus_. By Joshua Sylvester. The Third +Edition, with Additions of His Owne and Elegies. 1613. Printed by +Humphrey Lownes.' Sylvester's own poem is followed by poems in Latin, +Italian, and English by Joseph Hall and others, and then by a +separate title-page: _Sundry Funerall Elegies ... Composed by severall +Authors_. The authors are G. G. (probably George Gerrard), Sir P. O., +Mr. Holland, Mr. Donne, Sir William Cornwallis, Sir Edward Herbert, +Sir Henry Goodyere, and Henry Burton. Jonson told Drummond 'That Done +said to him, he wrott that Epitaph on Prince Henry _Look to me, Faith_ +to match Sir Ed: Herbert in obscurenesse' (Drummond's _Conversations_, +ed. Laing). Donne's elegy was printed with some carelessness in +the _Lachrymae Lachrymarum_. The editor of _1633_ has improved the +punctuation in places. + +The obscurity of the poem is not so obvious as its tasteless +extravagance: 'The death of Prince Henry has shaken in me both Faith +and Reason, concentric circles or nearly so (l. 18), for Faith does +not contradict Reason but transcend it.' See _Sermons_ 50. 36. +'Our Faith is shaken because, contemplating his greatnesse and its +influence on other nations, we believed that with him was to begin the +age of peace: + + Ultima Cumaei venit iam carminis aetas, + Magnus ab integro saeclorum nascitur ordo. + +But by his death this faith becomes heresy. Reason is shaken because +reason passes from cause to effect. Miracle interrupts this progress, +and the loss of him is such a miracle as brings all our argument to +a standstill. We can predict nothing with confidence.' In his +over-subtle, extravagant way Donne describes the shattering of men's +hopes and expectations. + +At the end he turns to her whom the Prince loved, + + The she-Intelligence which mov'd this sphere. + +Could he but tell who she was he would be as blissful in singing her +praises as they were in one another's love. + +A short epitaph on Prince Henry by Henry King (1592-1669), the friend +and disciple of Donne, bears marks of being inspired by this poem. It +is indeed ascribed to 'J. D.' in _Le Prince d'Amour_ (1660), but is +contained in King's _Poems, Elegies, Paradoxes and Sonnets_ (1657). + +PAGE =269=, ll. 71-6. These lines are printed as follows in the +_Lachrymae Lachrymarum_: + + If faith have such a chaine, whose diverse links + Industrious man discerneth, as hee thinks + When Miracle doth joine; and to steal-in + A new link Man knowes not where to begin: + At a much deader fault must reason bee, + Death having broke-off such a linke as hee. + +But compare _The Second Anniversary_, p. 255, ll. 143-6. + + +PAGE =271=. OBSEQUIES TO THE LORD HARRINGTON, &c. + +The MS. from which _1633_ printed this poem probably had the title as +above. It stands so in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. By a pure accident it +was changed to _Obsequies to the Lord Harringtons brother. To the +Countesse of Bedford._ There was no Lord Harington after the death of +the subject of this poem. + +John Harington, the first Baron of Exton and cousin of Sir John +Harington the translator of the _Orlando Furioso_, died at Worms in +1613, when returning from escorting the Princess Elizabeth to her +new home at Heidelberg. His children were John, who succeeded him as +Second Baron of Exton, and Lucy, who had become Countess of Bedford in +1594. The young Baron had been an intimate friend of Prince Henry. In +1609 he visited Venice and was presented to the Doge as likely to be +a power in England when Henry should succeed. 'He is learned', +said Wotton, 'in philosophy, has Latin and Greek to perfection, is +handsome, well-made as any man could be, at least among us.' His fate +was as sudden and tragic as that of his patron. Travelling in France +and Italy in 1613 he grew ill, it was believed he had been poisoned +by accident or design, and died at his sister's house at Twickenham on +the 27th of February, 1614. + +There is not much in Donne's ingenious, tasteless poem which evinces +affection for Harington or sorrow for his tragic end, nor is there +anything of the magnificent poetry, 'ringing and echoing with music,' +which in _Lycidas_ makes us forgetful of the personality of King. +Donne's poem was written to please Lady Bedford: + + And they who write to Lords rewards to get, + Are they not like singers at dores for meat? + +Apparently it served its purpose, for in a letter written a year or +two later Donne says to Goodyere: 'I am almost sorry, that an Elegy +should have been able to move her to so much compassion heretofore, as +to offer to pay my debts; and my greater wants now, and for so good +a purpose, as to come disingaged into that profession, being plainly +laid open to her, should work no farther but that she sent me £30,' +&c. _Letters, &c._, p. 219. + +Of Harington, Wiffen, in his _Historical Memoirs of the House of +Russell_, says: 'Whilst he devoted much of his time to literary study +he is reported to have uniformly begun and closed the day with prayer +... and to have been among the first who kept a diary wherein his +casual faults and errors were recorded, for his surer advancement in +happiness and virtue.' Wiffen's authority is probably _The Churches +Lamentation for the losse of the Godly Delivered in a Sermon at the +funerals of that truly noble, and most hopefull young Gentleman Iohn +Lord Harington, Baron of Exton, Knight of the noble order of the Bath +etc. by R. Stock_. 1614. To this verses Latin and English by I. P., F. +H. D. M., and Sir Thomas Roe are appended. The preacher gives details +of Harington's religious life. The D. N. B. speaks of two memorial +sermons. This is a mistake. + +l. 15. _Thou seest me here at midnight, now all rest;_ Chambers +by placing a semicolon after 'midnight' makes 'now all rest' an +independent, rhetorical statement: + + Thou seest me here at midnight; now all rest; + +The Grolier Club editor varies it: + + Thou seest me here at midnight now, all rest; + +But surely as punctuated in the old editions the line means 'at +midnight, now when all rest', 'the time when all rest'. 'I watch, +while others sleep.' + +Donne's description of his midnight watch recalls that of Herr +Teufelsdroeckh: 'Gay mansions, with supper rooms and dancing rooms are +full of light and music and high-swelling hearts, but in the Condemned +Cells the pulse of life beats tremulous and faint, and bloodshot eyes +look out through the darkness which is around and within, for the +light of a stern last morning,' &c. _Sartor Resartus_, i. 3. + +PAGE =272=, l. 38. _Things, in proportion fit, by perspective._ It is +by an accident, I imagine, that _1633_ drops the comma after 'fit', +and I have restored it. The later punctuation, which Chambers adopts, +is puzzling if not misleading: + + Things, in proportion, fit by perspective. + +It is with 'proportion' that 'fit' goes. Deeds of good men show us by +perspective things in a proportion fitted to our comprehension. They +bring the goodness or essence of things, which is seen aright only in +God, down to our level. The divine is most clearly revealed to _us_ in +the human. + +PAGE =274=, l. 102. _Sent hither, this worlds tempests to becalme._ I +have adopted the reading to which the MSS. point in preference to that +of the editions. Both the chief groups read 'tempests', and 'this' +(for 'the') has still more general support. Now if the 's' in +'tempests' were once dropped, 'this' would be changed to 'the', the +emphasis shifting from 'this' to 'world'. I think the sense is better. +If but one tempest is contemplated, then either so many 'lumps of +balm' are not needed, or they fail sadly in their mission. They come +rather to allay the storms with which human life is ever and again +tormented. Moreover, in Donne's cosmology 'this world' is frequently +contrasted with other and better worlds. Compare _An Anatomie of the +World_, pp. 225 et seq. + +l. 110. _Which the whole world, or man the abridgment hath._ The comma +after 'man' in _1633_ gives emphasis. The absence of a comma, however, +after 'abridgment' gives a reader to-day the impression that it is +object to 'hath'. I have, therefore, with _1635-69_, dropped the +comma after 'man'. The omission of commas in appositional phrases is +frequent. 'Man the abridgment' means of course 'Man the microcosm': +'the Macrocosme and Microcosme, the Great and the Lesser World, man +extended in the world, and the world contracted and abridged into +man.' _Sermons_ 80. 31. 304. + +ll. 111-30. _Thou knowst, &c._ The circles running parallel to +the equator are all equally circular, but diminish in size as they +approach the poles. But the circles which cut these at right angles, +and along which we measure the distance of any spot from the equator, +from the sun, are all of equal magnitude, passing round the earth +through the poles, i.e. meridians are great circles, their planes +passing through the centre of the earth. + +Harington's life would have been a Great Circle had it completed its +course, passing through the poles of youth and age. In that case we +should have had from him lessons for every phase of life, medicines to +cure every moral malady. + +In _The Crosse_ Donne writes: + + All the Globes frame and spheares, is nothing else + But the Meridians crossing Parallels. + +And in the _Anatomie of the World_, p. 239, ll. 278-80: + + For of Meridians, and Parallels, + Man hath weav'd out a net, and this net throwne + Upon the Heavens, and now they are his owne. + +PAGE =275=, l. 133. _Whose hand, &c._ The singular is the reading of +all the MSS., and is pretty certainly right. The minute and second +hands were comparatively rare at the beginning of the seventeenth +century. See the illustrations in F. J. Britten's _Old Clocks and +Watches and their Makers, &c._ (1904); and compare: 'But yet, as +he that makes a Clock, bestowes all that labour upon the severall +wheeles, that thereby the Bell might give a sound, and that thereby +the hand might give knowledge to others how the time passes,' &c. +_Sermons_ 80. 55. 550. + +PAGE =276=, l. 154. _And great Sun-dyall to have set us All._ Compare: + + The lives of princes should like dyals move, + Whose regular example is so strong, + They make the times by them go right or wrong. + Webster, _White Devil_, I. ii. 313. + +PAGE =279=, l. 250. _French soldurii._ The reading of the editions +is a misprint. The correct form is given in _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, and +is used by Donne elsewhere: 'And we may well collect that in Caesars +time, in France, for one who dyed naturally, there dyed many by +this devout violence. For hee says there were some, whom hee calls +_Devotos_, and _Clientes_ (the latter Lawes call them _Soldurios_) +which enjoying many benefits, and commodities, from men of higher +ranke, alwaies when the Lord dyed, celebrated his Funerall with their +owne. And Caesar adds, that in the memorie of man, no one was found +that ever refused it.' _Biathanatos_, Part I, Dist. 2, Sect. 3. The +marginal note calls them 'Soldurii', and refers to Caes., _Bell. +Gall._ 3, and _Tholosa. Sym._ lib. 14, cap. 10, N. 14. + + +PAGE =279=. ELEGIE ON THE LADY MARCKHAM. + +The wife of Sir Anthony Markham, of Sedgebrook in the county of Notts. +She was the daughter of Sir James Harington, younger brother of John, +first Baron Harington of Exton. See note to last poem. She was thus +first cousin to Lucy, Countess of Bedford, and died at her home at +Twickenham on May 4, 1609. On her tombstone it is recorded that she +was 'inclytae Luciae Comitissae de Bedford sanguine (quod satis) sed +et amicitia propinquissima'. It is probably to this friendship of +a great patroness of poets that she owes this and other tributes +of verse. Francis Beaumont wrote one which is found in several MS. +collections of Donne's poems, sometimes with his, sometimes with +Beaumont's initials. In it he frankly confesses that he never knew +Lady Markham. I quote a few lines: + + As unthrifts grieve in strawe for their pawnd Beds, + As women weepe for their lost Maidenheads + (When both are without hope of Remedie) + Such an untimelie Griefe, have I for thee. + I never sawe thy face; nor did my hart + Urge forth mine eyes unto it whilst thou wert, + But being lifted hence, that which to thee + Was Deaths sad dart, prov'd Cupids shafte to me. + +The taste of Beaumont's poem is execrable. Elegies like this, and I +fear Donne's among them, were frankly addressed not so much to the +memory of the dead as to the pocket of the living. + +According to two MSS.(_RP31_ and _H40_) the _Elegie_, 'Death be +not proud', was written by Lady Bedford herself on the death of +her cousin. It is much simpler and sincerer in tone than Donne's or +Beaumont's, but the tenor of the thought seems to connect it with the +_Elegie on M^{ris} Boulstred_, 'Death I recant'. The same MSS. contain +the following _Epitaph uppon the Ladye Markham_, which shows that she +was a widow when she died: + + A Mayde, a Wyfe shee liv'd, a Widdowe dy'd: + Her vertue, through all womans state was varyed. + The widdowes Bodye which this vayle doth hide + Keepes in, expecting to bee justlie [highly _H40_] marryed, + When that great Bridegroome from the cloudes shall call + And ioyne, earth to his owne, himself to all. + +l. 7. _Then our land waters, &c._ 'That hand which was wont _to wipe +all teares from all our eyes_, doth now but presse and squeaze us as +so many spunges, filled one with one, another with another cause of +teares. Teares that can have no other banke to bound them, but the +declared and manifested _will of God_: For, till our teares flow to +that heighth, that they might be called a _murmuring_ against +the declared will of God, it is against our Allegiance, it is +_Disloyaltie_, to give our teares any stop, any termination, any +measure.' _Sermons_ 50. 33. 303: _On the Death of King James_. + +PAGE =280=, l. 11. _And even these teares, &c._: i.e. the + + Teares which our Soule doth for her sins let fall, + +which are the waters _above_ our firmament as opposed to the _land_ +or _earthly_ waters which are the tears of passion. The 'these' of the +MSS. seems necessary for clearness of references: 'For, _Lacrymae sunt +sudor animae maerentis_, Teares are the sweat of a labouring soule, +... Raine water is better then River water; The water of Heaven, +teares for offending thy God, are better then teares for worldly +losses; But yet come to teares of any kinde, and whatsoever occasion +thy teares, _Deus absterget omnem lacrymam_, there is the largeness of +his bounty, _He will wipe all teares from thine eyes_; But thou must +have teares first: first thou must come to this weeping, or else God +cannot come to this wiping; God hath not that errand to thee, to wipe +teares from thine eyes, if there be none there; If thou doe nothing +for thy selfe, God finds nothing to doe for thee.' _Sermons_ 80. 54. +539-40. + +The waters above the firmament were a subject of considerable +difficulty to mediaeval philosophy--so difficult indeed that St. +Augustine has to strengthen himself against sceptical objections by +reaffirming the authority of Scripture: _Maior est Scripturae huius +auctoritas quam omnis humani ingenii capacitas. Unde quoquo modo et +qualeslibet aquae ibi sint, eas tamen ibi esse, minime dubitamus._ +Aquinas, who quotes these words from Augustine, comes to two main +conclusions, himself leaning to the last. If by the firmament be meant +either the firmament of fixed stars, or the ninth sphere, the _primum +mobile_, then, since heavenly bodies are not made of the elements of +which earthly things are made (being incorruptible, and unchangeable +except in position), the waters above the firmament are not of +the same _kind_ as those on earth (_non sunt eiusdem speciei cum +inferioribus_). If, however, by the firmament be meant only the upper +part of the air where clouds are condensed, called firmament because +of the thickness of the air in that part, then the waters above the +firmament are simply the vaporized waters of which rain is formed +(_aquae quae vaporabiliter resolutae supra aliquam partem aeris +elevantur, ex quibus pluviae generantur_). _Above_ the firmament +waters are generated, _below_ they rest. _Summa_ I. 68. + +If I follow him, Donne to some extent blends or confounds these views. +Tears shed for our sins differ in _kind_ from tears shed for worldly +losses, as the waters above from those below. But the extract from +the sermon identifies the waters above the firmament with rain-water. +'Rain water is better than River-water.' It is purer; but it does +_not_ differ from it in kind. + +l. 12. _Wee, after Gods Noe, drowne our world againe._ I think the +'our' of the majority of the MSS. must be correct. From the spelling +and punctuation both, it is clear that the source from which _1633_ +printed closely resembled _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, which read 'our'. The +change to 'the' was made in the spirit which prompted the grosser +error of certain MSS. which read 'Noah'. Donne has in view the +'microcosm' rather than the 'macrocosm'. There is, of course, an +allusion to the Flood and the promise, but the immediate reference +is to Christ and the soul. 'After Christ's work of redemption and his +resurrection, which forbid despair, we yet yield to the passion of +sorrow.' We drown not _the_ world but _our_ world, the world within +us, or which each one of us is. This sense is brought out more clearly +in _Cy_'s version, which is a paraphrase rather than a version: + + Wee after Gods mercy drowne our Soules againe. + +l. 22. _Porcelane, where they buried Clay._ 'We are not thoroughly +resolved concerning _Porcelane_ or _China_ dishes, that according to +common belief they are made of Earth, which lieth in preparation about +an hundred years under ground; for the relations thereof are not only +divers, but contrary, and Authors agree not herein.' Browne, _Vulgar +Errors_, ii. 5. Browne quotes some of the older opinions and then +points out that a true account of the manufacture of porcelain had +been furnished by Gonzales de Mendoza, Linschoten, and Alvarez the +Jesuit, and that it was confirmed by the Dutch Embassy of 1665. The +old physical theories were retained for literary purposes long after +they had been exploded. + +l. 29. _They say, the sea, when it gaines, loseth too._ 'But we passe +from the circumstance of the time, to a second, that though Christ +thus despised by the _Gergesens_, did, in his Justice, depart from +them; yet, as the sea gaines in one place, what it loses in another, +his abundant mercy builds up more in _Capernaum_, then his Justice +throwes downe among the _Gergesens_: Because they drave him away, in +Judgement he went from them, but in Mercy he went to the others, who +had not intreated him to come.' _Sermons_ 80. 11. 103. + +'They flatly say that he eateth into others dominions, as the sea doth +into the land, not knowing that in swallowing a poore Iland as big as +Lesbos he may cast up three territories thrice as big as Phrygia: for +what the sea winneth in the marshe, it looseth in the sand.' Lyly, +_Midas_ v. 2. 17. + +Compare also Burton's _Anatomy of Melancholy_, Part 2, Sect 2, Mem. 3. + +Pope has borrowed the conceit from Donne in _An Essay on Criticism_, +ll. 54-9: + + As on the land while here the ocean gains, + In other parts it leaves wide sandy plains; + Thus in the soul while memory prevails, + The solid power of understanding fails; + Where beams of warm imagination play, + The memory's soft figures melt away. + +l. 34. _For, graves our trophies are, and both deaths dust._ The +modern printing of this as given in the Grolier Club edition makes +this line clearer--'both Deaths' dust.' 'Graves are our trophies, +their dust is not our dust but the dust of the elder and the younger +death, i.e. sin and the physical or carnal death which sin brought +in its train.' Chambers's 'death's dust' means, I suppose, the same +thing, but one can hardly speak of 'both death'. + +PAGE =281=, ll. 57-8. _this forward heresie, + That women can no parts of friendship bee._ + +Montaigne refers to the same heresy in speaking of 'Marie de Gournay +le Jars, ma fille d'alliance, et certes aymée de moy beaucoup plus que +paternellement, et enveloppée en ma retraitte et solitude comme l'une +des meilleures parties de mon propre estre. Je ne regarde plus qu'elle +au monde. Si l'adolescence peut donner presage, cette ame sera quelque +jour capable des plus belles choses et entre autres de la perfection +de _cette tressaincte amitié ou nous ne lisons point que son sexe ait +pu monter encores_: la sincerité et la solidité de ses moeurs y sont +desja bastantes.' _Essais_ (1590), ii. 17. + + +PAGE =282=. ELEGIE ON M^{ris} BOULSTRED. + +Cecilia Boulstred, or Bulstrode, was the daughter of Hedgerley +Bulstrode, of Bucks. She was baptized at Beaconsfield, February 12, +1583/4, and died at the house of her kinswoman, Lady Bedford, at +Twickenham, on August 4, 1609. So Mr. Chambers, from Sir James +Whitelocke's _Liber Famelicus_ (Camden Society). He quotes also from +the Twickenham Registers: 'M^{ris} Boulstred out of the parke, was +buried ye 6th of August, 1609.' In a letter to Goodyere Donne speaks +of her illness: 'but (by my troth) I fear earnestly that Mistresse +Bolstrod will not escape that sicknesse in which she labours at this +time. I sent this morning to aske of her passage this night, and the +return is, that she is as I left her yesternight, and then by the +strength of her understanding, and voyce, (proportionally to her +fashion, which was ever remisse) by the eavenesse and life of her +pulse, and by her temper, I could allow her long life, and impute all +her sicknesse to her minde. But the History of her sicknesse makes me +justly fear, that she will scarce last so long, as that you, when you +receive this letter, may do her any good office in praying for her.' +Poor Miss Bulstrode, whose + + voice was + Gentle and low, an excellent thing in woman, + +has not lived to fame in an altogether happy fashion, as the subject +of some tortured and tasteless _Epicedes_, a coarse and brutal Epigram +by Jonson (_An Epigram on the Court Pucell_ in _Underwoods_,--Jonson +told Drummond that the person intended was Mris Boulstred), a +complimentary, not to say adulatory, _Epitaph_ from the same pen, and +a dubious _Elegy_ by Sir John Roe ('Shall I goe force an Elegie,' p. +410). It was an ugly place, the Court of James I, as full of cruel +libels as of gross flattery, a fit subject for Milton's scorn. The +epitaph which Jonson wrote is found in more than one MS., and in some +where Donne's poems are in the majority. Chambers very tentatively +suggested that it might be by Donne himself, and I was inclined for a +time to accept this conjecture, finding it in other MSS. besides those +he mentioned, and because the sentiment of the closing lines is quite +Donnean. But in the Farmer-Chetham MS. (ed. Grosart) it is signed B. +J., and Mr. Percy Simpson tells me that a letter is extant from Jonson +to George Gerrard which indicates that the epitaph was written by +Jonson while Gerrard's man waited at the door. I quote it from _B_: + +_On the death of M^{rs} Boulstred._ + + Stay, view this Stone, and if thou beest not such + Reade here a little, that thou mayest know much. + It covers first a Virgin, and then one + That durst be so in Court; a Virtue alone + To fill an Epitaph; but shee hath more: + Shee might have claym'd to have made the Graces foure, + Taught Pallas language, Cynthia modesty; + As fit to have encreas'd the harmonye + Of Spheares, as light of Starres; she was Earths eye, + The sole religious house and votary + Not bound by rites but Conscience; wouldst thou all? + She was Sil. Boulstred, in which name I call + Up so much truth, as could I here pursue, + Might make the fable of good Woemen true. + +The name is given as 'Sal', but corrected to 'Sil' in the margin. +Other MSS. have 'Sell'. It is doubtless 'Cil', a contraction for +'Cecilia'. Chambers inadvertently printed 'still'. + +The language of Jonson's _Epitaph_ harmonizes ill with that of his +_Epigram_. Of all titles Jonson loved best that of 'honest', but +'honest', in a man, meant with Jonson having the courage to tell +people disagreeable truths, not to conceal your dislikes. He was a +candid friend to the living; after death--_nil nisi bonum_. + +For the relation of this _Elegie_ to that beginning 'Death, be not +proud' (p. 416) see _Text and Canon, &c._, p. cxliii. + +The _1633_ text of this poem is practically identical with that of +_D_, _H49_, _Lec_. With these MSS. it reads in l. 27 'life' for the +'lives' of other MSS. and editions, and 'but' for 'though' in the last +line. The only variant in _1633_ is 'worke' for 'workes' in l. 45. The +latter reading has the support of other MSS. and is very probably what +Donne wrote. Such use of a plural verb after two singular subjects of +closely allied import was common. See Franz, _Shakespeare-Grammatik_, +§ 673, and the examples quoted there, e.g. 'Both wind and tide stays +for this gentleman,' _Com. of Err_. IV. i. 46, where Rowe corrects to +'stay'; 'Both man and master is possessed,' _ibid._ IV. iv. 89. + +l. 10. _Eating the best first, well preserv'd to last._ The 'fruite' +or 'fruites' of _A18_, _N_, _TC_, which is as old as _P_ (1623), is +probably a genuine variant. The reference is to the elaborate dainties +of the second course at Elizabethan banquets, the dessert. Sleep, in +Macbeth's famous speech, is + + great Nature's second course, + +and Donne uses the same metaphor of the Eucharist: 'This fasting then +... is but a continuation of a great feast: where the first +course (that which we begin to serve in now) is Manna, food of +Angels,--plentiful, frequent preaching; but the second course is the +very body and blood of Christ Jesus, shed for us and given to us, in +that Blessed Sacrament, of which himself makes us worthy receivers at +that time.' _Sermons_. 'The most precious and costly dishes are always +reserved for the last services, but yet there is wholesome meat before +too.' _Ibid._ + +l. 18. _In birds, &c._: 'birds' is here in the possessive case, +'birds' organic throats'. I have modified the punctuation so as to +make this clearer. + +l. 24. _All the foure Monarchies_: i.e. Babylon, Persia, Greece, and +Rome. John Sleidan, mentioned in a note on the _Satyres_, wrote _The +Key of Historie: Or, A most Methodicall Abridgement of the foure +chiefe Monarchies &c._, to quote its title in the English translation. + +l. 27. _Our births and lives, &c._ _1633_ and the two groups of MSS. +_D_, _H49_, _Lec_ and _A18_, _L74_, _N_, _TC_ read 'life'. If this be +correct, then 'births' would surely need to be 'birth'. _HN_ shows, I +think, what has happened. The voiced 'f' was not always distinguished +from the breathed sound by a different spelling ('v' for 'f'), and +'lifes' would very easily become 'life'. On the other hand 'v' was +frequently written where we now have 'f', and sometimes misleads. +Peele's _The Old Wives Tale_ is not necessarily, as usually printed, +_Wives'_. It is just an _Old Woman's Tale_. + + +PAGE =284=. ELEGIE. + +PAGE =285=, l. 34. _The Ethicks speake, &c._ A rather strange +expression for 'Ethics tell'. The article is rare. Donne says, 'No +booke of Ethicks.' _Sermons_ 80. 55. 550. In _HN_ Drummond has altered +to 'Ethnicks' a word Donne uses elsewhere: 'Of all nations the Jews +have most chastely preserved that ceremony of abstaining from Ethnic +names.' _Essays in Divinity._ It does not, however, seem appropriate +here, unless Donne means to say that she had all the cardinal virtues +of the heathen with the superhuman, theological virtues which are +superinduced by grace: + + Her soul was Paradise, &c. + +But this is not at all clear. Apparently there is no more in the line +than a somewhat vaguely expressed hyperbole: 'she had all the cardinal +virtues of which we hear in Ethics'. + +PAGE =286=, l. 44. _Wee'had had a Saint, have now a holiday_: i.e. +'We should have had a saint and should have now a holiday'--her +anniversary. The MS. form of the line is probably correct: + + We hád had á Saint, nów a hólidáy. + +l. 48. _That what we turne to_ feast, _she turn'd to_ pray. As printed +in the old editions this line, if it be correctly given, is one of the +worst Donne ever wrote: + + That what we turne to feast, she turn'd to pray, + +i.e. apparently 'That, the day which we turn into a feast or festival +she turned into a day of prayer, a fast'. But 'she turn'd to pray' +in such a sense is a hideously elliptical construction and cannot, +I think, be what Donne meant to write. Two emendations suggest +themselves. One occurs in _HN_: + + That when we turn'd to feast, she turn'd to pray. + +When we turn'd aside from the routine of life's work to keep holiday, +she did so also, but it was to pray. This is better, but it is +difficult to understand how, if this be the correct reading, the error +arose, and only _HN_ reads 'when'. The emendation I have introduced +presupposes only careless typography or punctuation to account for +the bad line. I take it that Donne meant 'feast' and 'pray' to be +imperatives, and that the line would be printed, if modernized, thus: + + That what we turn to 'feast!' she turn'd to 'pray!' + +That the command to keep the Sabbath day holy, which we, especially +Roman Catholics and Anglicans of the Catholic school, interpret as +to the Christian Church a command to feast, to keep holiday, she +interpreted as a command to fast and pray. Probably both Lady Markham +and Lady Bedford belonged to the more Calvinist wing of the Church. +There is a distinctly Calvinist flavour about Lady Bedford's own +_Elegy_, which reads also as though it were to some extent a rebuke to +Donne for the note, either too pagan or too Catholic for her taste, of +his poems on Death. See p. 422, and especially: + + Goe then to people curst before they were, + Their spoyles in triumph of thy conquest weare. + +l. 58. _will be a Lemnia._ All the MSS. read 'Lemnia' without the +article, probably rightly, 'Lemnia' being used shortly for 'terra +Lemnia', or 'Lemnian earth'--a red clay found in Lemnos and reputed +an antidote to poison (Pliny, _N. H._ xxv. 13). It was one of +the constituents of the theriaca. It may be here thought of as an +antiseptic preserving from putrefaction. But Norton points out that by +some of the alchemists the name was given to the essential component +of the Philosopher's stone, and that what Donne was thinking of was +transmuting power, changing crystal into diamond. The alchemists, +however, dealt more in metals than in stones. The thought in Donne's +mind is perhaps rather that which he expresses at p. 280, l. 21. As +in some earths clay is turned to porcelain, so in this Lemnian earth +crystal will turn to diamond. + +The words 'Tombe' and 'diamond' afford so bad a rhyme that G. L. Craik +conjectured, not very happily,'a wooden round'. Craik's criticism of +Donne, written in 1847, _Sketches of the History of Literature and +Learning in England_, is wonderfully just and appreciative. + + +PAGE =287=. ELEGIE ON THE L. C. + +Whoever may be the subject of this _Elegie_, Donne speaks as though he +were a member of his household. In 1617 Donne had long ceased to be +in any way attached to the Lord Chancellor's retinue. The reference to +his 'children' also without any special reference to his son the new +earl, soon to be Earl of Bridgewater, is very unlike Donne. Moreover, +Sir Thomas Egerton never had more than two sons, one of whom was +killed in Ireland in 1599. + +ll. 13-16. _As we for him dead: though, &c._ Both Chambers and the +Grolier Club editor connect the clause 'though no family ... with him +in joy to share' with the next, as its principal clause, 'We lose +what all friends lov'd, &c.' To me it seems that it must go with the +preceding clause, 'As we [must wither] for him dead'. I take it as a +clause of concession. 'With him we, his family, must die (as the briar +does with the tree on which it grows); but no family could die with +a more certain hope of sharing the joy into which their head has +entered; with none would so many be willing to "venture estates" in +that great voyage of discovery.' With the next lines,'We lose,' &c., +begins a fresh argument. The thought is forced and obscure, but the +figure, taken from voyages of discovery, is characteristic of Donne. + + +PAGE =288=. AN HYMNE TO THE SAINTS, AND TO MARQUESSE HAMYLTON. + +In the old editions this is placed among the _Divine Poems_, and Donne +meant it to bear that character. For it was rather unwillingly that +Donne, now in Orders, wrote this poem at the instance of his friend +and patron Sir Robert Ker, or Carr, later (1633) Earl of Ancrum. + +James Hamilton, b. 1584, succeeded his father in 1604 as Marquis of +Hamilton, and his uncle in 1609 as Duke of Chatelherault and Earl of +Arran. He was made a Gentleman of the Bed-Chamber and held other posts +in Scotland. On the occasion of James I's visit to Scotland in 1617 he +played a leading part, and thereafter became a favourite courtier, +his name figuring in all the great functions described in Nichol's +_Progresses_. In 1617 Chamberlain writes: 'I have not heard a man +generally better spoken of than the Marquis, even by all the English; +insomuch that he is every way held as the gallantest gentleman of +both the nations.' He was High Commissioner to the Parliament held at +Edinburgh in 1624, where he secured the passing of the Five Articles +of Perth. In 1624 he opposed the French War policy of Buckingham, and +when he died on March 2, 1624/5, it was maintained that the latter had +poisoned him. + +The rhetoric and rhythm of this poem depend a good deal on getting +the right punctuation and a clear view of what are the periods. I have +ventured to make a few emendations in the arrangement of _1633_. The +first sentence ends with the emphatic 'wee doe not so' (l. 8), where +'wee' might be printed in italics. The next closes with 'all lost a +limbe' (l. 18), and the effect is marred if, with Chambers and the +Grolier Club editor, one places a full stop after 'Music lacks a +song', though a colon might be most appropriate. The last two lines +clinch the detailed statement which has preceded. The next sentence +again is not completed till l. 30, 'in the form thereof his bodie's +there', but, though _1633_ has only a semicolon here, a full stop +is preferable, or at least a colon. Chambers's full stops at l. 22, +'none', and l. 28, 'a resurrection', have again the effect of +breaking the logical and rhythmical structure. Lines 23-4 are entirely +parenthetical and would be better enclosed in brackets. Four sustained +periods compose the elegy. + +PAGE =289=, ll. 6-7. _If every severall Angell bee A kind alone._ Ea +enim quae conveniunt specie, et differunt numero, conveniunt in formâ +sed distinguuntur materialiter. Si ergo Angeli non sunt compositi ex +materiâ et formâ ... sequitur quod _impossibile sit esse duos Angelos +unius speciei_: sicut etiam impossibile esset dicere quod essent +plures albedines (whitenesses) separatae aut plures humanitates: ... +Si tamen Angeli haberent materiam nec sic possent esse plures Angeli +unius speciei. Sic enim opporteret quod principium distinctionis unius +ab alio esset materia, non quidem secundum divisionem quantitatis, cum +sint incorporei, sed secundum diversitatem potentiarum: quae quidem +diversitas materiae causat diversitatem non solum speciei sed generis. +Aquinas, _Summa_ I. l. 4. + + +PAGE =293=. INFINITATI SACRUM, _&c._ + +PAGE =294=, l. 11. _a Mucheron_: i.e. a mushroom, here equivalent to +a fungus. Chambers adopts without note the reading of the later +editions, 'Maceron', but spells it 'Macaron'. Grosart prints +'Macheron', taking 'Mucheron' as a mis-spelling. Captain Shirley +Harris first pointed out, in _Notes and Queries_, that 'Mucheron' +must be correct, for Donne has in view, as so often elsewhere, the +threefold division of the soul--vegetal, sensitive, rational. Captain +Harris quoted the very apt parallel from Burton, where, speaking +of metempsychosis, he says: 'Lucian's cock was first Euphorbus, a +captain: + + Ille ego (nam memini Troiani tempore belli) + Panthoides Euphorbus eram, + +a horse, a man, a spunge.' _Anatomy of Melancholy_, Part 1, Sect. 1, +Mem. 2, Subs. 10. Donne's order is, a man, a horse, a fungus. But +to Burton a sponge was a fungus. The word fungus is cognate with or +derived from the Greek [Greek: spongos]. + +As for the form 'mucheron' (n. b. 'mushrome' in _G_) the O.E.D. +gives it among different spellings but cites no example of this exact +spelling. From the _Promptorium Parvulorum_ it quotes, 'Muscheron, +toodys hatte, _boletus_, _fungus_.' Captain Harris has supplied me +with the following delightful instance of the word in use as late as +1808. It is from a catalogue of Maggs Bros. (No. 263, 1910): + +'THE DISAPPOINTED KING OF SPAIN, or the downfall of the Mucheron King +Joe Bonaparte, late Pettifogging Attorney's Clerk. Between two stools +the Breech comes to the Ground.' + +The caricature is etched by G. Cruikshank and is dated 1808. + +The 'Maceron' which was inserted in _1635_ is not a misprint, but a +pseudo-correction by some one who did not recognize 'mucheron' and +knew that Donne had elsewhere used 'maceron' for a fop or puppy (see +p. 163, l. 117). + +'Mushrome', the spelling of the word in _G_, is found also in the +_Sermons_ (80. 73. 748). + +l. 22. _which Eve eate_: 'eate' is of course the past tense, and +should be 'ate' in modernized editions, not 'eat' as in Chambers's and +the Grolier Club editions. + + +THE PROGRESSE OF THE SOULE. + +The strange poem _The Progresse of the Soule_, or _Metempsychosis_, is +dated by Donne himself, 16 Augusti 1601. The different use of the +same title which Donne made later to describe the progress of the +soul heavenward, after its release from the body, shows that he had no +intention of publishing the poem. How widely it circulated in MS. we +do not know, but I know of three copies only which are extant, viz. +_G_, _O'F_, and that given in the group _A18_, _N_, _TCC_, _TCD_. +It was from the last that the text of _1633_ was printed, the editor +supplying the punctuation, which in the MS. is scanty. In some copies +of _1633_ the same omissions of words occur as in the MS. but the poem +was corrected in several places as it passed through the press. +_G_, though not without mistakes itself, supplies some important +emendations. + +The sole light from without which has been thrown upon the poem comes +from Ben Jonson's conversations with Drummond: 'The conceit of Dones +Transformation or [Greek: Metempsychôsis] was that he sought the soule +of that aple which Eve pulled and thereafter made it the soule of a +bitch, then of a shee wolf, and so of a woman; his generall purpose +was to have brought in all the bodies of the Hereticks from the soule +of Cain, and at last left in the bodie of Calvin. Of this he never +wrotte but one sheet, and now, since he was made Doctor, repenteth +highlie and seeketh to destroy all his poems.' + +Jonson was clearly recalling the poem somewhat inaccurately, and +at the same time giving the substance of what Donne had told him. +Probably Donne mystified him on purpose, for it is evident from the +poem that in his first intention Queen Elizabeth herself was to be the +soul's last host. It is impossible to attach any other meaning to the +seventh stanza; and that intention also explains the bitter tone in +which women are satirized in the fragment. Women and courtiers are +the chief subject of Donne's sardonic satire in this poem, as of +Shakespeare's in _Hamlet_. + +I have indicated elsewhere what I think is the most probable motive +of the poem. It reflects the mood of mind into which Donne, like many +others, was thrown by the tragic fate of Essex in the spring of the +year. In _Cynthia's Revels_, acted in the same year as Donne's poem +was composed, Jonson speaks of 'some black and envious slanders +breath'd against her' (i.e. Diana, who is Elizabeth) 'for her divine +justice on Actaeon', and it is well known that she incurred both +odium and the pangs of remorse. Donne, who was still a Catholic in +the sympathies that come of education and association, seems to +have contemplated a satirical history of the great heretic in lineal +descent from the wife of Cain to Elizabeth--for private circulation. +See _The Poetry of John Donne_, II. pp. xvii-xx. + +PAGE =295=, l. 9. _Seths pillars._ Norton's note on this runs: 'Seth, +the son of Adam, left children who imitated his virtues. 'They were +the discoverers of the wisdom which relates to the heavenly bodies and +their order, and that their inventions might not be lost they made +two pillars, the one of brick, the other of stone, and inscribed their +discoveries on them both, that in case the pillar of brick should be +destroyed by the flood, the pillar of stone might remain and exhibit +these discoveries to mankind.... Now this remains in the land of +Siriad to this day.' Josephus, _Antiquities of the Jews_ (Whiston's +translation), I. 2, §3. + +PAGE =296=, l. 21. _holy Ianus._ 'Janus, whom Annius of Viterbo and +the chorographers of Italy do make to be the same with Noah.' Browne, +_Vulgar Errors_, vi. 6. The work referred to is the _Antiquitatum +variarum volumina XVII_ (1498, reprinted and re-arranged 1511), by +Annius of Viterbo (1432-1502), a Dominican friar, Fra Giovanni +Nanni. Each of the books, after the first, consists of a digest +with commentary of various works on ancient history, the aim being +apparently to reconcile Biblical and heathen chronology and to +establish the genealogy of Christ. _Liber XIIII_ is a digest, or +'defloratio', of Philo (of whom later); _Liber XV_ of Berosus, +a reputed Chaldaean historian ('patria Babylonicus; et dignitate +Chaldaeus'), cited by Josephus. From him Annius derives this +identification of Janus with Noah: 'Hoc vltimo loco Berosus de tribus +cognominibus rationes tradit: Noa: Cam & Tythea. De Noa dicit quod +fuit illi tributum cognomen Ianus a Iain: quod apud Aramaeos et +Hebraeos sonat vinum: a quo Ianus id est vinifer et vinosus: quia +primus vinum invenit et inebriatus est: vt dicit Berosus: et supra +insinuavit Propertius: et item Moyses Genesis cap ix. vbi etiam Iain +vinum Iani nominat: vbi nos habemus: Cum Noa evigilasset a vino. Cato +etiam in fragmentis originum; et Fabius Pictor in de origine vrbis +Romae dicunt Ianum dictum priscum Oenotrium: quia invenit vinum et +far ad religionem magis quam ad vsum,' &c., XV, Fo. cxv. Elsewhere +the identity is based not on this common interest in wine but on +their priestly office, they being the first to offer 'sacrificia et +holocausta', VII, Fo. lviii. Again, 'Ex his probatur irrevincibiliter +a tempore demonstrato a Solino et propriis Epithetis Iani: eundem +fuisse Ogygem: Ianum et Noam ... Sed Noa fuit proprium: Ogyges verum +Ianus et Proteus id est Vertumnus sunt solum praenomina ejus,' XV, Fo. +cv. No mention of the ark as a link occurs, but a ship figured on the +copper coins distributed at Rome on New Year's day, which was sacred +to Janus. The original connexion is probably found in Macrobius' +statement (_Saturn._ I. 9) that among other titles Janus was invoked +as 'Consivius ... a conserendo id est a propagine generis humani quae +Iano auctore conseritur'. Noah is the father of the extant human race. + +PAGE =299=, ll. 114-17. There can be no doubt, I think, that the 1633 +text is here correct, though for clearness a comma must be inserted +after 'reasons'. The emendation of the 1635 editor which modern +editors have followed gives an awkward and, at the close, an absurdly +tautological sentence. It is not the reason, the rational faculty, +of sceptics which is like the bubbles blown by boys, that stretch too +thin, 'break and do themselves spill.' What Donne says, is that the +reasons or arguments of those who answer sceptics, like bubbles which +break themselves, injure their authors, the apologists. The verse +wants a syllable--not a unique phenomenon in Donne's satires; but if +one is to be supplied 'so' would give the sense better than 'and'. + +PAGE =300=, l. 129. _foggie Plot._ The word 'foggie' has here the in +English obsolete, in Scotch and perhaps other dialects, still known +meaning of 'marshy', 'boggy'. The O.E.D. quotes, 'He that is fallen +into a depe foggy well and sticketh fast in it,' Coverdale, _Bk. +Death_, I. xl. 160; 'The foggy fens in the next county,' Fuller, +_Worthies_. + +l. 137. _To see the Prince, and have so fill'd the way._ The +grammatically and metrically correct reading of _G_ appears to me to +explain the subsequent variation. 'Prince' struck the editor of +the 1633 edition as inconsistent with the subsequent 'she', and he +therefore altered it to 'Princess'. He may have been encouraged to +do so by the fact that the copy from which he printed had dropped the +'have', or he may himself have dropped the 'have' to adjust the verse +to his alteration. The former is, I think, the more likely, because +what would seem to be the earlier printed copies of _1633_ read +'Prince': unless he himself overlooked the 'have' and then amended +by 'Princess'. The 1635 editor restored 'Prince' and then amended the +verse by his usual device of padding, changing 'fill'd' to 'fill up'. +Of course Donne's line may have read as we give it, with 'Princess' +for 'Prince', but the evidence of the MSS. is against this, so far +as it goes. The title of 'Prince' was indeed applicable to a female +sovereign. The O.E.D. gives: 'Yea the Prince ... as she hath most of +yearely Revenewes ... so should she have most losse by this dearth,' +W. Stafford, 1581; 'Cleopatra, prince of Nile,' Willobie, _Avisa_, +1594; 'Another most mighty prince, Mary Queene of Scots,' Camden +(Holland), 1610. + + PAGE =301=, ll. 159-160. _built by the guest, + This living buried man, &c._ + +The comma after guest is dropped in the printed editions, the editor +regarding 'this living buried man' as an expansion of 'the guest'. But +the man buried alive is the 'soul's second inn', the mandrake. 'Many +Molas and false conceptions there are of Mandrakes, the first from +great Antiquity conceiveth the Root thereof resembleth the shape of +Man which is a conceit not to be made out by ordinary inspection, +or any other eyes, than such as regarding the clouds, behold them in +shapes conformable to pre-apprehensions.' Browne, _Vulgar Errors_. + +PAGE =303=, ll. 203-5. The punctuation of this stanza is in the +editions very chaotic, and I have amended it. A full stop should be +placed at the end of l. 203, 'was not', _because_ these lines complete +the thought of the previous stanza. Possibly the semicolon after 'ill' +was intended to follow 'not', but a full stop is preferable. Moreover, +the colon after 'soule' (l. 204) suggests that the printer took ''twas +not' with 'this soule'. The correct reading of l. 204 is obviously: + + So jolly, that it can move, this soul is. + +Chambers prefers: + + So jolly, that it can move this soul, is + The body ... + +but Donne was far too learned an Aristotelian and Scholastic to make +the body move the soul, or feel jolly on its own account: + + thy fair goodly soul, which doth + Give this flesh power to taste joy, thou dost loathe. + _Satyre III_, ll. 41-2. + +'The soul is so glad to be at last able to move (having been +imprisoned hitherto in plants which have the soul of growth, not of +locomotion or sense), and the body is so free of its kindnesses to the +soul, that it, the sparrow, forgets the duty of self-preservation.' + +l. 214. _hid nets._ In making my first collation of the printed texts +I had queried the possibility of 'hid' being the correct reading for +'his', a conjecture which the Gosse MS. confirms. + +PAGE =305=, l. 257. _None scape, but few, and fit for use, to get._ +I have added a comma after 'use' to make the construction a little +clearer; a pause is needed. 'The nets were not wrought, as now, to let +none scape, but were wrought to get few and those fit for use; as, for +example, a ravenous pike, &c.' + +PAGE =306=, ll. 267-8. '_To make the water thinne, and airelike faith +cares not._' What Chambers understands by 'air like faith', I do not +know. What Donne says is that the manner in which fishes breathe is a +matter about which faith is indifferent. Each man may hold what theory +he chooses. There is not much obvious relevance in this remark, but +Donne has already in this poem touched on the difference between faith +and knowledge: + + better proofes the law + Of sense then faith requires. + +A vein of restless scepticism runs through the whole. + +l. 280. _It's rais'd, to be the Raisers instrument and food._ If with +_1650-69_, Chambers, and the Grolier Club editor, we alter the full +stop which separates this line from the last to a comma, 'It' must +mean the same as 'she', i.e. the fish. This is a harsh construction. +The line is rather to be taken as an aphorism. 'To be exalted is often +to become the instrument and prey of him who has exalted you.' + +PAGE =307=, l. 296. _That many leagues at sea, now tir'd hee lyes._ +The reading of _G_ represents probably what Donne wrote. It is quite +clear that _1633_ was printed from a MS. identical with _A18_, _N_, +_TC_, and underwent considerable correction as it passed through the +press. In no poem does the text of one copy vary so much from that +of another as in this. Now in this MS. a word is dropped. The editor +supplied the gap by inserting 'o're-past', which simply repeats 'flown +long and fast'. _G_ shows what the dropped word was. 'Many leagues at +sea' is an adverbial phrase qualifying 'now tir'd he lies'. + +ll. 301-10. I owe the right punctuation of this stanza to the Grolier +Club edition and Grosart. The 'as' of l. 303 requires to be followed +by a comma. Missing this, Chambers closes the sentence at l. 307, +'head', leaving 'This fish would seem these' in the air. The words +'when all hopes fail' play with the idea of 'the hopeful Promontory', +or Cape of Good Hope. + +PAGE =308=, ll. 321-2. _He hunts not fish, but as an officer, + Stayes in his court, at his owne net._ + +Compare: 'A confidence in their owne strengths, a sacrificing to their +own Nets, an attributing of their securitie to their own wisedome or +power, may also retard the cause of God.' _Sermons_, Judges xv. 20 +(1622). + +'And though some of the Fathers pared somewhat too neare the quick in +this point, yet it was not as in the Romane Church, to lay snares, and +spread nets for gain.' _Sermons_ 80. 22. 216. + +'The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of comfort comes to him' (the courtier) +'but hee will die in his old religion, which is to sacrifice to his +owne Nets, by which his portion is plenteous.' _Sermons_ 80. 70. 714. + +The image of the net is probably derived from Jeremiah v. 26: 'For +among my people are found wicked men; they lay wait as he that setteth +snares; they set a trap, they catch men.' Compare also: 'he lieth in +wait to catch the poor: he doth catch the poor when he draweth him +into his net.' Psalm x. 9. + +PAGES =310-11=, ll. 381-400. Compare: 'Amongst _naturall Creatures_, +because howsoever they differ in bignesse, yet they have some +proportion to one another, we consider that some very little +creatures, contemptible in themselves, are yet called enemies to great +creatures, as the Mouse is to the Elephant.' _Sermons_ 50. 40. 372. +'How great an Elephant, how small a Mouse destroys.' _Devotions_, p. +284. + +ll. 405-6. _Who in that trade, of Church, and kingdomes, there + Was the first type._ + +The _1635_ punctuation of this passage is right, though it is better +to drop the comma after 'Kingdoms' and obviate ambiguity. The trade is +the shepherd's; in it Abel is type both of Church and Kingdom, Emperor +and Pope. As a type of Christ Donne refers to Abel in _The Litanie_, +p. 341, l. 86. + +PAGE =312=, l. 419. _Nor <make> resist._ I have substituted 'make' for +the 'much' of the editions, confident that it is the right reading and +explains the vacillation of the MSS. The proper alternative to 'show' +is 'make'. The error arose from the obsolescence of 'resist' used as +a noun. But the O.E.D. cites from Lodge, _Forbonius and Priscilla_ +(1585), 'I make no resist in this my loving torment', and other +examples dated 1608 and 1630. Donne is fond of verbal nouns retaining +the form of the verb unchanged. + +l. 439. _soft Moaba._ 'Moaba', 'Siphatecia' (l. 457), 'Tethlemite' (l. +487), and Themech' (l. 509) are not creatures of Donne's invention, +but derived from his multifarious learning. It is, however, a little +difficult to detect the immediate source from which he drew. The +ultimate source of all these additions to the Biblical narrative and +persons was the activity of the Jewish intellect and imagination in +the interval between the time at which the Old Testament closes and +the dispersion under Titus and Vespasian, the desire of the Jews in +Palestine and Alexandria to 'round off the biblical narrative, fill +up the lacunae, answer all the questions of the inquiring mind of the +ancient reader'. Of the original Hebrew writings of this period none +have survived, but their traditions passed into mediaeval works like +the _Historia Scholastica_ of Petrus Comestor and hence into popular +works, e.g. the Middle English _Cursor Mundi_. Another compendium +of this pseudo-historical lore was the _Philonis Judaei Alexandrini. +Libri Antiquitatum. Quaestionum et Solutionum in Genesin. de Essaeis. +de Nominibus hebraicis. de Mundo. Basle._ 1527. An abstract of this +work is given by Annius of Viterbo in the book referred to in a +previous note. Dr. Cohn has shown that this Latin work is a third- or +fourth-century translation of a Greek work, itself a translation from +the Hebrew. More recently Rabbi M. Gaster has brought to light the +Hebrew original in portions of a compilation of the fourteenth century +called the _Chronicle of Jerahmeel_, of which he has published +an English translation under the 'Patronage of the Royal Asiatic +Society', _Oriental Translation Fund_. New Series, iv. 1899. In +chapter xxvi of this work we read: 'Adam begat three sons and three +daughters, Cain and his twin wife Qualmana, Abel and his twin wife +Deborah, and Seth and his twin wife Nōba. And Adam, after he had +begotten Seth, lived seven hundred years, and there were eleven sons +and eight daughters born to him. These are the names of his sons: Eli, +Shēēl, Surei, 'Almiel, Berokh, Ke'al, Nabath, Zarh-amah, Sisha, +Mahtel, and Anat; and the names of his daughters are: Havah, Gitsh, +Harē, Bikha, Zifath, Hēkhiah, Shaba, and 'Azin.' In Philo this +reappears as follows: 'Initio mundi Adam genuit tres filios et unam +filiam, Cain, Noaba, Abel, et Seth: Et vixit Adam, postquam genuit +Seth, annos DCC., et genuit filios duodecim, et filias octo: Et haec +sunt nomina virorum, Aeliseel, Suris, Aelamiel, Brabal, Naat, Harama, +Zas-am, Maathal, et Anath: Et hae filiae eius, Phua, Iectas, Arebica, +Siphatecia, Sabaasin.' It is clear there are a good many mistakes in +Philo's account as it has come to us. His numbers and names do not +correspond. Clearly also some of the Latin names are due to the +running together of two Hebrew ones, e.g. Aeliseel, Arebica, and +Siphatecia. Of the names in Donne's poem two occur in the above +lists--Noaba (Heb. Nobā) and Siphatecia. But Noaba has become +Moaba: Siphatecia is 'Adams fift daughter', which is correct according +to the Hebrew, but not according to Philo's list; and there is no +mention in these lists of Tethlemite (or Thelemite) among Adam's sons, +or of Themech as Cain's wife. In the Hebrew she is called Qualmana. +Doubtless since two of the names are traceable the others are so also. +We have not found Donne's immediate source. I am indebted for such +information as I have brought together to Rabbi Gaster. + +PAGE =314=, l. 485. (_loth_). I have adopted this reading from the +insertion in _TCC_, not that much weight can be allowed to this +anonymous reviser (some of whose insertions are certainly wrong), +but because 'loth' or 'looth' is more likely to have been changed to +'tooth' than 'wroth'. The occurrence of 'Tooth' in _G_ as well as in +_1633_ led me to consult Sir James Murray as to the possibility of a +rare adjectival sense of that word, e.g. 'eager, with tooth on edge +for'. I venture to quote his reply: 'We know nothing of _tooth_ as an +adjective in the sense _eager_; or in any sense that would fit here. +Nor does _wroth_ seem to myself and my assistants to suit well. In +thinking of the possible word for which _tooth_ was a misprint, or +rather misreading ... the word _loth_, _loath_, _looth_, occurred +to myself and an assistant independently before we saw that it is +mentioned in the foot-note.... _Loath_ seems to me to be exactly the +word wanted, the true antithesis to willing, and it was a very easy +word to write as _tooth_.' Sir James Murray suggests, as just +a possibility, that 'wroth' (_1635-69_) may have arisen from a +provincial form 'wloth'. He thinks, however, as I do, that it is more +probably a mere editorial conjecture. + +PAGE =315=, ll. 505-9. _these limbes a soule attend; + And now they joyn'd: keeping some quality + Of every past shape, she knew treachery, + Rapine, deceit, and lust, and ills enow + To be a woman._ + +Chambers and the Grolier Club editor have erroneously followed +_1635-69_ in their punctuation and attached 'keeping some quality of +every past shape' to the preceding 'they'. The force of Donne's bitter +comment is thus weakened. It is with 'she', i.e. the soul, that the +participial phrase goes. 'She, retaining the evil qualities of all the +forms through which she has passed, has thus "ills enow" (treachery, +rapine, deceit, and lust) to be a woman.' + + + + +DIVINE POEMS. + +The dating of Donne's _Divine Poems_ raises some questions that have +not received all the consideration they deserve. They fall into two +groups--those written before and those written after he took orders. +Of the former the majority would seem to belong to the years of his +residence at Mitcham. The poem _On the Annunciation and Passion_ was +written on March 25, 1608/9. _The Litanie_ was written, we gather from +a letter to Sir Henry Goodyere, about the same time. _The Crosse_ we +cannot date, but I should be inclined with Mr. Gosse to connect +it rather with the earlier than the later poems. It is in the same +somewhat tormented, intellectual style. On the other hand the _Holy +Sonnets_ were composed, we know now from Sonnet XVII, first published +by Mr. Gosse, after the death of Donne's wife in 1617; and _The +Lamentations of Jeremy_ appear to have been written at the same +juncture. The first sermon which Donne preached after that event was +on the text (Lam. iii. 1): 'I am the man that hath seen affliction,' +and Walton speaks significantly of his having ended the night and +begun the day in _lamentations_. + +The more difficult question is the date of the _La Corona_ group of +sonnets. It is usual to attribute them to the later period of Donne's +ministry. This is not, I think, correct. It seems to me most probable +that they too were composed at Mitcham in or before 1609. + +Dr. Grosart first pointed out that one of Donne's short verse-letters, +headed in _1663_ and later editions _To E. of D. with six holy +Sonnets_, must have been sent with a copy of six of these sonnets, the +seventh being held back on account of some imperfection. It appears +with the same heading in _O'F_, but in _W_ it is entitled simply _To +L. of D._, and is placed immediately after the letter _To Mr. T. W._, +'Haste thee harsh verse' (p. 205), and before the next to the same +person, 'Pregnant again' (p. 206). It thus belongs to this group of +letters written apparently between 1597 and 1609-10. + +Who is the E. of D.? Dr. Grosart, Mr. Chambers, and Mr. Gosse assume +that it must be Lord Doncaster, though admitting in the same breath +that the latter was not Earl of, but Viscount Doncaster, and that only +between 1618 and 1622, four short years. The title 'L. of D.' might +indicate Doncaster because the title 'my Lord of' is apparently given +to a Viscount. In his letters from Germany Donne speaks of 'my Lord of +Doncaster'. It may, therefore, be a mistake of the printer or editor +of _1633_; which turned 'L. of D.' into 'E. of D.'; but Hay was still +alive in 1633, and the natural thing for the printer to do would have +been to alter the title to 'E. of C.' or 'Earl of Carlisle'. Before +1618 Donne speaks of the 'Lord Hay' or 'the L. Hay' (see _Letters_, +p. 145),[1] and this or 'the L. H.' is the title the poem would have +borne if addressed to him in any of the years to which the other +letters in the Westmoreland MS. (_W_) seem to belong. + +Moreover, there is another of Donne's noble friends who might +correctly be described as either E. of D. or L. of D. and that is +Richard Sackville, third Earl of Dorset. Donne generally speaks of him +as 'my Lord of Dorset': 'I lack you here', he writes to Goodyere, +'for my L. of Dorset, he might make a cheap bargain with me now, and +disingage his honour, which in good faith, is a little bound, because +he admitted so many witnesses of his large disposition towards me.' +Born in 1589, the grandson of the great poet of Elizabeth's early +reign, Richard Sackville was educated at Christ Church, Oxford. He +succeeded as third Earl of Dorset on February 27, 1608/9, having two +days previously married Anne, Baroness Clifford in her own right, the +daughter of George Clifford, the buccaneering Earl of Cumberland, and +Margaret, daughter of Francis, second Earl of Bedford. The Countess of +Dorset was therefore a first cousin to Edward, third Earl of Bedford, +the husband of Donne's patroness Lucy, Countess of Bedford. + +The earliest date at which the letter could have been addressed to +Dorset as L. of D. or E. of D. is 1609, just after his marriage into +the circle of Donne's friends. Now in Harleian MS. 4955 (_H49_) we +find the heading, + + Holy Sonnets: written 20 yeares since. + +This is followed at once by 'Deign at my hands', and then the title +_La Corona_ is given to the six sonnets which ensue. Thereafter +follow, without any fresh heading, twelve of the sonnets belonging +to the second group, generally entitled _Holy Sonnets_. It will be +noticed that in the editions this last title is used twice, first for +both groups and then, in italics, for the second alone. The question +is, did the copyist of _H49_ intend that the note should apply to all +the sonnets he transcribed or only to the _La Corona_ group? If to +all, he was certainly wrong as to the second lot, which were written +later; but he was quite possibly right as to the first. Now twenty +years before 1629, which is the date given to some of Andrewes' poems +in the MS., would bring us to 1609, the year of the Earl of Dorset's +accession and marriage, and the period when most of the letters among +which that to L. of D. in _W_ appears were written. + +Note, moreover, the content of the letter _To L. of D._ Most of the +letters in this group, to Thomas and Rowland Woodward, to S. B., and +B. B., are poetical replies to poetical epistles. Now that _To L. of +D._ is in the same strain: + + See Sir, how as the Suns hot Masculine flame + Begets strange creatures on Niles durty slime, + In me, your fatherly yet lusty Ryme + (For, these songs are their fruits) have wrought the same. + +This is in the vein of the letter _To Mr. R. W._, 'Muse not that by +thy mind,' and of the epistle _To J. D._ which I have cited in the +notes (p. 166). We hear nowhere that Lord Hay wrote verses, and it +is very unlikely that he, already when Donne formed his aquaintance a +rising courtier, should have joined with the Woodwards, and Brookes, +and Cornwallis, in the game of exchanging bad verses with Donne. It is +quite likely that the young Lord of Dorset, either in 1609, or earlier +when he was still an Oxford student or had just come up to London, may +have burned his pinch of incense to the honour of the most brilliant +of the wits, now indeed a grave _épistolier_ and moralist, but +still capable of 'kindling squibs about himself and flying into +sportiveness'. We gather from Lord Herbert of Cherbury that the Earl +of Dorset must have been an enthusiastic young man. When Herbert +returned to England after the siege of Julyers (whither Donne had sent +him a verse epistle), 'Richard, Earl of Dorset, to whom otherwise I +was a stranger, one day invited me to Dorset House, where bringing me +into his gallery, and showing me many pictures, he at last brought me +to a frame covered with green taffeta, and asked me who I thought was +there; and therewithal presently drawing the curtain showed me my +own picture; whereupon demanding how his Lordship came to have it, he +answered, that he had heard so many brave things of me, that he got a +copy of a picture which one Larkin a painter drew for me, the original +whereof I intended before my departure to the Low Countries for Sir +Thomas Lucy.' _Autobiography_, ed. Lee. A man so interested in Herbert +may well have been interested in Donne even before his connexion +by marriage with Lucy, Countess of Bedford. He became later one of +Donne's kindest and most practical patrons. The grandson of a great +poet may well have written verses.[2] + +But there is another consideration besides that of the letter _To E. +of D._ which seems to connect the _La Corona_ sonnets with the years +1607-9. That is the sonnet _To the Lady Magdalen Herbert: of St. Mary +Magdalen_, which I have prefixed, with that _To E. of D._, to +the group. This was sent with a prose letter which says, 'By this +messenger and on this good day, I commit the inclosed holy hymns and +sonnets (which for the matter not the workmanship, have yet escaped +the fire) to your judgment, and to your protection too, if you think +them worthy of it; and I have appointed this enclosed sonnet to usher +them to your happy hand.' This letter is dated 'July 11, 1607', which +Mr. Gosse thinks must be a mistake, because another letter bears the +same date; but the date is certainly right, for July 11 is, making +allowance for the difference between the Julian and the Gregorian +Calendars, July 22, i.e. St. Mary Magdalen's day, 'this good day.' + +What were the 'holy hymns and sonnets', of which Donne says: + + and in some recompence + That they did harbour Christ himself, a Guest, + Harbour these Hymns, to his dear name addrest? + +Walton says: 'These hymns are now lost; but doubtless they were +such as they two now sing in heaven.' But Walton was writing long +afterwards and was probably misled by the name 'hymns'. By 'hymns +and sonnets' Donne possibly means the same things, as he calls his +love-lyrics 'songs and sonets'. The sonnets are hymns, i.e. songs of +praise. Mr. Chambers suggests--it is only a suggestion--that they are +the second set, the _Holy Sonnets_. But these are not addressed to +Christ. In them Donne addresses The Trinity, the Father, Angels, +Death, his own soul, the Jews--Christ only in one (Sonnet XVIII, first +published by Mr. Gosse). On the other hand, 'Hymns to his dear name +addrest' is an exact description of the _La Corona_ sonnets. + +I venture to suggest, then, that the Holy Sonnets sent to Mrs. Herbert +and to the E. of D. were one and the same group, viz. the _La Corona_ +sequence. Probably they were sent to Mrs. Herbert first, and later +to the E. of D. Donne admits their imperfection in his letter to Mrs. +Herbert. One of them seems to have been criticized, and in sending the +sequence to the E. of D. he held it back for correction. If the E. +of D. be the Earl of Dorset they may have been sent to him before +he assumed that title. Any later transcript would adopt the title to +which he succeeded in 1609. We need not, however, take too literally +Donne's statement that the E. of D.'s poetical letter was 'the +only-begetter' of his sonnets. + +My argument is conjectural, but the assumptions that they were written +about 1617 and sent to Lord Doncaster are equally so. The last is +untenable; the former does not harmonize so well as that of an earlier +date with the obvious fact, which I have emphasized in the essay +on Donne's poetry, that these sonnets are more in the intellectual, +tormented, wire-drawn style of his earlier religious verse (excellent +as that is in many ways) than the passionate and plangent sonnets and +hymns of the years which followed the death of his wife. + + + [Footnote 1: This letter was written in November or December, + 1608, and seems to be the first in which Donne speaks of + Lord Hay as a friend and patron. The kindness he has shown in + forwarding a suit seems to have come somewhat as a surprise to + Donne.] + + [Footnote 2: Lord Dorset is thus described by his wife: 'He + was in his own nature of a just mind, of a sweet disposition, + and very valiant in his own person: He had a great advantage + in his breeding by the wisdom and discretion of his + grandfather, Thomas, Earl of Dorset, Lord High Treasurer of + England, who was then held one of the wisest men of that + time; by which means he was so good a scholar in all manner of + learning, that in his youth when he lived in the University + of Oxford, there was none of the young nobility then students + there, that excelled him. He was also a good patriot to his + country ... and so great a lover of scholars and soldiers, as + that with an excessive bounty towards them, or indeed any of + worth that were in distress, he did much diminish his estate; + As also, with excessive prodigality in house-keeping and other + noble ways at Court, as tilting, masking, and the like; Prince + Henry being then alive, who was much addicted to these + noble exercises, and of whom he was much beloved.' Collins's + _Peerage_, ii. 194-5. quoted in Zouch's edition of Walton's + _Lives_, 1817.] + + +PAGE =317=. TO E. OF D. + +ll. 3-4. _Ryme ... their ... have wrought._ The concord here seems +to require the plural, the rhyme the singular. Donne, I fear, does +occasionally rhyme a word in the plural with one in the singular, +ignoring the 's'. But possibly Donne intended 'Ryme' to be taken +collectively for 'verses, poetry'. Even so the plural is the normal +use. + + +TO THE LADY MAGDALEN HERBERT, &c. + +ll. 1-2. _whose faire inheritance + Bethina was, and jointure Magdalo._ + +'Mary Magdalene had her surname of magdalo a castell | and was born of +right noble lynage and parents | which were descended of the lynage +of kynges | And her fader was named Sinus and her moder eucharye | She +wyth her broder lazare and her suster martha possessed the castle +of magdalo: whiche is two myles fro nazareth and bethanye the castel +which is nygh to Iherusalem and also a gret parte of Iherusalem whiche +al thise thynges they departed amonge them in suche wyse that marye +had the castelle magdalo whereof she had her name magdalene | And +lazare had the parte of the cytee of Iherusalem: and martha had to her +parte bethanye' _Legenda Aurea_. See Ed. (1493), f. 184, ver. 80. + +l. 4. _more than the Church did know_, i.e. the Resurrection. John xx. +9 and 11-18. + + +PAGE =318=. LA CORONA. + +The MSS. of these poems fall into three well-defined groups: (1) That +on which the 1633 text is based is represented by _D_, _H49_; _Lec_ +does not contain these poems. (2) A version different in several +details is presented by the group _B_, _S_, _S96_, _W_, of which +_W_ is the most important and correct. _O'F_ has apparently belonged +originally to this group but been corrected from the first. (3) _A18_, +_N_, _TC_ agrees now with one, now with another of the two first +groups. When all the three groups unite against the printed text the +case for an emendation is a strong one. + + +PAGE =319=. ANNUNCIATION. + +l. 10. _who is thy Sonne and Brother._ + +'Maria ergo faciens voluntatem Dei, corporaliter Christi tantummodo +mater est, spiritualiter autem et soror et mater.' August. _De Sanct. +Virg._ i. 5. Migne 40. 399. + + +NATIVITIE. + +l. 8. _The effect of Herods jealous generall doome_: The singular +'effect' has the support of most of the MSS. against the plural of +the editions and of _D_, _H49_, and there can be no doubt that it is +right. All the effects of Herod's doom were not prevented, but the one +aimed at, the death of Christ, was. + + +PAGE =320=. CRUCIFYING. + +l. 8. _selfe-lifes infinity to'a span._ The MSS. supply the 'a' which +the editions here, as elsewhere (e.g. 'a retirednesse', p. 185), +have dropped. In the present case the omission is so obvious that +the Grolier Club editor supplies the article conjecturally. In the +editions after _1633_ 'infinitie' is the spelling adopted, leading to +the misprint 'infinite' in _1669_ and _1719_, a variant which I have +omitted to note. + + +PAGE =321=. RESURRECTION. + +It will be seen there are some important differences between the text +of this sonnet given in _1633_, _D_, _H49_, on the one hand and that +of _B_, _O'F_, _S_, _S96_, _W_. The former has (l. 5) 'this death' +where the latter gives 'thy death'. It may be noted that 'this' is +always spelt 'thys' in _D_, which makes easy an error one way or the +other. But the most difficult reading in _1633_ is (l. 8) 'thy little +booke'. Oddly enough this has the support not only of _D_, _H49_ but +also of _A18_, _N_, _TC_, whose text seems to blend the two versions, +adding some features of its own. Certainly the 'life-booke' of the +second version and the later editions seems preferable. Yet this too +is an odd expression, seeing that the line might have run: + + If in thy Book of Life my name thou'enroule. + +Was Donne thinking vaguely or with some symbolism of his own, not of +the 'book of life' (Rev. xiii. 8, and xx. 12) but of the 'little book' +(Rev. x. 2) which John took and ate? Or does he say 'little book' +thinking of the text, 'Strait is the gate and narrow is the way which +leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it' (Matt. vii. 14)? The +grimmer aspects of the Christian creed were always in Donne's mind: + + And though thou beest, O mighty bird of prey, + So much reclaim'd by God, that thou must lay + All that thou kill'st at his feet, yet doth hee + Reserve but few, and leave the most to thee. + +In l. 9 'last long' is probably right. _D_, _H49_ had dropped both +adjectives, and 'long' was probably supplied by the editor _metri +causa_, 'last' disappearing. Between 'glorified' and 'purified' in l. +11 it is impossible to choose. The reading 'deaths' for 'death' I have +adopted. Here _A18_, _N_, _TC_ agree with _B_, _O'F_, _S_, _W_, +and there can be no doubt that 'sleepe' is intended to go with both +'sinne' and 'death'. + + +PAGE =322=. HOLY SONNETS. + +The MSS. of these sonnets evidently fall into two groups: (1) _B_, +_O'F_, _S96_, _W_: of which _W_ is by far the fullest and most correct +representative. (2) _A18_, _D_, _H49_, _N_, _TCC_, _TCD_. I have kept +the order in which they are given in the editions _1635_ to _1669_, +but indicated the order of the other groups, and added at the close +the three sonnets contained only in _W_. I cannot find a definite +significance in any order, otherwise I should have followed that of +_W_ as the fullest and presumably the most authoritative. Each sonnet +is a separate meditation or ejaculation. + +PAGE =323=, III. 7. _That sufferance was my sinne; now I repent_: I +have followed the punctuation and order of _B_, _W_, because it shows +a little more clearly what is (I think) the correct construction. As +printed in _1635-69_, + + That sufferance was my sinne I now repent, + +the clause 'That sufferance was' &c. is a noun clause subject to +'repent'. But the two clauses are co-ordinates and 'That' is a +demonstrative pronoun. '_That_ suffering' (of which he has spoken +in the six preceding lines) 'was my sin. Now I repent. Because I did +suffer the pains of love, I must now suffer those of remorse.' + +PAGE =324=, V. 11. _have burnt it heretofore._ Donne uses 'heretofore' +not infrequently in the sense of 'hitherto', and this seems to be +implied in 'Let their flames retire'. I have therefore preferred the +perfect tense of the MSS. to the preterite of the editions. The 'hath' +of _O'F_ is a change made in the supposed interests of grammar, if not +used as a plural form, for 'their flames' implies that the fires of +lust and of envy are distinguished. In speaking of the first Donne +thinks mainly of his youth, of the latter he has in memory his years +of suitorship at Court. + +VI. 7, note. _Or presently, I know not, see that Face._ This line, +which occurs in several independent MSS., is doubtless Donne's, but +the reading of the text is probably his own emendation. The first +form of the line suggested too distinctly a not approved, or even +heretical, doctrine to which Donne refers more than once in his +sermons: 'So _Audivimus, et ab Antiquis_, We have heard, and heard by +them of old, That in how good state soever they dye yet the souls of +the departed do not see the face of God, nor enjoy his presence, till +the day of Judgement; This we have heard, and from so many of them of +old, as that the voyce of that part is louder, then of the other. And +amongst those reverend and blessed Fathers, which straied into these +errors, some were hearers and Disciples of the Apostles themselves, as +Papias was a disciple of S. John and yet Papias was a Millenarian, +and expected his thousand yeares prosperity upon the earth after the +Resurrection: some of them were Disciples of the Apostles, and some of +them were better men then the Apostles, for they were Bishops of Rome; +_Clement_ was so: and yet _Clement_ was one of them, who denied the +fruition of the sight of God, by the Saints, till the Judgement.' +_Sermons_ 80. 73. 739-40. + +There are two not strictly orthodox opinions to which Donne seems to +have leant: (1) this, perhaps a remnant of his belief in Purgatory, +the theory of a state of preparation, in this doctrine applied even +to the saints; (2) a form of the doctrine now called 'Conditional +Immortality'. See note on Letter _To the Countesse of Bedford_, p. +196, l. 58. + +PAGE =325=, VII. 6. _dearth._ This reading of the Westmoreland MS. is +surely right notwithstanding the consensus of the editions and other +MSS. in reading 'death'. The poet is enumerating various modes in +which death comes; death itself cannot be one of these. The 'death' +in l. 8 perhaps explains the error; it certainly makes the error more +obvious. + +VIII. 7. _in us, not immediately._ I have interjected a comma after +'us' in order to bring out distinctly the Scholastic doctrine of +Angelic knowledge on which this sonnet turns. See note on _The Dreame_ +with the quotation from Aquinas. What Donne says here is: 'If our +minds or thoughts are known to the saints in heaven as to angels, not +immediately, but by circumstances and signs (such as blushing or a +quickened pulsation) which are apparent in us, how shall the sincerity +of my grief be known to them, since these signs are found in lovers, +conjurers and pharisees?' 'Deo tantum sunt naturaliter cognitae +cogitationes cordium.' 'God alone who put grief in my heart knows its +sincerity.' + +l. 10. _vile blasphemous Conjurers._ The 'vilde' of the MSS. is +obviously the right reading. The form too is that which Donne used if +we may judge by the MSS., and by the fact that in _Elegie XIV: Julia_ +he rhymes thus: + + and (which is worse than vilde) + Sticke jealousie in wedlock, her owne childe + Scapes not the showers of envie. + +By printing 'vile' the old and modern editions destroy the rhyme. In +the sonnet indeed the rhyme is not affected, and accordingly, as I am +not prepared to change every 'vile' to 'vilde' in the poems, I have +printed 'vile'. _W_ writes vile. Probably one might use either form. + +PAGE =326=, IX. 9-10. I have followed here the punctuation of _W_, +which takes 'O God' in close connexion with the preceding line; the +vocative case seems to be needed since God has not been directly +addressed until l. 9. The punctuation of _D_, _H49_, which has often +determined that of _1633_, is not really different from that of _W_: + + But who am I, that dare dispute with Thee? + Oh God; Oh of thyne, &c. + +Here, as so often, the question-mark is placed immediately after the +question, before the sentence is ended. But 'Oh God' goes with the +question. A new strain begins with the second 'Oh'. The editions, by +punctuating + + But who am I that dare dispute with thee? + O God, Oh! &c. + +(which modern editors have followed), make 'O God, Oh!' a hurried +series of exclamations introducing the prayer which follows. This +suits the style of these abrupt, passionate poems. But it leaves +the question without an address to point it; and to my own mind the +hurried, feverous effect of 'O God, Oh!' is more than compensated for +by the weight which is thrown, by the punctuation adopted, upon the +second 'Oh',--a sigh drawn from the very depths of the heart, + + so piteous and profound + As it did seem to shatter all his bulk, + And end his being. + +PAGE =327=, XII. 1. _Why are wee by all creatures, &c._ The 'am I' of +the _W_ is probably what Donne first wrote, and I am strongly tempted +to restore it. Donne's usual spelling of 'am' is 'ame' in his letters. +This might have been changed to 'are', which would have brought +the change of 'I' to 'we' in its wake. On the other hand there are +evidences in this sonnet of corrections made by Donne himself (e.g. l. +9), and he may have altered the first line as being too egotistical in +sound. I have therefore retained the text of the editions. + +l. 4. _Simple, and further from corruption?_ The 'simple' of _1633_ +and _D_, _H49_, _W_ is preferable to the 'simpler' of the later +editions and somewhat inferior MSS. which Chambers has adopted, +inadvertently, I think, for he does not notice the earlier reading. +The dropping of an 'r' would of course be very easy; but the +simplicity of the element does not admit of comparison, and what Donne +says is, I think, 'The elements are purer than we are, and (being +simple) farther from corruption.' + +PAGE =328=, XIII. 4-6. _Whether that countenance can thee affright, + Teares in his eyes quench the amazing light, + Blood fills his frownes, which from his pierc'd head fell._ + +Chambers alters the comma after 'affright' to a full stop, the Grolier +Club editor to a semicolon. Both place a semicolon after 'fell'. +Any change of the old punctuation seems to me to disguise the close +relation in which the fifth and sixth lines stand to the third. It is +with the third line they must go, not with the seventh, with which a +slightly different thought is introduced. 'Mark the picture of Christ +in thy heart and ask, can that countenance affright thee in whose eyes +the light of anger is quenched in tears, the furrows of whose frowns +are filled with blood.' Then, from the countenance Donne's thought +turns to the tongue. The full stop, accidentally dropped after 'fell' +in the editions of _1633_ and _1635_, was restored in _1639_. + +l. 14. _assures._ In this case the MSS. enable us to correct an +obvious error of _all_ the printed editions. + +PAGE =329=, XVI. 9. _Yet such are thy laws._ I have adopted the +reading 'thy' of the Westmoreland and some other MSS. because the +sense seems to require it. 'These' and 'those' referring to the same +antecedent make a harsh construction. 'Thy laws necessarily transcend +the limits of human capacity and therefore some doubt whether these +conditions of our salvation can be fulfilled by men. They cannot, but +grace and spirit revive what law and letter kill.' + +l. 11. _None doth; but all-healing grace and spirit._ I have dropped +the 'thy' of the editions, following all the MSS. I have no doubt +that 'thy' has been inserted: (1) It spoils the rhyme: 'spirit' has +to rhyme with 'yet', which is impossible unless the accent may fall on +the second syllable; (2) 'thy' has been inserted, as 'spirit' has been +spelt with a capital letter, under the impression that 'spirit' stands +for the Divine Spirit, the Holy Ghost. But obviously 'spirit' is +opposed to 'letter' as 'grace' is to 'law'. In _W_ both 'grace' and +'spirit' are spelt with capitals. Either both or neither must be so +treated. 'Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; +not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the +spirit giveth life.' 2 Cor. iii. 6. + +If 'thy' is to be retained, then 'spirit' must be pronounced 'sprit'. +Commentators on Shakespeare declare that this happens, but it is +very difficult to prove it. When Donne needs a monosyllable he uses +'spright'; 'spirit' he rhymes as disyllable with 'merit'. + +PAGE =330=, XVII. 1. _she whom I lov'd._ This is the reference to his +wife's death which dates these poems. Anne More, Donne's wife, died +on August 15, 1617, on the seventh day after the birth of her twelfth +child. She was buried in the church of St. Clement Danes. Her monument +disappeared when the Church was rebuilt. The inscription ran: + + { ANNAE } + GEORGII} { MORE de } {Filiae + ROBERT} {Lothesley} {Soror. + WILIELMI} { Equitum } {Nept. + CHRISTOPHERI} { Aurator } {Pronept. + Foeminae lectissimae, dilectissimaeq' + Conjugi charissimae, castissimaeq' + Matri piissimae, indulgentissimaeq' + xv annis in conjugio transactis, + vii post xii partum (quorum vii superstant) dies + immani febre correptae + (quod hoc saxum fari jussit + Ipse prae dolore infans) + Maritus (miserrimum dictu) olim charae charus + cineribus cineres spondet suos, + novo matrimonio (annuat Deus) hoc loco sociandos, + JOHANNE DONNE + Sacr: Theol: Profess: + Secessit + An^o xxxiii aetat. suae et sui Jesu + CIↃ. DC. XVII. + Aug. xv + +XVIII. It is clear enough why this sonnet was not published. It would +have revealed Donne, already three years in orders, as still conscious +of all the difficulties involved in a choice between the three +divisions of Christianity--Rome, Geneva (made to include Germany), and +England. This is the theme of his earliest serious poem, the _Satyre +III_, and the subject recurs in the letters and sermons. Donne entered +the Church of England not from a conviction that it, and it alone, was +the true Church, but because he had first reached the position that +there is salvation in each: 'You know I never fettered nor imprisoned +the word Religion; not straitening it Frierly _ad Religiones +factitias_, (as the _Romans_ call well their orders of Religion) nor +immuring it in a Rome, or a _Wittenberg_, or a _Geneva_; they are all +virtuall beams of one Sun, and wheresoever they find clay hearts, +they harden them, and moulder them into dust; and they entender and +mollifie waxen. They are not so contrary as the North and South Poles; +and that they are connatural pieces of one circle.' _Letters_, p. 29. +From this position it was easy to pass to the view that, this being +so, the Church of England may have special claims on _me_, as the +Church of my Country, and to a recognition of its character as +primitive, and as offering a _via media_. As such it attracted +Casaubon and Grotius. But the Church of England never made the appeal +to Donne's heart and imagination it did to George Herbert: + + Beautie in thee takes up her place + And dates her letters from thy face + When she doth write. + Herbert, _The British Church_. + +Compare, however, the rest of Donne's poem with Herbert's description +of Rome and Geneva, and also: 'Trouble not thy selfe to know the +formes and fashions of forraine particular Churches; neither of a +Church in the Lake, nor a Church upon seven hils'. _Sermons_ 80. 76. +769. + + +PAGE =331=. THE CROSSE. + +Donne has evidently in view the aversion of the Puritan to the sign of +the cross used in baptism. + +With the latter part of the poem compare George Herbert's _The +Crosse_. + +PAGE =332=, l. 27. _extracted chimique medicine._ Compare: + + Only in this one thing, be no Galenist; To make + Courts hot ambitions wholesome, do not take + A dramme of Countries dulnesse; do not adde + Correctives, but as chymiques, purge the bad. + _Letters to, &c._, p. 182, ll. 59-62. + +ll. 33-4. _As perchance carvers do not faces make, + But that away, which hid them there, do take._ + +'To make representations of men, or of other creatures, we finde two +wayes; Statuaries have one way, and Painters have another: Statuaries +doe it by Substraction; They take away, they pare off some parts of +that stone, or that timber, which they work upon, and then that which +they leave, becomes like that man, whom they would represent: Painters +doe it by Addition; Whereas the cloth or table presented nothing +before, they adde colours, and lights, and shadowes, and so there +arises a representation.' _Sermons_ 80. 44. 440. + +Norton compares Michelangelo's lines: + + Non ha l' ottimo artista alcun concetto + Ch' un marmo solo in se non circonscriva + Col suo soverchio, e solo a quello arriva + La man che obbedisce all' intelletto. + +PAGE =333=, l. 47. _So with harsh, &c._ Chambers, I do not know why, +punctuates this line: + + So with harsh, hard, sour, stinking; cross the rest; + +This disguises the connexion of 'cross' with its adverbial +qualifications. The meaning is that as we cross the eye by making it +contemplate 'bad objects' so we must cross the rest, i.e. the other +senses, with harsh (the ear), hard (touch), sour (the taste), and +stinking (the sense of smell). The asceticism of Donne in his later +life is strikingly evidenced in such lines as these. + +l. 48. I have made an emendation here which seems to me to combine +happily the text of _1633_ and that of the later editions. It seems +to me that _1633_ has dropped 'all', _1635-69_ have dropped 'call'. I +thought the line as I give it was in _O'F_, but found on inquiry I had +misread the collation. I should withdraw it, but cannot find it in my +heart to do so. + +l. 52. _Points downewards._ I think the MS. reading is probably right, +because (1) 'Pants' is the same as 'hath palpitation'; (2) Donne +alludes to the anatomy of the heart, in the same terms, in the +_Essayes in Divinity_, p. 74 (ed. Jessop, 1855): 'O Man, which art +said to be the epilogue, and compendium of all this world, and the +Hymen and matrimonial knot of eternal and mortal things ... and was +made by God's hands, not His commandment; and hast thy head erected to +heaven, and all others to the centre, that yet only thy heart of all +others points downward, and only trembles.' + +The reference in each case is to the anatomy of the day: 'The figure +of it, as Hippocrates saith in his Booke _de Corde_ is Pyramidall, or +rather turbinated and somewhat answering to the proportion of a Pine +Apple, because a man is broad and short chested. For the Basis above +is large and circular but not exactly round, and after it by degrees +endeth in a cone or dull and blunt round point ... His lower part is +called the Vertex or top, _Mucro_ or point, the Cone, the heighth of +the heart. Hippocrates calleth it the taile which Galen saith ... is +the basest part, as the Basis is the noblest.' Helkiah Crooke: [Greek: +MIKROKOSMOGRΑPHIΑ], _A Description of the Body of Man, &c._ (1631), +Book I, chap. ii, _Of the Heart_. + +'The heart therefore is called [Greek: kardia apo tou kerdainesthai], +(_sic. i.e._ [Greek: kradainesthai]) which signifieth _to beate_ +because it is perpetually moved from the ingate to the outgate of +life.' _Ibid._, Book VII, _The Preface_. + +l. 53. _dejections._ Donne uses both the words given here: 'dejections +of spirit,' _Sermons_ 50. 13. 102; and 'these detorsions have small +force, but (as sunbeams striking obliquely, or arrows diverted with a +twig by the way) they lessen their strength, being turned upon another +mark than they were destined to,' _Essays in Divinity_ (Jessop), p. +42. + +l. 61. _fruitfully._ The improved sense, as well as the unanimity of +the MSS., justifies the adoption of this reading. A preacher may deal +'faithfully' with his people. The adverb refers to his action, not its +result in them. The Cross of Christ, in Donne's view, must always deal +faithfully; whether its action produces fruit depends on our hearts. + + +PAGE =334=. THE ANNUNTIATION AND PASSION. + +The MSS. add 'falling upon one day Anno Dñi 1608'; i.e. March 25, +1608/9. George Herbert wrote some Latin verses _In Natales et Pascha +concurrentes_, and Sir John Beaumont an English poem 'Vpon the two +great feasts of the Annuntiation and Resurrection falling on the same +day, March 25, 1627'. + + +PAGE =336=. GOOD FRIDAY. + +l. 2. _The intelligence_: i.e. the angel. Each sphere has its angel +or intelligence that moves and directs it. Grosart quotes the +arrangement,--the Sun, Raphael; the Moon, Gabriel; Mercury, Michael; +Mars, Chemuel; Jupiter, Adahiel; Venus, Haniel; Saturn, Zaphiel. + +l. 4. _motions._ Nothing is more easy and common than the dropping of +the final 's', which in writing was indicated by little more than a +stroke. The reference is to the doctrine of cycles and epicycles. + +l. 13. _But that Christ on this Crosse, did rise and fall._ Grosart +and Chambers adopt the reading 'his Crosse' of _1635-69_, the former +without any reference to the alternative reading. Professor Norton, +in the Grolier Club edition, prints this, but in a note at the +end remarks' that all editions after that of 1633 give this verse, +correctly, + + But that Christ on his cross did rise and fall'. + +The agreement of the later editions is of little importance. They too +often agree to go wrong. The balance of the MS. evidence is on the +side of _1633_. To me 'this' seems the more vivid and pointed reading. +The line must be taken in close connexion with what precedes. 'If I +turned to the East,' says Donne, 'I should see Christ lifted on to his +Cross to die, a Sun by rising set. And unless Christ had consented +to rise and set on _this_ Crosse (this Crosse which I should see in +vision if I turned my head), which was raised this day, Sin would have +eternally benighted all.' + +l. 22. _turne all spheres._ The 'tune all speares' of the editions +and some MSS. is tempting because of (as it is doubtless due to) the +Platonic doctrine of the music of the spheres. But Donne was more of a +Schoolman and Aristotelian than a Platonist, and I think there can be +little doubt that he is describing Christ as the 'first mover'. On the +other hand 'tune' may include 'turne'. The Dutch poet translates: + + Die 't Noord en Zuyder-punt bereicken, + daer Sy 't spanden + Er geven met een' draeg elck Hemel-rond + sijn toon. + +The idea that the note of each is due to the rate at which it is spun +is that of Plato, _The Republic_, x. + + +PAGE =338=. THE LITANIE. + +In a letter to Goodyere written apparently in 1609 or 1610, Donne +says: 'Since my imprisonment in my bed, I have made a meditation in +verse, which I call a Litany; the word you know imports no other then +supplication, but all Churches have one forme of supplication, by that +name. Amongst ancient annals I mean some 800 years, I have met +two Litanies in Latin verse, which gave me not the reason of my +meditations, for in good faith I thought not upon them then, but they +give me a defence, if any man, to a Lay man, and a private, impute it +as a fault, to take such divine and publique names, to his own little +thoughts. The first of these was made by Ratpertus a Monk of Suevia; +and the other by S. Notker, of whom I will give you this note by the +way, that he is a private Saint, for a few Parishes; they were both +but monks and the Letanies poor and barbarous enough; yet Pope Nicolas +the 5, valued their devotion so much, that he canonized both their +Poems, and commanded them for publike service in their Churches: mine +is for lesser Chappels, which are my friends, and though a copy of it +were due to you, now, yet I am so unable to serve my self with writing +it for you at this time (being some 30 staves of 9 lines) that I must +intreat you to take a promise that you shall have the first, for a +testimony of that duty which I owe to your love, and to my self, +who am bound to cherish it by my best offices. That by which it will +deserve best acceptation, is, that neither the Roman Church need call +it defective, because it abhors not the particular mention of the +blessed Triumphers in heaven; nor the Reformed can discreetly accuse +it, of attributing more then a rectified devotion ought to doe.' + +The Litanies referred to in Donne's letter to Goodyere may be read in +Migne's _Patrologia Latina_, vol. lxxxvii, col. 39 and 42. They are +certainly barbarous enough. That of Ratpertus is entitled _Litania +Ratperti ad processionem diebus Dominicis_, and begins: + + Ardua spes mundi, solidator et inclyte coeli + Christe, exaudi nos propitius famulos. + Virgo Dei Genetrix rutilans in honore perennis, + Ora pro famulis, sancta Maria, tuis. + +The other is headed _Notkeri Magistri cognomento Balbuli Litania +rhythmica_, and opens thus: + + Votis supplicibus voces super astra feramus, + Trinus ut et simplex nos regat omnipotens. + Sancte Pater, adiuva nos, Sancte Fili, adiuva nos, + Compar his et Spiritus, ungue nos intrinsecus. + +Michael, John the Baptist, Peter, Paul, and Stephen, martyrs and +virgins, are appealed to in both. There are some differences in +respect of particular saints invoked. + +It is interesting also to compare Donne's series of petitions with +those in a Middle English Litany preserved in the Balliol Coll. MS. +354 (published by Edward Flügel in _Anglia_ xxv. 220). The poetry is +very poor and I need not quote. The interesting feature is the list +of petitions 'Vnto the ffader', 'ye sonne', 'ye holy gost', 'the +trinite', 'our lady', 'ye angelles'. 'ye propre angell', 'John +baptist', 'ye appostiles', 'ye martires', 'the confessours', 'ye +virgins', 'unto all sayntes'. Donne, it will be observed, includes +the patriarchs and the prophets, but omits any reference to a guardian +angel and to the saints. Other references in his poems and sermons +show that he had the thought of a guardian angel often in his mind: +'As that Angel, which God hath given to protect thee, is not weary of +his office, for all thy perversenesses, so, howsoever God deale with +thee, be not thou weary of bearing thy part, in his Quire here in the +Militant Church.' _Sermons_ 80. 44. 440. + +PAGE =339=, l. 34. _a such selfe different instinct + Of these;_ + +'As the three persons of the Trinity are distinguished as Power (The +Father), Knowledge (The Son), Love (The Holy Ghost), and are yet +identical, not three but one, may in me power, love, and knowledge be +thus at once distinct and identical.' The comma after 'these' in _D_, +_H49_, _Lec_ was accidentally dropped. In _1635-69_ a comma was then +interpolated after 'instinct' and 'Of these' was connected with what +follows: 'Of these let all mee elemented bee,' 'these' being made to +point forward to the next line. Chambers and the Grolier Club editor +both read thus. But _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ show what was the original +punctuation. Without 'Of these' it is difficult to give a precise +meaning to 'instinct'. It would be easy to change 'a such' to 'such +a' with most of the MSS., but Donne seems to have affected this order. +Compare _Elegie X: The Dreame_, p. 95, l. 17: + + After a such fruition I shall wake. + +PAGE =341=, l. 86. _In Abel dye._ Abel was to the early Church a type +of Christ, as being the first martyr. + +PAGE =343=, ll. 122-4. One might omit the brackets in these lines and +substitute a semicolon after 'hearken too' and a comma after 'and +do', and make the sense clearer. The MSS. bear evidence to their +difficulty. There is certainly no call for brackets as we use them, +and the 1633 edition is more sparing of them in this poem than the +later editions. What Donne says is: 'While this quire' (enumerated in +the previous stanzas) 'prays for us and thou hearkenest to them, let +not us whose duty is to pray, to endure patiently, and to do thy will, +trust in their prayers so far as to forget our duty of obedience and +service.' + +PAGE =347=, l. 231. _Which well, if we starve, dine_: 'well' has the +support of all the MSS. and may be the adverb placed before its verb. +'If we starve they dine well.' In this wire-drawn and tormented poem +it is hard to say what Donne may not have written. Most of the editors +read 'will', and this appears in some copies of _1633_. + +l. 243. _Heare us, weake ecchoes, O thou eare, and cry._ The 'cry' of +the editions is surely right. God is at once the source of our prayers +and their answerer. Our prayers are echoes of what His grace inspires +in our hearts. The 'eye' of _S_ and other MSS., which also read +'wretches' for 'ecchoes', is due to a misapprehension of the condensed +thought, and 'eye' with 'ecchoes' is entirely irrelevant. _JC_ tries +another emendation: 'Oh thou heare our cry.' + +'Every man who prostrates himselfe in his chamber, and poures out his +soule in prayer to God;... though his faith assure him, that God hath +granted all that he asked upon the first petition of his prayer, yea +before he made it, (for God put that petition in to his heart and +mouth, and moved him to aske it, that thereby he might be moved to +grant it), yet as long as the Spirit enables him he continues his +prayer,' &c. _Sermons_ 80. 77. 786. + +But indeed we do not need to go to the _Sermons_ to see that this is +Donne's meaning. He has emphasized it already in this poem: e.g. in +Stanza xxiii: + + Heare us, for till thou heare us, Lord + We know not what to say: + Thine eare to'our sighes, teares, thoughts gives voice and word. + O Thou who Satan heard'st in Jobs sicke day, + Heare thy selfe now, for thou in us dost pray. + +'But in things of this kind (i.e. sermons), that soul that inanimates +them never departs from them. The Spirit of God that dictates them in +the speaker or writer, and is present in his tongue or hand, meets +him again (as we meet ourselves in a glass) in the eyes and ears and +hearts of the hearers and readers.' Gosse, _Life, &c._, i. 123: To ... +the Countess of Montgomery. + +'God cannot be called a cry', Grosart says; but St. Paul so describes +the work of the Spirit: 'Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our +infirmities, for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: +but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which +cannot be uttered. And he that searcheth the heart knoweth what is +the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints +according to the will of God.' Calvin thus closes his note on the +passage: 'Atque ita locutus est Paulus quo significantius id totum +tribueret Spiritus gratiae. Iubemur quidem pulsare, sed nemo sponte +praemeditari vel unam syllabam poterit, nisi arcano Spiritus sui +instinctu nos Deus pulset, adeoque sibi corda nostra aperiat.' + +PAGE =348=, l. 246. _Gaine to thy self, or us allow._ If we perish +neither Christ nor we have gained anything. Both have died in vain. +If 'and' is substituted for 'or' in this line (_1635-69_ and Chambers) +then the next line becomes otiose. + + +PAGE =348=. UPON THE TRANSLATION OF THE PSALMES, &c. + +We do not know what was the occasion of these lines. The Countess was +the mother of William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, and Philip Herbert, +Earl of Montgomery, and of Pembroke after his brother's death. +Poems by the former are frequently found with Donne's, e.g. in +the Hawthornden MS. which is made from a collection in Donne's own +possession. Doubtless they were known to one another, but there is no +evidence of intimacy, such as letters. To the Countess of Montgomery +Donne in 1619 sent a copy of one of his sermons which she had asked +for (Gosse, _Life, &c_., ii. 123). It may have been for her that he +composed this poem. + +An elaborate copy of the Psalms was prepared by John Davis of +Hereford. From this they were published in 1822. + +From l. 53 it is evident that Donne's poem was written after the death +of the Countess of Pembroke in 1621. + +PAGE =349=, l. 38. _So well attyr'd abroad, so ill at home._ Donne has +probably in mind the French versions of Clement Marot, which were the +war-songs of the Huguenots. + + +PAGE =351=. TO MR. TILMAN. + +Of Mr. Tilman I can find no trace in printed Oxford or Cambridge +registers. The poem is a strange comment on the seventeenth century's +estimate of the clergy: + + Why do they think unfit + That Gentry should joyne families with it? + +In his _Life of George Herbert_ Walton tells us of Herbert's +resolution to enter the Church, and the opposition he met with: +'He did, at his return to London, acquaint a Court-friend with his +resolution to enter into _Sacred Orders_, who perswaded him to alter +it, as too mean an employment, and too much below his birth, and the +excellent abilities and endowments of his mind. To whom he replied, +'_It hath been formerly judg'd that the Domestick Servants of the King +of Heaven, should be of the noblest Families on Earth: and, though the +Iniquity of the late Times have made Clergy-men meanly valued, and +the sacred name of Priest contemptible; yet, I will labour to make +it honourable, by consecrating all my learning, and all my poor +abilities, to advance the Glory of that God that gave them._' This +estimate of the clergy must not be overlooked when considering the +struggle that went on in Donne's mind too before he crossed the +Rubicon. + +PAGE =352=, l. 43. _As Angels out of clouds, &c._ Walton doubtless +had this line in his mind when he described Donne's own preaching: +'A Preacher in earnest, weeping sometimes for his Auditory, sometimes +with them, alwayes preaching to himselfe, like an Angel from a cloud, +though in none: carrying some (as S. Paul was) to heaven, in holy +raptures; enticing others, by a sacred art and courtship, to +amend their lives; and all this with a most particular grace, and +un-imitable fashion of speaking.' + + +PAGE =352=. A HYMNE TO CHRIST. + +PAGE =353=, ll. 9-12. Perhaps the rhetoric of these lines would be +improved by shifting the semicolon from l. 10 to l. 11. 'In putting, +at thy behest, the seas between my friends and me, I sacrifice them +unto thee: Do thou put thy,' &c. As the verse stands the connexion +between the first two lines and the next is a little vague. + +l. 12. _thy sea_. I have adopted 'sea' from the MSS. in place of +'seas' _1633_. It was easy for the printer to take over 'seas' from +the preceding line, but 'sea' is the more pointed word. The sea is the +blood of Christ. The 1635-69 editions indeed read 'blood', which is as +though a gloss had crept in from the margin. More probably 'blood' +was a first version, changed by a bold metaphor to a more striking +antithesis. + +Miss Spearing has drawn my attention, since writing this note, to the +peroration of _A Sermon of Valediction at my going into Germany, at +Lincolns-Inne, April_ 18, 1619, which I had overlooked. It confirms +the rightness of 'sea'. The whole passage is of interest in connexion +with this poem: 'Now to make up a circle, by returning to our first +word, remember: As we remember God, so for his sake, let us remember +one another. In my long absence, and far distance from hence, remember +me, as I shall do you in the ears of that God, to whom the farthest +East, and the farthest West are but as the right and left ear in +one of us; we hear with both at once, and he hears in both at once; +remember me, not my abilities; for when I consider my Apostleship that +I was sent to you, I am in St. Pauls _quorum, quorum ego sum minimus_, +the least of them that have been sent; and when I consider my +infirmities, I am in his _quorum_, in another commission, another way, +_Quorum ego maximus_; the greatest of them; but remember my labors, +and endeavors, at least my desire, to make sure your salvation. And +I shall remember your religious cheerfulness in hearing the word, and +your christianly respect towards all them that bring that word unto +you, and towards myself in particular far bove my merit. And so as +your eyes that stay here, and mine that must be far of, for all that +distance shall meet every morning, in looking upon that same Sun, and +meet every night, in looking upon the same Moon; so our hearts may +meet morning and evening in that God, which sees and hears everywhere; +that you may come thither to him with your prayers, that I, (if I may +be of use for his glory, and your edification in this place) may be +restored to you again; and may come to him with my prayer that what +_Paul_ soever plant amongst you, or what _Apollos_ soever water, God +himself will give us the increase: That if I never meet you again till +we have all passed the gate of death, yet in the gates of heaven, I +may meet you all, and there say to my Saviour and your Saviour, that +which he said to his Father and our Father, _Of those whom thou hast +given me, have I not lost one_. Remember me thus, you that stay in +this Kingdome of peace, where no sword is drawn, but the sword of +Justice, as I shal remember you in those Kingdomes, where ambition on +one side, and a necessary defence from unjust persecution on the other +side hath drawn many swords; and Christ Jesus remember us all in his +Kingdome, to which, _though we must sail through a sea, it is the +sea of his blood_, where no soul suffers shipwrack; though we must be +blown with strange winds, with sighs and groans for our sins, yet it +is the Spirit of God that blows all this wind, and shall blow away +all contrary winds of diffidence or distrust in God's mercy; where we +shall be all Souldiers of one army, the Lord of Hostes, and Children +of one Quire, the God of Harmony and consent: where all Clients shall +retain but one Counsellor, our Advocate Christ Jesus, nor present him +any other fee but his own blood, and yet every Client have a Judgment +on his side, not only in a not guilty, in the remission of his sins, +but in a _Venite benedicti_, in being called to the participation +of an immortal Crown of glory: where there shall be no difference in +affection, nor in mind, but we shall agree as fully and perfectly in +our _Allelujah_, and _gloria in excelsis_, as God the Father, Son, and +Holy Ghost agreed in the _faciamus hominem_ at first; where we shall +end, and yet begin but then; where we shall have continuall rest, and +yet never grow lazie; where we shall be stronger to resist, and yet +have no enemy; where we shall live and never die, where we shall meet +and never part.' _Sermons_ 26. 19. 280. + +l. 28. _Fame, Wit, Hopes, &c._ Compare: 'How ill husbands then of this +dignity are we by _sinne_, to forfeit it by submitting our selves to +inferior things? either to _gold_, then which every worme, (because a +worme hath life, and gold hath none) is in nature more estimable, and +more precious; Or, to that which is lesse than gold, to Beauty; for +there went neither labour, nor study, nor cost to the making of that; +(the Father cannot diet himselfe so, nor the mother so, as to be sure +of a faire child) but it is a thing that hapned by chance, wheresoever +it is; and, as there are Diamonds of divers waters, so men enthrall +themselves in one clime to a black, in another to a white beauty. +To that which is lesse then _gold_ or _Beauty_, _voice_, _opinion_, +_fame_, _honour_, we sell our selves.' _Sermons_ 50. 38. 352. + + +PAGE =354=. THE LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMY. + +Immanuel Tremellius was born in the Ghetto of Ferrara in 1510. His +father was apparently a Jewish surgeon, a man of distinction in the +Jewish community. Educated as a Jew, Tremellius became a Christian +about the age of twenty, and, under the influence of the Protestant +movement which was agitating Italy as well as other countries, a +Calvinist. When persecution began Tremellius fled from Lucca, where +he had taught Hebrew under the reformer Vermigli, to Strasburg, and +thereafter his life was that of the wandering, often fugitive, scholar +and reformer. He was invited to England by Cranmer in 1548, and held +the Professorship of Hebrew at Cambridge until 1553. The accession of +Mary drove him back to the Continent, and he was tutor to the children +of the Duke of Zweibrüchen from 1554 to 1558, and rector of the +Gymnasium at Hornbach from 1558 to 1560. The Duke became a Lutheran, +and Tremellius was exiled, but found after a year or two a haven in +the University of Heidelberg, where Duke Frederick III had rallied to +the Calvinist cause. Tremellius was Professor of Theology here from +1562-77, and it was here that he issued most of his works. He had +already published a Hebrew version of the Genevan Catechism intended +for his Jewish brethren. The works issued at Heidelberg include a +Chaldaic and Syriac Grammar, an edition of the Peschito (an old Syrian +version of the New Testament), and the Latin translation of the Old +Testament which Donne utilized for his paraphrase. In this work he was +assisted by his son-in-law Francis Junius (father of the Anglo-Saxon +and Antiquarian scholar), a native of Bourges, who had served as a +field-preacher under William the Silent. Junius was responsible only +for the Apocrypha, so that Donne rightly mentions Tremellius alone. +The work was published at Frankfort in 1575-9; in London in 1580, +1581, and 1585; at Geneva in 1590 and 1617. In the Genevan editions +it was coupled with Beza's translation of the New Testament. The whole +was re-issued at Hanover as late as 1715. + +Duke Frederick III's successor was a Lutheran, and Tremellius was +driven into exile once more in 1577. His last years were spent as +teacher in the Academy instituted by Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, +Vicomte de Turenne, in Sedan. Here he died in 1580. + +I have compared Donne's version throughout with both Tremellius' +translation and the Vulgate, and wherever the collation helps to fix +the text I have quoted their readings in the textual notes. I add here +one or two more quotations from the originals. Tremellius' version was +accompanied, it must be remembered, with an elaborate commentary. + +PAGE =356=, l. 58. _accite_, the reading of _B_, _O'F_ as well as +_1635-69_, I have not yet found elsewhere in Donne's works, but +doubtless it occurs. Shakespeare uses it once: + + He by the Senate is accited home + From weary wars against the barbarous Goths. + _Tit. Andr._ I. i. 27-8. + + ll. 75-6. _for they sought for meat + Which should refresh their soules, they could not get_. + +Chambers has printed this poem from _1639_, noting occasionally the +readings of _1635_ and _1650_, but ignoring consistently those of +_1633_. Here _1633_ has the support of _N_, _TCD_; _B_ reads 'they none +could get'; and _O'F_, if I may trust my collation, agrees with +_1635-69;_ Grolier follows _1633_ but conjectures 'the sought-for +meat'. This is unnecessary. It is quite in Donne's style to close with +an abrupt 'they could not get'. Modern punctuation would change the +comma to a semicolon. The version of Tremellius runs: 'Expirarunt +quum quaererent escam sibi, qua reficerent se ipsos.' The Vulgate, +'consumpti sunt, quia quaesierunt cibum sibi ut refocillarent animum.' + +PAGE =357=, l. 81. _Of all which heare I mourne_: i.e. 'which hear +that I mourn.' The construction is harsh, and I was tempted for a +moment to adopt the 'me' of _N_, but Donne is translating Tremellius, +and 'me in gemitu esse' is not quite the same thing as 'me gementem'. +Grosart and Chambers and the Grolier Club editor would not have +followed _1639_ in changing 'heare' to 'here' had they consulted the +original poem which Donne is paraphrasing in any version. The Vulgate +runs: 'Audierunt quia ingemisco ego, et non est qui consoletur me.' + +PAGE =359=, l. 161. _poure, for thy sinnes_. The 'poure out thy +sinnes' of _1635-69_ which Grosart and Chambers follow is obviously +wrong. The words 'for thy sinnes' have no counterpart in the Latin of +Tremellius or the Vulgate. The latter runs: 'Effunde sicut aquam cor +tuum ante conspectum Domini.' + + PAGE =360=, ll. 182-3. _hath girt mee in + With hemlocke, and with labour_. + +Cingit cicuta et molestia, _Tremellius_: circumdedit me felle et +labore, _Vulgate_. Donne combines the two versions. He is fond of +using 'hemlock' as the typical poison: and he tells Wotton in one of +his letters that to him labour or business is the worst of evils: +'I professe that I hate businesse so much, as I am sometimes glad +to remember, that the _Roman Church_ reads that verse _A negotio +perambulante in tenebris_, which we reade from the pestilence +walking by night, so equall to me do the plague and businesse deserve +avoiding.' _Letters_, p. 142. To Goodyere in like manner he writes, +'we who have been accustomed to one another are like in this, that we +love not businesse.' _Letters_, p. 94. + +PAGE =361=, l. 193. _the children of his quiver_. Donne found this +phrase in the Vulgate or in the margin of Tremellius. In the text +of the latter the verse runs, 'Immitit in renes meos tela pharetrae +suae.' The marginal note says, '_Heb._ filios, id est, prodeuntes a +pharetra.' The Vulgate reads, 'filias pharetrae suae.' + +l. 197. _drunke with wormewood_: 'inebriavit me absinthio, _Tremellius +and Vulgate_. + +PAGE =362=, ll. 226-30. I have changed the full stop in l. 229, 'him', +to a comma, for all these clauses are objective to 'the Lord allowes +not this'. The construction is modelled on the original: 'Non enim +affligit ex animo suo, moestitiaque afficit filios viri. 34. Conterere +sub pedibus suis omnes vinctos terrae, 35. Detorquere ius viri coram +facie superioris, 36. Pervertere hominem in causa sua, Dominus +non probat.' The version of the Vulgate is similar: '33. Non enim +humiliavit ex corde suo, et abiecit filios hominum, 34. Ut contereret +sub pedibus suis omnes vinctos terrae; 35. Ut declinaret iudicium viri +in conspectu vultus Altissimi; 36. Ut perverteret hominem in iudicio +suo; Dominus ignoravit.' + +PAGE =364=, l. 299. _their bone_. The reading of the editions +is probably right: 'Concreta est cutis eorum cum osse ipsorum,' +_Tremellius_. + +l. 302. _better through pierc'd then through penury_. I have no doubt +that the 'through penury' of the 1635-69 editions and the MSS. is +what Donne wrote. The 1633 editor changed it to 'by penury'. Donne is +echoing the parallelism of 'confossi gladio quam confossi fame'. The +Vulgate has simply 'Melius fuit occisio gladio quam interfectio fame'. + +PAGE =366=, l. 337. _The annointed Lord, &c._ Chambers, to judge from +his use of capital letters, evidently reads this verse as applying to +God,--'Th'Annointed Lord', 'under His shadow'. It is rather the King +of Israel. Tremellius's note runs: 'Id est, Rex noster e posteritate +Davidis, quo freti saltem nobis dabitur aliqua interspirandi occasio +in quibuslibet angustiis: nam praefidebant Judaei dignitati illius +regni, tamquam si pure et per seipsum fuisset stabile; non autem +spectabant Christum, qui finis est et complementum illius typi, +neque conditiones sibi imperatas.' 'The anointed of the Lord' is +the translation of the Revised Version. The Vulgate version seems +to indicate a prophetic reference, which may be what Chambers had in +view: 'Spiritus oris nostri, Christus Dominus, captus est in peccatis +nostris: In umbra tua vivemus in gentibus.' Donne took this verse as +the text of a Gunpowder Plot sermon in 1622. He points out there +that some commentators have applied the verse to Josiah, a good king; +others to Zedekiah, a bad king: 'We argue not, we dispute not; we +embrace that which arises from both, That both good Kings and +bad Kings ... are the anointed of the Lord, and the breath of the +nostrils, that is, the life of the people,' &c. James is 'the Josiah +of our times'. James had good reasons for preferring bishops to Andrew +Melville and other turbulent presbyters. But Donne, who was steeped in +the Vulgate, notes a possible reference to Christ: 'Or if he lamented +the future devastation of that Nation, occasioned by the death of the +King of Kings, Christ Jesus, when he came into the world, this was +their case _prophetically_.' _Sermons_ 50. 43. 402. + +l. 355. _wee drunke, and pay_: 'pecunia bibimus' _Tremellius and +Vulgate_: the Latin may be present or past tense, but the verse goes +on in the Vulgate, 'ligna nostra pretio comparavimus,' which shows +that 'bibimus' is 'we drunk' or 'we have drunk'. The Authorized +Version reads 'we have drunken'. + +PAGE =367=, l. 374. _children fall_. 'Juvenes ad molendum portant, et +pueri ad ligna corruunt,' _Tremellius_; 'et pueri in ligno corruerunt,' +_Vulgate_. But the latter translates the first half of the line quite +differently. + + +PAGE =368=. HYMN TO GOD MY GOD, IN MY SICKNESSE. + +The date which Walton gives for this poem, March 23, 1630, is of +course March 23, 1631, i.e. eight days before the writer's death. +Donne's tense and torturing will never relaxed its hold before the +final moment: Being speechlesse, he did (as Saint Stephen) look +steadfastly towards heaven, till he saw the Sonne of God standing at +the right hand of his Father; And being satisfied with this blessed +sight, (as his soule ascended, and his last breath departed from him) +he closed his owne eyes, and then disposed his hands and body into +such a posture, as required no alteration by those that came to shroud +him.' _Walton_ (1670). + +Donne's monument had been designed by himself and shows him thus +shrouded. The epitaph too is his own composition and is the natural +supplement to this hymn: + + JOHANNES DONNE + SAC. THEOL. PROFESS. + POST VARIA STVDIA QVIBVS AB ANNIS + TENERRIMIS FIDELITER, NEC INFELICITER + INCVBVIT; + INSTINCTV ET IMPVLSV SP. SANCTI, MONITV + ET HORTATV + REGIS JACOBI, ORDINES SACROS AMPLEXVS + ANNO SVI JESV MDCXIV. ET SVÆ ÆTATIS XLII + DECANATV HVJVS ECCLESIÆ INDVTVS + XXVII NOVEMBRIS, MDCXXI. + EXVTVS MORTE VLTIMO DIE MARTII MDCXXXI. + HIC LICET IN OCCIDVO CINERE ASPICIT EVM + CVJVS NOMEN EST ORIENS. + +The reference in the last line of the epitaph, and the figure of the +map with which he plays in the second and third stanzas of the _Hymne_ +are both illustrated by a passage in a sermon on Psalm vi. 8-10: 'In +a flat Map, there goes no more, to make West East, though they be +distant in an extremity, but to paste that flat Map upon a round body, +and then West and East are all one. In a flat soule, in a dejected +conscience, in a troubled spirit, there goes no more to the making +of that trouble, peace, then to apply that trouble to the body of the +Merits, to the body of the Gospel of Christ Jesus, and conforme thee +to him, and thy West is East, thy Trouble of spirit is Tranquillity +of spirit. The name of Christ is _Oriens_, _The East_; And yet Lucifer +himself is called _Filius Orientis_, _The Son of the East_. If thou +beest fallen by _Lucifer_, fallen to _Lucifer_, and not fallen as +_Lucifer_, to a senselessnesse of thy fall, and an impenitiblenesse +therein, but to a troubled spirit, still thy prospect is the East, +still thy Climate is heaven, still thy Haven is Jerusalem; for, in +our lowest dejection of all, even in the dust of the grave, we are +so composed, so layed down, as that we look to the East: If I could +beleeve that _Trajan_, or _Tecla_, could look Eastward, that is, +towards Christ, in Hell, I could beleeve with them of Rome, that +Trajan and Tecla were redeemed by prayer out of hell.' _Sermons_ 80. +55. 558. + +For 'the name of Christ is Oriens'. Donne refers in the margin to +_Zachariae_ vi. 12: 'Et loqueris ad eum dicens: Haec ait Dominus +exercituum, dicens: ECCE VIR ORIENS NOMEN EJUS; et subter eum orietur, +et aedificabit templum Domino.' In the English versions, Genevan and +Authorized, the words run 'whose name is the Branch', but to Donne the +Vulgate was the form in which he knew the Scriptures most intimately. +At the same time he consulted and refers to the English versions +frequently: 'that which we call the _Bishops Bible_, nor that which +we call the _Geneva Bible_, and that which we may call the _Kings_.' +_Sermons_ 80. 50. 506. + +The difference between the two versions is due, I understand, to +the fact that the Hebrew participle 'rising' and the Hebrew word for +'branch' contain the same consonants. In unpointed Hebrew it was, +therefore, possible to confound them. The Septuagint version is +[Greek: Anatolê onoma autou]. + +In describing the preparations for making Donne's tomb Walton says: +'Upon this urn he thus stood, with his eyes shut, and with so much of +the sheet turned aside, as might show his lean, pale, and deathlike +face, which was purposely turned towards the east, from whence he +expected the second coming of his and our Saviour Jesus.' Walton +says that he stood, but Mr. Hamo Thornycroft has pointed out that the +drapery by its folds reveals that it was modelled from a recumbent +figure. Gosse, _Life, &c_., ii. 288. + + ll. 18-20. _Anyan, and Magellan, and Gibraltare, + All streights, and none but streights, are wayes to them._ + +Grosart and Chambers have boggled unnecessarily at these lines. The +former inserts an unnecessary and unmetrical 'are' after 'Gibraltare'. +The latter interpolates a mark of interrogation after 'Gibraltare', +putting 'Anyan, and Magellan and Gibraltare' on a level with the +Pacific, the 'eastern riches' and Jerusalem, i.e. _six_ possible homes +instead of _three_. What the poet says is simply, 'Be my home in the +Pacific, or in the rich east, or in Jerusalem, to each I must sail +through a strait, viz. Anyan (i.e. Behring Strait) if I go west by the +North-West passage, or Magellan, or Gibraltar. These, all of which are +straits, are ways to them, and none but straits are ways to them.' +A condensed construction makes 'are ways to them' predicate to +two subjects. For 'the straight of Anian' see Hakluyt's _Principal +Navigations_, vol. vii, Glasgow, 1904, esp. the map at p. 256, which +shows very distinctly how the 'Straight of Anian' was conceived to +separate America from 'Cathaia in Asia' and to lead right on to +Japan and the 'Ilandes of Moluccae', 'the eastern riches.' The +_Mare Pacificum_ lies further to the south and east, entered by the +'Straight of Magellanes' between Peru and the 'Terra del Fuego', which +latter is not an island but part of the great 'Terra Australis'. Thus +'none but straights' lead to the 'eastern riches' or the Pacific. +'Outre ce que les navigations des modernes ont des-jà presque +descouvert que ce n'est point une isle, ains terre ferme et continente +avec l'Inde orientale d'un costé, et avec les terres qui sont soubs +les deux poles d'autre part; ou, si elle en est separée, que c'est +d'un si petit destroit et intervalle, qu'elle ne merite pas d'estre +nommé isle pour cela.' Montaigne, _Essais_, i. 31: _Des Cannibales_. + +The conceit about the 'straits' Donne had already used: 'a narrower +way but to a better Land; thorow Straits; 'tis true; but to the +_Pacifique_ Sea, The consideration of the treasure of the Godly Man +in this World, and God's treasure towards him, both in this, and the +next.' _Sermons_ 26. 5. 71. + +'Who ever amongst our Fathers thought of any other way to the +Moluccaes, or to China, then by the Promontory of _Good Hope_? Yet +another way opened itself to _Magellan_; a Straite; it is true; but +yet a way thither; and who knows yet, whether there may not be a +North-East, and a North-West way thither, besides?' _Sermons_ 80. 24. +241. + +Nevertheless by the time Donne wrote his hymn the sea to the south of +Terra del Fuego had recently been discovered. He is using the language +of a slightly earlier date, of his own youth, when travels and far +countries were much in his imagination. In 1617 George, Lord Carew, +writing to Sir Thomas Roe, Ambassador at the Court of the Mogul, says: +'The Hollanders have discovered to the southward of the Strayghts of +Magellen an open sea and free passage to the south sea.' _Letters of +George, Lord Carew to Sir Thomas Roe_, Camden Society, 1860. For the +'Straight of Anyan' compare also: + + This makes the foisting traveller to sweare, + And face out many a lie within the yeere. + And if he have beene an howre or two aboarde + To spew a little gall: then by the Lord, + He hath beene in both th'Indias, East and West, + Talks of Guiana, China, and the rest, + The straights of Gibraltare, and Ænian + Are but hard by; no, nor the Magellane: + Mandeville, Candish, sea-experienst Drake + Came never neere him, if he truly crake. + Gilpin, _Skialetheia_, Satyre I. + +For 'Ænian' in this passage Grosart conjectures 'Aegean'! I have put a +semicolon for a comma in the third last line quoted. I take it and the +preceding to be a quotation from the traveller's talk. + + +PAGE =369=. A HYMNE TO GOD THE FATHER. + +The text of the 1633 edition, which is, with one trifling exception, +that of the other printed editions, is followed by Walton in the first +short life of Donne prefixed to the _LXXX Sermons_ (1640). Walton +probably took it from one of the 1633, 1635, or 1639 editions; but he +may have had a copy of the poem. The MSS. which contain the hymn have +some important differences, and instead of noting these as variants +or making a patchwork text I have thought it best to print the poem +as given in _A18_, _N_, _O'F_, _S96_, _TCC_, _TCD_. The six MSS. +represent three or perhaps two different sources if _O'F_ and _S96_ +are derived from a common original--(1) _A18_, _N_, _TC_, (2) _S96_, +(3) _O'F_. It is not likely, therefore, that their variants are simply +editorial emendations. In some respects their text seems to me to +improve on that of the printed editions. + +_S96_ and _O'F_ differ from the third group in reading, at l. 5, 'I +have not done.' On the other hand, _A18_ and _TC_ at l. 4 read 'do +them', and at l. 15 'this sunne' (probably a misreading of 'thie'). It +seems to me that the readings of l. 2 ('is'), l. 3 ('those sinnes'), +l. 7 ('by which I won'), and l. 15 ('Sweare by thyself') are +undoubtedly improvements, and in a text constructed on the principle +adopted by Mr. Bullen in his anthologies I should adopt them. Some of +the other readings, e.g. l. 18 ('I have no more'), probably belong +to a first version of the poem and were altered by the poet himself. +_O'F_, which was prepared in 1632, strikes out 'have' and writes +'fear' above. But in a seventeenth-century poem, circulating in MS. +and transcribed in commonplace-books, who can say which emendations +are due to the author, which to transcribers? Moreover, the line 'I +have no more', i.e. no more to ask, emphasizes the play upon his own +name which runs through the poem. 'I have no more' is equivalent to 'I +am Donne'. + +Walton in citing this hymn adds: 'I have the rather mentioned this +Hymn for that he caused it to be set to a most grave and solemn tune +and to be often sung to the Organ by the Choristers of St. Pauls +Church, in his own hearing, especially at the Evening Service; and +at his Customary Devotions in that place, did occasionally say to a +friend, The words of this Hymne have restored me to the same thoughts +of joy that possest my Soul in my sicknesse when I composed it. And, +O the power of Church-music! that Harmony added to it has raised the +Affections of my heart, and quickened my graces of zeal and gratitude; +and I observe, that I always return from paying this publick duty of +Prayer and Praise to God, with an unexpressible tranquillity of mind, +and a willingness to leave the world.' + +Walton does not tell us who composed the music he refers to, but the +following setting has been preserved in Egerton MS. 2013. The +composer is John Hillton (d. 1657), organist to St. Margaret's Church, +Westminster. See Grove's _Dictionary of Music_. + +As given here it has been corrected by Mr. Barclay Squire: + +[Illustration: Musical notation with lyrics: + + Wilt thou for-give the sinnes where I be-gunne, + w^{c}h is my sinne though it weare done be-fore, + wilt thou for-give those sinnes through w^{c}h I + runne, & doe them still, though still I doe de-plore + when thou hast done, thou hast not done, + for I have more.] + + 2 Wilt thou forgive y^t sinne by w^{ch} I won + Others to sinne & made my sinne their dore + Wilt thou forgive that sinne w^{ch} I did shun + A yeare or two, but wallowed in a score + When thou hast done, thou hast not done + For I have more. + + 3 I have a sinne of feare y^t when I 'ave spun + My last thred I shall perish one y^e shore + Sweare by thy selfe y^t att my death thy son + Shall shine as he shines now & heartofore + And havinge done, thou hast done + I need noe more. + + John: Hillton. + +The music has been thus harmonized for four voices by Professor C. +Sanford Terry: + +[Illustration: musical notation + +A - - - men.] + + +PAGE =370=, ll. 7-8. _that sinne which I have wonne + Others to sinn? &c._ + +In a powerful sermon on Matthew xxi. 44, Donne enumerates this among +the curses that will overwhelm the sinner: 'There shall fall upon him +those sinnes which he hath done after anothers dehortation, and those, +which others have done after his provocation.' _Sermons_ 50. 35. 319. + + +ELEGIES UPON THE AUTHOR. + +The first and third of these _Elegies_, those by King and Hyde, were +affixed, without any signature, to _Deaths Duell, or A Consolation to +the Soule, against the dying Life, and living Death of the Body.... By +that late learned and Reverend Divine John Donne, D^r in Divinity, and +Deane of S. Pauls, London. Being his last Sermon, and called by his +Maiesties houshold_ THE DOCTORS OWNE FVNERALL SERMON. _London, Printed +by Thomas Harper, for Richard Redmer and Beniamin Fisher, and are to +be sold at the signe of the Talbot in Alders-gate street._ 1632. The +book was entered in the Stationers' Register to Beniamin Fisher and +Richard Redmer on the 30th of September, 1631, and was issued with a +dedicatory letter by Redmer to his sister 'M^{rs} Elizabeth Francis of +Brumsted in Norff' and a note 'To the Reader' signed 'R'. Now we know +from his own statement that King was Donne's executor and had been +entrusted with his sermons which at King's 'restless importunity' +Donne had prepared for the press. (Letter, dated 1664, prefixed to +Walton's _Lives_, 1670.) The sermons and papers thus consigned to King +were taken from him later at the instance apparently of Donne's son. +But the presence of King's epitaph in this edition of _Deaths Duell_ +seems to show that he was responsible for, or at any rate permitted, +the issue of the sermon by Redmer and Fisher. The reappearance of +these Elegies signed, and accompanied by a number of others, suggests +in like manner that King _may_ have been the editor behind Marriot +of the _Poems_ in 1633. This would help to account for the general +excellence of the text of that edition, for King, a poet himself as +well as an intimate friend, was better fitted to edit Donne's poems +than the gentle and pious Walton, who was less in sympathy with the +side of Donne which his poetry reveals. + +Of Henry King (1591-1669) poet, 'florid preacher', canon of Christ +Church, dean of Rochester, and in 1641 Bishop of Chichester it +is unnecessary to say more here. A fresh edition of his poems by +Professor Saintsbury is in preparation and will show how worthy a +disciple he was of Donne as love-poet, eulogist, and religious poet. +Probably the finest of his poems is _The Surrender_. + +It was to King also that Redmer was indebted for the frontispiece to +_Deaths Duell_, the picture of Donne in his shroud, reproduced in the +first volume. 'It was given', Walton says, 'to his dearest friend +and Executor D^r King, who caused him to be thus carved in one entire +piece of white Marble, as it now stands in the Cathedral Church of St. +Pauls.' + +The second of the _Elegies_ in 1633 was apparently by the author of +the _Religio Medici_ and must be his earliest published work, written +probably just after his return from the Continent. The lines were +withdrawn after the first edition. + +The Edw. Hyde responsible for the third Elegy, 'On the death of Dr. +Donne,' is said by Professor Norton to be Edward Hyde, D.D. (1607-59), +son of Sir Lawrence Hyde of Salisbury. Educated at Westminster School +and Cambridge he became a notable Royalist divine; had trouble with +Parliament; and wrote various sermons and treatises (see D.N.B.). 'A +Latin poem by Hyde is prefixed to Dean Duport's translation of Job +into Greek verse (1637) and he contributed to the "Cambridge Poems" +some verses in celebration of the birth of Princess Elizabeth.' + +It would be interesting to think that the author of the lines on Donne +was not the divine but his kinsman the subsequent Lord Chancellor. +There is this to be said for the hypothesis, that among those who +contribute to the collection of complimentary verses are some of +Clarendon's most intimate friends about this time, viz. Thomas Carew, +Sir Lucius Carie or Lord Falkland, and (but his elegy appears first +in 1635) Sidney Godolphin. The John Vaughan also, whose MS. lines to +Donne I have printed in the introduction (_Text and Canon, &c._, p. +lxiv, note), is enrolled by Clarendon among his intimates at this +time. If his friends, legal and literary, were thus eulogizing Donne, +why should Hyde not have tried his hand too? However, we know of no +other poetical effusions by the historian, and as these verses were +first affixed with King's to _Deaths Duell_ it is most probable that +their author was a divine. + +The author of the fourth elegy, Dr. C. B. of O., is Dr. Corbet, Bishop +of Oxford (1582-1635). Walton reprinted the poem in the _Lives_ (1670) +as 'by Dr. Corbet ... on his Friend Dr. Donne'. We have no particulars +regarding this friendship, but they were both 'wits' and their poems +figure together in MS. collections. Ben Jonson was an intimate of +Corbet's, who was on familiar terms with all the Jacobean wits +and poets. For Corbet's life see D.N.B. His poems are in Chalmers' +collection. + +The Hen. Valentine of the next Elegy matriculated at Christ's College, +Cambridge, in December, 1616, and proceeded B.A. in 1620/1, M.A. 1624. +He was incorporated at Oxford in 1628, where he took the degree of +D.D. in 1636. On the 8th of December, 1630, he was appointed Rector +of Deptford. He was either ejected under the Commonwealth or died, for +Mallory, his successor, was deprived in 1662. For this information +I am indebted to the _Biographical Register of Christ's College, +1505-1905, &c., compiled by John Peile ... Master of the College_, +1910. Of works by him the British Museum Catalogue contains _Foure +Sea-Sermons preached at the annual meeting of the Trinitie Companie in +the Parish Church of Deptford_, London, 1635, and _Private devotions, +digested into six litanies ... Seven and twentieth edition_, London, +1706. The last was first published in 1651. + +Izaak Walton's _Elegie_ underwent a good deal of revision. Besides the +variants which I have noted, _1635-69_ add the following lines: + + Which as a free-will-offring, I here give + Fame, and the world, and parting with it grieve, + I want abilities, fit to set forth + A monument great, as _Donnes_ matchlesse worth. + +In 1658 and 1670, when the _Elegie_ was transferred to the enlarged +_Life of Donne_, it was again revised, and opens: + + Our Donne is dead: and we may sighing say, + We had that man where language chose to stay + And shew her utmost power. I would not praise + That, and his great Wit, which in our vaine dayes + Makes others proud; but as these serv'd to unlocke + That Cabinet, his mind, where such a stock + Of knowledge was repos'd, that I lament + Our just and generall cause of discontent. + +But the poem in its final form is included in the many reprints of +Walton's _Lives_, and it is unnecessary to note the numerous verbal +variations. The most interesting is in ll. 25-6. + + Did his youth scatter Poetry, wherein + Lay Loves Philosophy? + +Professor Norton notes that 'the name of the author of this' (the +seventh) 'Elegy is given as Carie or Cary in all the early editions, +by mistake for Carew'. But the spelling (common in the MSS.) simply +represents the way in which the name was pronounced. Thomas Carew +(1598?-1639?) was sewer-in-ordinary to King Charles in 1633, and in +February 1633/4 his most elaborate work, the _Coelum Britannicum_, +was performed at Whitehall, on Shrove Tuesday. It was published +immediately afterwards, 1634. His collected _Poems_ were issued in +1640 and contained this _Elegie_. I note the following variants from +the text of 1640 as reproduced by Arthur Vincent (_Muses Library_, +1899): + +3. dare we not trust _1633_: did we not trust _1640_; 5. Churchman +_1633_: lecturer _1640_; 8. thy Ashes _1633_: the ashes _1640_; 9. +no voice, no tune? _1633_: nor tune, nor voice? _1640_; 17. our Will, +_1633_: the will, _1640_; 44. dust _1633_: dung _1640_; rak'd _1633_: +search'd _1640_; 50. stubborne language _1633_: troublesome language +_1640_; 58. is purely thine _1633_: was only thine _1640_; 59. thy +smallest worke _1633_: their smallest work _1640_; 63. repeale _1633_: +recall _1640_; 65. Were banish'd _1633_: Was banish'd _1640_; 66. +o'th'Metamorphoses _1633_: i'th'Metamorphoses _1640_; + +68-9. + + Till verse refin'd by thee, in this last Age, + Turne ballad rime _1633_: + + Till verse, refin'd by thee in this last age, + Turn ballad-rhyme _1640_ (_Vincent_): + +Surely 'in this last Age' goes with 'Turne ballad rime'; 73. awfull +solemne _1633_; solemn awful _1640_; 74. faint lines _1633_: rude +lines _1640_; 81. maintaine _1633_: retain _1640_; 88. our losse +_1633_: the loss _1640_; 89. an Elegie, _1633_: one Elegy, _1640_; + +91-2. + + Though every pen should share a distinct part, + Yet art thou Theme enough to tyre all Art; + _1633_: _omit 1640_. + +Some of these differences are trifling, but in several instances (3, +8, 50, 59, 66, 91-2) the 1633 text is so much better that it seems +probable that the poem was printed in 1640 from an early, unrevised +version. In 87. 'the' _1633_, _1640_ should be 'thee'. + +Sir Lucius Cary, second Viscount Falkland (1610-1643), was a young man +of twenty-one when Donne died, and succeeded his father in the year +in which this poem was published. He had been educated at Trinity +College, Dublin. 'His first years of reason', Wood says, 'were spent +in poetry and polite learning, into the first of which he made divers +plausible sallies, which caused him therefore to be admired by the +poets of those times, particularly by Ben Jonson ... by Edm. Waller of +Beaconsfield ... and by Sir John Suckling, who afterwards brought him +into his poem called _The Session of Poets_ thus, + + He was of late so gone with divinity, + That he had almost forgot his poetry, + Though to say the truth (and Apollo did know it) + He might have been both his priest and his poet.' + +But Falkland is best known through his friendship with Clarendon, +whose account of him is classical: 'With these advantages' (of birth +and fortune) 'he had one great disadvantage (which in the first +entrance into the world is attended with too much prejudice) in his +person and presence, which was in no degree attractive or promising. +His stature was low, and smaller than most men; his motion not +graceful; and his aspect so far from inviting, that it had somewhat +in it of simplicity; and his voice the worst of the three, and so +untuned, that instead of reconciling, it offended the ear, so that +nobody would have expected music from that tongue; and sure no man +was less beholden to nature for its recommendation into the world: +but then no man sooner or more disappointed this general and customary +prejudice: that little person and small stature was quickly found to +contain a great heart, a courage so keen, and a nature so fearless, +that no composition of the strongest limbs, and most harmonious and +proportioned presence and strength, ever more disposed any man to +the greatest enterprise; it being his greatest weakness to be too +solicitous for such adventures: and that untuned voice and tongue +easily discovered itself to be supplied and governed by a mind and +understanding so excellent that the wit and weight of all he said +carried another kind of lustre and admiration in it, and even another +kind of acceptation from the persons present, than any ornament of +delivery could reasonably promise itself, or is usually attended with; +and his disposition and nature was so gentle and obliging, so much +delighted in courtesy, kindness, and generosity, that all mankind +could not but admire and love him.' _The Life of Edward Earl of +Clarendon_ (Oxford, 1827) i. 42-50. Coming from him, Falkland's +poem is an interesting testimony to the influence of Donne's poetry, +presence, and character. + +Jaspar Mayne (1604-72), author of _The City Match_, was a student and +graduate of Christ Church, Oxford, a poet, dramatist, and divine. He +wrote complimentary verses on the Earl of Pembroke, Charles I, Queen +Henrietta, Cartwright, and Ben Jonson--all, like those on Donne, +very bad. He was the translator of the Epigrams ascribed to Donne and +published with some of his _Paradoxes, Problemes, Essays, Characters_ +in 1651. + +Arthur Wilson (1595-1652), historian and dramatist, author of _The +Inconstant Lady_ and _The Swisser_, had in 1633 just completed a +rather belated course at Trinity College, Oxford, whither he had gone +after leaving the service of the third Earl of Essex. For Wilson's +_Life_ see D.N.B. and Feuillerat: _The Swisser ... avec une +Introduction et des Notes_, Paris, 1904. + +The 'Mr. R. B.' who wrote these lines is said by Mr. Gosse to be the +voluminous versifier Richard Brathwaite (1588-1673), author of _A +Strappado for the Divell_ and other works, satirical and pious. He is +perhaps the most likely candidate for the initials, which are all we +have to go by. At the same time it is a little surprising that a +poet whose name was so well known should have concealed himself under +initials, the device generally of a young man venturing among more +experienced poets. If he had not been too young in 1633, I should have +ventured to suggest that the author was Ralph Brideoak, who proceeded +B.A. at Oxford 1634, and in 1638 contributed lines to _Jonsonus +Virbius_. He was afterwards chaplain to Speaker Lenthall, and died +Bishop of Chichester. In the lines on Jonson, Brideoak describes the +reception of Jonson's plays with something of the vividness with which +the poet here describes the reception of Donne's sermons. He also +refers to Donne: + + Had learned Donne, Beaumont, and Randolph, all + Surviv'd thy fate, and sung thy funeral, + Their notes had been too low: take this from me + None but thyself could write a verse for thee. + +This last line echoes Donne (p. 204, l. 24). Most of Donne's eulogists +were young men. + +Brathwaite's wife died in 1633, and, perhaps following Donne, he for +some years wrote _Anniversaries upon his Panarete_. W. C. Hazlitt +suggests Brome as the author of the lines on Donne, which is not +likely. + +The Epitaph which follows R. B.'s poem is presumably by him also. + +Endymion Porter (1587-1649) may have had a common interest with Donne +in the Spanish language and literature, for the former owed his early +success as an ambassador and courtier to his Spanish descent and +upbringing. He owes his reputation now mainly to his patronage of art +and poetry and to the songs of Herrick. For his life see D.N.B. and E. +B. de Fonblanque's _Lives of the Lords Strangford_, 1877. + +Daniel Darnelly, the author of the long Latin elegy added to the +collection in 1635, was, according to Foster (_Alumni Oxonienses_, +vol. i. 1891), the son of a Londoner, and matriculated at Oxford on +Nov. 14, 1623, at the age of nineteen. He proceeded B.A. in 1627, M.A. +1629/30, and was incorporated at Cambridge in 1634. He is described +in Musgrave's _Obituary_ as of Trinity Hall. In 1632 he was appointed +rector of Curry Mallet, Somersetshire, and of Walden St. Paul, Herts., +1634. This would bring him into closer touch with London, and probably +explains his writing an elegy for the forthcoming second edition of +Donne's _Poems_. He was rector of Teversham, Cambridgeshire, from +1635 to 1645, when his living was sequestered. He died on the 23rd of +November, 1659. + +The heading of this poem shows that it was written at the request of +some one, probably King. In l. 35 _Nilusque minus strepuisset_ the +reference is to the great cataract. See Macrobius, _Somn. Scip._ ii. +4. + +Of Sidney Godolphin (1610-43) Clarendon says, 'There was never so +great a mind and spirit contained in so little room; so large an +understanding and so unrestrained a fancy in so very small a body: so +that the Lord Falkland used to say merrily, that he was pleased to be +found in his company, where he was the properer man; and it may be +the very remarkableness of his little person made the sharpness of his +wit, and the composed quickness of his judgement and understanding the +more notable.' _The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon_, i. 51-2. He +was killed at Chagford in the civil war. Professor Saintsbury has not +included this poem in his collection of Godolphin's poems, _Caroline +Poets_, ii. pp. 227-61. + +John Chudleigh's name appears in MSS. occasionally at the end of +different poems. In the second collection in the Trinity College, +Dublin MS. G. 2. 21 (_TCD_ Second Collection) he is credited with the +authorship of Donne's lyric _A Feaver_, but two other poems are also +ascribed to him. He is the author of another in Addl. MS. 33998. f. 62 +b. Who he was, I am not sure, but probably he may be identified with +John Chudleigh described in 1620 (_Visitation of Devonshire_) as son +and heir of George Chudley of Asheriston, or Ashton, in the county of +Devon, and then aged fourteen. On the 1st of June, 1621, aged 15, +he matriculated at Wadham College, Oxford. He proceeded B.A. 1623-4, +being described as 'equ. aur. fil.' for his father, a member of +Parliament, had been created a baronet on the 1st of August, 1622. +He took his M.A. in 1626, and was incorporated at Cambridge in 1629 +(Foster, _Alumni Oxonienses_, i. 276). Just before taking his M.A. he +was elected to represent East Looe. He died, however, before May 10, +1634, which is difficult to reconcile with his being the author of +these verses in 1635, unless they were written some time before. + + + + +APPENDIX A. + +LATIN POEMS AND TRANSLATIONS. + + +Who the Dr. Andrews referred to was we do not know. Dr. Grosart +identifies him with the Andrews whose poems are transcribed in _H49_, +but this is purely conjectural. + +The lines which I have taken out and made into a separate Epigram +are printed in the old editions as the third and fourth lines of the +letter. As Professor Norton pointed out, they have no connexion with +it. They seem to be addressed to some one who had travelled to Paris +from Frankfort, on an Embassy to the King of France, and had returned. +'The Maine passed to the Seine, into the house of the Victor, and with +your return comes to Frankfort.' + +If Grosart's conjecture be correct, the author of the epigram may be +the Francis Andrews whose poems appear along with Donne's in _H49_, +for among these are some political poems in somewhat the same vein: + + Though Ister have put down the Rhene + And from his channel thrust him quite; + Though Prage again repayre her losses, + And Idol-berge doth set up crosses, + Yet we a change shall shortly feele + When English smiths work Spanish steele; + Then Tage a nymph shall send to Thames, + The Eagle then shall be in flames, + Then Rhene shall reigne, and Boeme burne, + And Neccar shall to Nectar turne. + +And of Henri IV: + + Henrie the greate, great both in peace and war + Whom none could teach or imitate aright, + Findes peace above, from which he here was far; + A victor without insolence or spite, + A Prince that reigned, without a Favorite. + +Of course, Andrews may be only the transcriber of these poems. + + +PAGE =398=. TO MR. GEORGE HERBERT, &c. + +Walton has described the incident of the seals: 'Not long before his +death he caused to be drawn the figure of the Body of Christ, extended +upon an Anchor, like those which Painters draw when they would present +us with the picture of Christ crucified on the Cross; his varying +no otherwise than to affix him not to a Cross, but to an Anchor (the +Emblem of hope); this he caused to be drawn in little, and then many +of those figures thus drawn to be ingraven very small in _Helitropian_ +Stones, and set in gold, and of these he sent to many of his dearest +friends, to be used as _Seals_ or _Rings_, and kept as memorials of +him, and of his affection to them.' + +These seals have been figured and described in _The Gentleman's +Magazine_, vol. lxxvii, p. 313 (1807); and _Notes and Queries_, 2nd +Series, viii. 170, 216; 6th Series, x. 426, 473. + +Herbert's epistle to Donne is given in _1650_. In Walton's _Life_ the +first two and a half lines of Donne's Latin poem and the whole of +the English one are given, and so with Herbert's reply. As printed +in _1650_ Herbert's reply is apparently interrupted by the insertion +between the eighth and ninth lines of two disconnected stanzas, which +may or may not be by Herbert. The first of these ('When Love' &c.) +with some variants is given in the 1658 edition of the _Life_ of +Donne; but in the collected _Lives_ (1670, 1675) it is withdrawn. The +second I have not found elsewhere. + + Although the Crosse could not Christ here detain, + Though nail'd unto't, but he ascends again, + Nor yet thy eloquence here keep him still, + But onely while thou speak'st; This Anchor will. + Nor canst thou be content, unlesse thou to + This certain Anchor adde a Seal, and so + The Water, and the Earth both unto thee + Doe owe the symbole of their certainty. + Let the world reel, we and all ours stand sure, + This holy Cable's of all storms secure. + + When Love being weary made an end + Of kinde Expressions to his friend, + He writ; when's hand could write no more, + He gave the Seale, and so left o're. + + How sweet a friend was he, who being griev'd + His letters were broke rudely up, believ'd + 'Twas more secure in great Loves Common-weal + (Where nothing should be broke) to adde a Seal. + + [Line 2: Though _1650_: When _Walton_] + + [Line 10: of _1650_: from _Walton_] + +In the _Life of Herbert_ Walton refers again to the seals and adds, +'At Mr. Herbert's death these verses were found wrapped up with that +seal which was by the Doctor given to him. + + When my dear Friend could write no more, + He gave this Seal, and, so gave ore. + + When winds and waves rise highest, I am sure, + This Anchor keeps my faith, that, me secure.' + + +PAGE =400=, l. 22. <_Wishes_> I have ventured to change 'Works' to +'Wishes'. It corrects the metre and corresponds to the Latin. + + +PAGE =400=. TRANSLATED OUT OF GAZAEUS, &c. + +The original runs as follows: + + Tibi quod optas et quod opto, dent Divi, + (Sol optimorum in optimis Amicorum) + Vt anima semper laeta nesciat curas, + Vt vita semper viva nesciat canos, + Vt dextra semper larga nesciat sordes, + Vt bursa semper plena nesciat rugas, + Vt lingua semper vera nesciat lapsum, + Vt verba semper blanda nesciant rixas, + Vt facta semper aequa nesciant fucum, + Vt fama semper pura nesciat probrum, + Vt vota semper alta nesciant terras, + Tibi quod optas et quod opto, dent Divi. + +I have taken it from: + + PIA + H I L A R I A + VARIAQVE + CARMINA + + ANGELINI GAZÆI + _è Societate Iesu, Atrebatis_. + + [An ornament in original.] + + DILINGAE + + _Formis Academicis + Cum auctoritate Superiorum_. + Apud VDALRICUM REM + CIↃ. IↃC. XXIII. + +The folios of this edition do not correspond to those of that which +Donne seems to have used. + + + + +APPENDIX B. + +POEMS WHICH HAVE BEEN ATTRIBUTED TO DONNE. + + +For a full discussion of the authorship of these poems see _Text and +Canon of Donne's Poems_, pp. cxxix _et seq._ + + +PAGE =401=. TO S^r NICHOLAS SMYTH. + +Chambers points out that a Nicholas Smyth has a set of verses in +_Coryats Crudities_, 1611. + +In the _Visitation of the County of Devon_, 1620, a long genealogy is +given, the closing portion of which shows who this Nicholas Smith or +Smyth of Exeter (l. 15) and his father were: + + Joan, d. of James Walker = Sir Geo. Smith of Exeter, + who was descended of the | Knt., ob. 1619. + Mathewes of Wales who | + were descended of Flewellyns | + and Herberts. | + +-----------------+-----------+------+-----------------------+ + | | | | + Divers children Elizabeth, Sir Nicholas Smith=Dorothea, d. James, + d. without &c. of Larkbeare in of Sir Raphe &c. + issue. com. Devon, Kt. Horsey de + com. Dorsett. + +Seven children of Sir Nicholas are given, including another Nicholas +(aet. 14), and the whole is signed 'Nich Smith'. + +This is doubtless Roe's friend. With Roe as a Falstaff he had probably +'heard the chimes at midnight' in London before he settled down to +raise a family in Devonshire. + +l. 7. _sleeps House, &c._ Ovid xi; Ariosto, _Orlando Furioso_, Canto +xiv; Spenser, _Faerie Queene_, I. i. + +PAGE =402=, l. 26. _Epps_. 'This afternoon a servingman of the Earl +of Northumberland fought with swaggering Eps, and ran him through the +ear.' _Manninghams Diary_, 8th April, 1603 (Camden Club, p. 165). This +is the only certain reference to Epps I have been able to find, but +Grosart declares he is the soldier described in Dekker's _Knights +Conjuring_ as behaving with great courage at the siege of Ostend +(1601-4), where he was killed. I can find no name in Dekker's work. + +ll. 27-31. As printed in _1669_ these lines are not very intelligible, +and neither Grosart nor Chambers has corrected them. As given in the +MSS. (e.g. _TCD_) they are a little clearer: + + For his Body and State + The Physick and Counsel (which came too late) + 'Gainst whores and dice, hee nowe on mee bestowes + Most superficially: hee speakes of those, + (I found by him) least soundly whoe most knows: + +The purpose of bracketing 'which came too late' is obviously to keep +it from being taken with ''Gainst whores and dice'--the very mistake +that _1669_ has fallen into and Grosart and Chambers have preserved. +The drawback to this use of the bracket is that it disguises, at least +to modern readers, that 'which came too late' must be taken with 'For +his Body and State'. I have therefore dropped it and placed a comma +after 'late'. The meaning I take to be as follows: 'The physic and +counsel against whores and dice, which came too late for his own body +and estate, he now bestows on me in a superficial fashion; for I found +by him that of whores and dice those speak least soundly who know +most from personal experience.' A rather shrewd remark. There are some +spheres where experience does not teach, but corrupt. + +l. 40. _in that or those_: 'that' the Duello, 'those' the laws of the +Duello. There is not much to choose between 'these' and 'those'. + + ll. 41-3. _Though sober; but so never fought. I know + What made his Valour, undubb'd, Windmill go, + Within a Pint at most:_ + +The MSS. improve both the metre and the sense of the first of these +lines, which in _1669_ and Chambers runs: + + Though sober; but nere fought. I know ... + +It is when he is sober that he never fights, though he may quarrel. +Roe knows exactly how much drink it would take to make this undubb'd +Don Quixote charge a windmill, or like a windmill. But the poem is too +early for an actual reference to _Don Quixote_ + +PAGE =403=, ll. 67-8. _and he is braver now + Than his captain._ + +By 'braver' the poet means, not more courageous, but more splendidly +attired, more 'braw'. + +PAGE =404=, l. 88. _Abraham France_--who wrote English hexameters. His +chief works are _The Countess of Pembrokes Ivy Church_ (1591) and _The +Countess of Pembrokes Emmanuel_ (1591). He was alive in 1633. + +PAGE =405=, l. 113. _So they their weakness hide, and greatness +show._ Grosart refused the reading 'weakness', which he found in +his favourite MS. _S_, and Chambers ignored it. It has, however, the +support of _B_, _O'F_, and _L74_ (which is strong in Roe's poetry), +and seems to me to give the right edge to the sarcasm. 'By giving to +flatterers what they owe to worth, Kings and Lords think to hide their +weakness of character, and to display the greatness of their wealth +and station.' They make a double revelation of their weakness in their +credulity and their love of display. + +l. 128. _Cuff._ Henry Cuff (1563-1601), secretary to Essex and an +abettor of the conspiracy. + +l. 131. _that Scot._ It is incredible that Donne wrote these lines. He +found some of his best friends among the Scotch--Hay, Sir Robert Ker, +Essex, and Hamilton, to say nothing of the King. + + +PAGE =406=. SATYRE. + +PAGE =407=, ll. 32-3. _A time to come, &c._ I have adopted Grosart's +punctuation and think his interpretation of 'beg' must be the right +one--'beg thee as an idiot or natural.' The O.E.D. gives: '† 5a. _To +beg a person_: to petition the Court of Wards (established by Henry +VIII and suppressed under Charles II) for the custody of a minor, an +heiress, or an idiot, as feudal superior or as having interest in the +matter: hence also fig. _To beg_ (any one) _for a fool_ or _idiot_: to +take him for, set him down as. _Obs._' Among other examples is, 'He +proved a wiser man by much than he that begged him. Harington, _Met. +Ajax_ 46.' What the satirist says is, 'The time will come when she +will beg to have wardship of thee as an idiot. If you continue she +will take you for one now.' + +l. 35. _Besides, her<s>._ My reading combines the variants. I think +'here' must be wrong. + + +PAGE =407=. AN ELEGIE. + +PAGE =408=, l. 5. _Else, if you were, and just, in equitie &c._ This +is the punctuation of _H39_, and is obviously right, 'in equitie' +going with what follows. He has denied the existence or, at least, the +influence of the Fates, and now continues, 'For if you existed or had +power, and if you were just, then, according to all equity I should +have vanquish'd her as you did me.' Grosart and the Grolier Club +editor follow _1635-54_, and read: + + Else, if you were, and just in equity, &c. + +Chambers accepts the attempt of _1669_ to amend this, and prints: + + True if you were, and just in equity, &c. + +But 'just in equity' is not a phrase to which any meaning can be +attached. + + +PAGE =412=. AN ELEGIE. + +Grosart prints this very incorrectly. He does not even reproduce +correctly the MS. _S_, which he professes to follow. Chambers follows +Grosart, adopting some of the variants of the Haslewood-Kingsborough +MS. reported by Grosart. They both have the strange reading 'cut +in bands' in l. 11, which as a fact is not even in _S_, from which +Grosart professes to derive it. The reading of all the MSS., 'but in +his handes,' makes quite good sense. The Scot wants matter, except +in his hands, i.e. dirt, which is 'matter out of place'. The reading, +'writ in his hands', which Chambers reports after Grosart, is probably +a mistake of the latter's. Indeed his own note suggests that the +reading of _H-K_ is 'but in's hands'. + + +PAGE =417=. TO THE COUNTESSE OF HUNTINGTON. + +It looks as if some lines of this poem had been lost. The first +sentence has no subject unless 'That' in the second line be a +demonstrative--a very awkward construction. + +If written by Donne this poem must have been composed about the same +time as _The Storme_ and _The Calme_. He is writing apparently from +the New World, from the Azores. But it is as impossible to recover the +circumstances in which the poem was written as to be sure who wrote +it. + + +PAGE =422=. ELEGIE. + +ll. 5-6. _denounce ... pronounce._ The reading of the MSS. seems to +me plainly the correct one. 'In others, terror, anguish and grief +announce the approach of death. Her courage, ease and joy in dying +pronounce the happiness of her state.' The reading of the printed +texts is due to the error by which _1635_ and _1639_ took 'comming' +as an epithet to 'terror' as 'happy' is to 'state'. Some MSS. read +'terrors' and 'joyes'. + +l. 22. _Their spoyles, &c._ I have adopted the MS. reading here, +though with some hesitation, because (1) it is the more difficult +reading: 'Soules to thy conquest beare' seems more like a conjectural +emendation than the other reading, (2) The construction of the line +in the printed texts is harsh--one does not bear anything 'to a +conquest', (3) the meaning suits the context better. It is not souls +that are spoken of, but bodies. The bodies of the wicked become the +spoil of death, trophies of his victory over Adam; not so those of the +good, which shall rise again. See 1 Cor. xv. 54-5. + + +PAGE =424=. PSALME 137. + +This Psalm is found in a MS. collection of metrical psalms (Rawlinson +Poetical 161), in the Bodleian Library, transcribed by a certain R. +Crane. The list of authors is Fr. Dav., Jos. Be., Rich. Cripps, Chr. +Dav., Th. Carry. That Davison is the author of this particular Psalm +is strongly suggested by the poetical _Induction_ which in style and +verse resembles the psalm. The induction is signed 'Fr. Dav.' The +first verse runs: + + Come Urania, heavenly Muse, + and infuse + Sacred flame to my invention; + Sing so loud that Angells may + heare thy lay, + Lending to thy note attention. + + +PAGE =429=. SONG. + +_Soules joy, now I am gone, &c._ George Herbert, in the _Temple_, +gives _A Parodie_ of this poem, opening: + + Soul's joy, when thou art gone, + And I alone, + Which cannot be, + Because Thou dost abide with me, + And I depend on Thee. + +The parody does not extend beyond the first verse. + +It was one of the aims of Herbert to turn the Muse from profane love +verses to sacred purposes. Mr. Chambers points to another reference +to this poem in some very bad verses by Sir Kenelm Digby in Bright's +edition of Digby's _Poems_ (p. 8), _The Roxburghe Club_. + + + + +APPENDIX C. + + +I. POEMS FROM ADDITIONAL MS. 25707. PAGE =433=. + +The authorship of the four poems here printed from _A25_ has been +discussed in the _Text and Canon, &c._ There is not much reason to +doubt that the first is what it professes to be. The order of the +names in the heading, and the character of the verses both suggest +that the second and corresponding verses are Donne's contribution. +There is a characteristic touch in each one. I cannot find anything +eminently characteristic in any of the rest of the group. The third +poem refers to the poetical controversy on Love and Reason carried on +with much spirit between the Earl of Pembroke and Sir Benjamin Rudyerd +in their _Poems_ as printed by the younger Donne in 1660. A much finer +fragment of the debate, beginning-- + + And why should Love a footboy's place despise? + +is attributed to Donne by the Bridgewater MS. and the MS. in the +library of the Marquess of Crewe. It is part of a poem by Rudyerd in +the debate in the volume referred to. + + +II. POEMS FROM THE BURLEY MS. PAGE =437=. + +Of the poems here printed from the Burley-on-the-Hill MS., none I +think is Donne's. The chief interest of the collection is that it +comes from a commonplace-book of Sir Henry Wotton, and therefore +presumably represents the work of the group of wits to which Donne, +Bacon, and Wotton belonged. I have found only one of them in other +MSS., viz. that which I have called _Life a Play_. This occurs in +quite a number of MSS. in the British Museum, and has been published +in Hannah's _Courtly Poets_. It is generally ascribed to Sir Walter +Raleigh; and Harleian MS. 733 entitles it _Verses made by Sir Walter +Raleigh made the same morning he was executed_. I have printed it +because with the first, and another in the _Reliquiae Wottonianae_, it +illustrates Wotton's taste for this comparison of life to a stage, a +comparison probably derived from an epigram in the Greek Anthology, +which may be the source of Shakespeare's famous lines in _As You Like +It_. The epitaph by Jonson on Hemmings, Shakespeare's fellow-actor +and executor, is interesting. A similar epitaph on Burbage is found in +Sloane MS. 1786: + + +An Epitaph on Mr Richard Burbage the Player. + + This life's a play groaned out by natures Arte + Where every man hath his alloted parte. + This man hath now as many men can tell + Ended his part, and he hath done it well. + The Play now ended, think his grave to bee + The retiring house of his sad Tragedie. + Where to give his fame this, be not afraid: + Here lies the best Tragedian ever plaid. + + +III. POEMS FROM VARIOUS MSS. PAGE =443=. + +Of the miscellaneous poems here collected there is very little to be +said. The first eight or nine come from the O'Flaherty MS. (_O'F_), +which professes to be a collection of Donne's poems, and may, Mr. +Warwick Bond thinks, have been made by the younger Donne, as it +contains a poem by him. It is careless enough to be his work. +They illustrate well the kind of poem attributed to Donne in the +seventeenth century, some on the ground of their wit, others because +of their subject-matter. Donne had written some improper poems as a +young man; it was tempting therefore to assign any wandering poem +of this kind to the famous Dean of St. Paul's. The first poem, _The +Annuntiation_, has nothing to do with Donne's poem _The Annuntiation +and Passion_, but has been attached to it in a manner which is +common enough in the MSS. The poem _Love's Exchange_ is obviously an +imitation of Donne's _Lovers infinitenesse_ (p. 17). _A Paradoxe of a +Painted Face_ was attributed to Donne because he had written a prose +_Paradox_ entitled _That Women ought to paint_. The poem was not +published till 1660. In Harleian MS. it is said to be 'By my Lo: of +Cant. follower Mr. Baker'. The lines on _Black Hayre and Eyes_ (p. +460) are found in fifteen or more different MSS. in the British Museum +alone, and were printed in _Parnassus Biceps_ (1656) and Pembroke and +Ruddier's _Poems_ (1660). Two of the MSS. attribute the poem to Ben +Jonson, but others assign it to W. P. or Walton Poole. Mr. Chambers +points out that a Walton Poole has verses in _Annalia Dubrensia_ +(1636), and also cites from Foster's _Alumni Oxonienses_: 'Walton +Poole of Wilts arm. matr. 9.1.1580 at Trinity Coll. aged 15.' These +may be the same person. The signature A. P. or W. P. at the foot of +several pages suggests that the Stowe MS. 961 of Donne's poems had +belonged to some member of this family. The fragment of an Elegy at +p. 462 occurs only in _P_, where it forms part of an Heroicall Epistle +with which it has obviously nothing to do. I have thought it worth +preserving because of its intense though mannered style. The line, +'Fortune now do thy worst' recalls _Elegie XII_, l. 67. The closing +poem,'Farewell ye guilded follies,' comes from Walton's _Complete +Angler_ (1658), where it is thus introduced: 'I will requite you with +a very good copy of verses: it is a farewell to the vanities of the +world, and some say written by Dr. D. But let they be written by +whom they will, he that writ them had a brave soul, and must needs be +possest with happy thoughts of their composure.' In the third edition +(1661) the words were changed to 'And some say written by Sir Harry +Wotton, who I told you was an excellent Angler.' In one MS. they are +attributed to Henry King, Donne's friend and literary executor, and in +two others they are assigned to Sir Kenelm Digby, as by whom they are +printed in _Wits Interpreter_ (1655). Mr. Chambers points out that +'The closing lines of King's _The Farewell_ are curiously similar to +those of this poem.' He quotes: + + My woeful Monument shall be a cell, + The murmur of the purling brook my knell; + My lasting Epitaph the Rock shall groan; + Thus when sad lovers ask the weeping stone, + What wretched thing does in that centre lie, + The hollow echo will reply, 'twas I. + +I cannot understand why Mr. Chambers, to whom I am indebted for most +of this information, was content to print so inadequate a text when +Walton was in his hand. Two of his lines completely puzzled me: + + Welcome pure thoughts! welcome, ye careless groans! + These are my guests, this is that courtage tones. + +'Groans' are generally the sign of care, not of its absence. However, +I find that Ashmole MS. 38, in the Bodleian, and some others read: + + Welcome pure thoughts! welcome ye careless groves! + These are my guests, this is that court age loves. + +This explains the mystery. But Mr. Chambers followed Grosart; and +Grosart was inclined to prefer the version of a bad MS. which he had +found to a good printed version. + + + + +SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. + +PAGES =5=, =6=. The poems of Ben Jonson are here printed just as +they stand in the 1650, 1654, 1669 editions of Donne's _Poems_. +A comparison with the 1616 edition of Jonson's _Works_ shows some +errors. The poem _To John Donne_ (p. 5) is xxiii of the _Epigrammes_. +The sixth line runs + + And which no affection praise enough can give! + +The absurd 'no'n' of 1650 seems to have arisen from the printing +'no'affection' of the 1640 edition of Jonson's _Works_. The 1719 +editor of Donne's _Poems_ corrected this mistake. A more serious +mistake occurs in the ninth line, which in the _Works_ (1616) runs: + + All which I meant to praise, and, yet I would. + +The error 'mean' comes from the 1640 edition of the _Works of Ben +Jonson_, which prints 'meane'. + +_To Lucy, &c._, is xciii of the _Epigrammes_. The fourteenth line +runs: + + Be of the best; and 'mongst those, best are you. + +The comma makes the sense clearer. In l. 3, 1616 reads 'looke,' with +comma. + +_To John Donne_ (p. 6) is xcvi. There are no errors; but 'punees' is +in _1616_ more correctly spelt 'pui'nees'. + +PAGES =7=, =175=, =369=. I am indebted for the excellent copies of +the engravings here reproduced to the kind services of Mr. Laurence +Binyon. The portraits form a striking supplement to the poems along +with which they are placed. The first is the young man of the _Songs +and Sonets_, the _Elegies_ and the _Satyres_, the counterpart of Biron +and Benedick and the audacious and witty young men of Shakespeare's +Comedies. 'Neither was it possible,' says Hacket in his _Scrinia +Reserata: a Memorial of John Williams ... Archbishop of York_ (1693), +'that a vulgar soul should dwell in such promising features.' + +The engraving by Lombart is an even more lifelike portrait of the +author of the _Letters_, _Epicedes_, _Anniversaries_ and earlier +_Divine Poems_, learned and witty, worldly and pious, melancholy +yet ever and again 'kindling squibs about himself and flying into +sportiveness', writing at one time the serious _Pseudo-Martyr_, +at another the outrageous _Ignatius his Conclave_, and again the +strangely-mooded, self-revealing _Biathanatos_: 'mee thinks I have the +keyes of my prison in mine owne hand, and no remedy presents it selfe +so soone to my heart, as mine own sword.' + +After describing the circumstances attending the execution of the last +portrait of Donne, Walton adds in the 1675 edition of the _Lives_ (the +passage is not in the earlier editions of the _Life of Donne_): 'And +now, having brought him through the many labyrinths and perplexities +of a various life: even to the gates of death and the grave; my desire +is, he may rest till I have told my Reader, that I have seen many +Pictures of him, in several habits, and at several ages, and in +several postures: And I now mention this, because, I have seen one +Picture of him, drawn by a curious hand at his age of eighteen; with +his sword and what other adornments might then suit with the present +fashions of youth, and the giddy gayeties of that age: and his Motto +then was, + + How much shall I be chang'd, + Before I am chang'd. + +And, if that young, and his now dying Picture, were at this time set +together, every beholder might say, _Lord! How much is_ Dr. Donne +_already chang'd, before he is chang'd!_' The change written in the +portrait is the change from the poet of the _Songs and Sonets_ to the +poet of the _Holy Sonnets_ and last _Hymns_. + +The design of this last picture and of the marble monument made from +it is not very clear. He was painted, Walton says, standing on the +figure of the urn. But the painter brought with him also 'a board +of the just height of his body'. What was this for? Walton does not +explain. But Mr. Hamo Thornycroft has pointed out that the folds of +the drapery show the statue was modelled from a recumbent figure. Can +it be that Walton's account confuses two things? The incident of the +picture is not in the 1640 _Life_, but was added in 1658. How could +Donne, a dying man, stand on the urn, with his winding-sheet knotted +'at his head and feet'? Is it not probable that he was painted lying +in his winding-sheet on the board referred to; but that the monument, +as designed by himself, and executed by Nicholas Stone, was intended +to represent him rising at the Last Day from the urn, habited as he +had lain down--a symbolic rendering of the faith expressed in the +closing words of the inscription + + Hic licet in Occiduo Cinere + Aspicit Eum + Cuius nomen est Oriens. + +PAGE =37=, l. 14. The textual note should have indicated that in most +or all of the MSS. cited the whole line runs: + + (Thou lovest Truth) but an Angell at first sight. + +This is probably the original form of the line, corrected later to +avoid the clashing of the 'but's. + +PAGE =96=, l. 6, note. The _R212_ cited here is Rawlinson Poetical +MS. 212, a miscellaneous collection of seventeenth-century prose and +poetry (e.g. Davies' _Epigrams_. See II. p. 101). I had cited it once +or twice in my first draft. The present instance escaped my eye. It +helps to show how general the reading 'tyde' was. + +PAGE =115=, l. 54. _goeing on it fashions_. The correct reading is +probably 'growing on it fashions', which has the support of both _JC_, +and _1650-69_ where 'its' is a mere error. I had made my text +before _JC_ came into my hand. To 'grow on' for 'to increase' is +an Elizabethan idiom: 'And this quarrel grew on so far,' North's +_Plutarch, Life of Coriolanus, ad fin._ See also O.E.D. + +I should like in closing to express my indebtedness throughout to the +_Oxford English Dictionary_, an invaluable help and safeguard to +the editor of an English text, and also to Franz's admirable +_Shakespeare-Grammatik_ (1909), which should be translated. + +PAGE =133=, l. 58. To what is said in the note on the taking of yellow +amber as a drug add: 'Divers men may walke by the Sea side, and the +same beames of the Sunne giving light to them all, one gathereth by +the benefit of that light pebles, or speckled shells, for curious +vanitie, and another gathers precious Pearle, or medicinall Ambar, by +the same light.' _Sermons_ 80. 36. 326. + +PAGES =156-7=. _Seeke true religion, &c._ All this passage savours a +little of Montaigne: 'Tout cela, c'est un signe tres-evident que nous +ne recevons nostre religion qu'à nostre façon et par nos mains, et +non autrement que comme les autres religions se reçoyvent. Nous nous +sommes rencontrez au païs où elle estoit en usage; ou nous regardons +son ancienneté ou l'authorité des hommes qui l'ont maintenue; ou +creignons les menaces qu'ell' attache aux mescreans, ou suyvons ses +promesses. Ces considerations là doivent estre employées à nostre +creance, mais comme subsidiaires: ce sont liaisons humaines. Une +autre region, d'autres tesmoings, pareilles promesses et menasses nous +pourroyent imprimer par mesme voye une croyance contraire. Nous sommes +chrestiens à mesme titre que nous sommes ou perigordins ou alemans.' +_Essais_ (1580), II. 12. _Apologie de Raimond Sebond_. + +PAGE =220=, l. 46. Compare: 'One of the most convenient Hieroglyphicks +of God, is a Circle; and a Circle is endlesse; whom God loves, hee +loves to the end ... His hailestones and his thunderbolts, and his +showres of blood (emblemes and instruments of his Judgements) fall +downe in a direct line, and affect or strike some one person, or +place: His Sun, and Moone, and Starres (Emblemes and Instruments of +his Blessings) move circularly, and communicate themselves to all. His +Church is his chariot; in that he moves more gloriously, then in the +Sun; as much more, as his begotten Son exceeds his created Sun, and +his Son of glory, and of his right hand, the Sun of the firmament; +and this Church, his chariot, moves in that communicable motion, +circularly; It began in the East, it came to us, and is passing now, +shining out now, in the farthest West.' _Sermons_ 80. 2. 13-4. + +l. 47. _Religious tipes_, is the reading of _1633_. The comma has +been accidentally dropped. There is no comma in _1635-69_, which print +'types'. + +PAGE =241=, ll. 343-4. _As a compassionate Turcoyse, &c._ Compare: + + And therefore Cynthia, as a turquoise bought, + Or stol'n, or found, is virtueless, and nought, + It must be freely given by a friend, + Whose love and bounty doth such virtue lend, + As makes it to compassionate, and tell + By looking pale, the wearer is not well. + Sir Francis Kynaston, _To Cynthia_. + Saintsbury, _Caroline Poets_, ii. 161. + +PAGE =251=, ll. 9-18. The source of this simile is probably Lucretius, +_De Rerum Natura_, III. 642-56. + + Falciferos memorant currus abscidere membra + Saepe ita de subito permixta caede calentis, + Ut tremere in terra videatur ab artubus id quod + Decidit abscisum, cum mens tamen atque hominis vis + Mobilitate mali non quit sentire dolorem; + Et semel in pugnae studio quod dedita mens est, + Corpore reliquo pugnam caedesque petessit, + Nec tenet amissam laevam cum tegmine saepe + Inter equos abstraxe rotas falcesque rapaces, + Nec cecidisse alius dextram, cum scandit et instat. + Inde alius conatur adempto surgere crure, + Cum digitos agitat propter moribundus humi pes. + Et caput abscisum calido viventeque trunco + Servat humi voltum vitalem oculosque patentis, + Donec reliquias animai reddidit omnes. + + PAGE =259=, ll. 275-6. _so that there is + (For aught thou know'st) piercing of substances._ + +'Piercing of substances,' the actual penetration of one substance by +another, was the Stoic as opposed to the Aristotelian doctrine of +mixture of substance ([Greek: krasis]), what is now called chemical +combination. The Peripatetics held that, while the qualities of the +two bodies combined to produce a new quality, the substances remained +in juxtaposition. Plotinus devotes the seventh book of the _Enneades_ +to the subject; and one of the arguments of the Stoics which he cites +resembles Donne's problem: 'Sweat comes out of the human body without +dividing it and without the body being pierced with holes.' The pores +were apparently unknown. See Bouillet's _Enneades de Plotin_, I. 243 +f. and 488-9, for references. + + +PAGE =368=. HYMNE TO GOD MY GOD, IN MY SICKNESSE. + +Professor Moore Smith has at the last moment reminded me of a fact, +the significance of which should have been discussed in the note on +the _Divine Poems_, that a copy of this poem found (Gosse, _Life &c._ +ii. 279) among the papers of Sir Julius Caesar bears the statement +that the verses were written in Donne's 'great sickness in December +1623'. Professor Moore Smith is of opinion that Sir Julius Caesar may +have been right and Walton mistaken, and there is a good deal to be +said for this view. 'It seems', he says, 'more likely that Walton +should have attributed the poem wrongly to Donne's last illness, than +that the MS. copy should antedate it by seven years.' In 1640 Walton +simply referred it to his deathbed; the precise date was given in +1658. Moreover the date 1623 seems to Professor Moore Smith confirmed +by a letter to Sir Robert Ker (later Lord Ancrum) in 1624 (Gosse, +_Life &c._ ii. 191), in which Donne writes, 'If a flat map be but +pasted upon a round globe the farthest east and the farthest west meet +and are all one.' + +On the other hand, Walton's final date is very precise, and was +probably given to him by King. If the poem was written at the same +time as that 'to God the Father', why did it not pass into wider +circulation? Stowe MS. 961 is the only collection in which I have +found it. The use of the simile in the letter to Ker is not so +conclusive as it seems. In that same letter Donne says, 'Sir, I took +up this paper to write a letter; but my imagination was full of a +sermon before, for I write but a few hours before I am to preach.' Now +I have in my note cited this simile from an undated sermon on one +of the Penitentiary Psalms. This, not the poem, may have been the +occasion of its repetition in this letter. Donne is very prone to +repeat a favourite figure--inundation, the king's stamped face &c. It +is quite likely that the poem was the last, not the first, occasion +on which he used the flat map. Note that the other chief figure in the +poem, the straits which lead to the Pacific Sea, was used in a sermon +(see note) dated February 12, 1629. + +The figure of the flat map is not used, as one might expect, in the +section of the _Devotions_ headed _The Patient takes his bed_, but the +last line of the poem is recalled by some words there: 'and therefore +am I _cast downe_, that I might not be _cast away_.' + +Walton's dates are often inaccurate, but here the balance of the +evidence seems to me in his favour. As Mr. Gosse says, Sir Julius +Caesar may have confounded this hymn with 'Wilt thou forgive'. In +re-reading the _Devotions_ with Professor Moore Smith's statement in +view I have come on two other points of interest. Donne's views on the +immortality of the soul (see II. pp. 160-2) are very clearly stated: +'That light, which is the very emanation of the light of God ... only +that bends not to this _Center_, to _Ruine_; that which was not made +of _Nothing_, is not thretned with this annihilation. All other +things are; even _Angels_, even our _soules_; they move upon the same +_Poles_, they bend to the same _Center_; and if they were not made +immortall by _preservation_, their _Nature_ could not keep them from +sinking to this _center_, _Annihilation_' (pp. 216-17). + +The difficult line in the sonnet _Resurrection_ (p. 321, l. 8) is +perhaps illuminated by pp. 206-8, where Donne speaks of 'thy first +booke, the booke of _life_', 'thy second book, the booke of Nature,' +and closes a further list with 'to those, _the booke with seven +seals_, which only _the Lamb which was slain, was found worthy to +open_; which, I hope, it shal not disagree with the measure of thy +blessed _spirit_, to interpret, the _promulgation of their pardon, +and righteousnes, who are washed in the blood of the Lamb_'. This is +possibly the 'little booke' of the sonnet, perhaps changed by Donne to +'life-book' to simplify the reference. But the two are not the same. + + + + +ADDENDUM. + + +Vol. I, p. 368, l. 6. Whilst my Physitions by their love are growne +Cosmographers ... Sir Julius Caesar's MS. (Addl. MS. 34324) has +_Loer_, scil. _Lore_. This is probably the true reading. + + + + +ERRATUM. + + +=P. 274=, l. 28. _for_ figure-inundation _read_ figure--inundation + + + + +INDEX OF FIRST LINES. + +(VOL. II.) + + + PAGE + + A learned Bishop of this Land 53 + Amongst the Poets Dacus numbered is 101 + An ill year of a Goodyere us bereft 145 + As in tymes past the rusticke shepheards sceant 171 + + Esteemed knight take triumph over death 145 + + Goe catch a star that's falling from the sky 12 + + Henrie the greate, greate both in peace and war 261 + How often hath my pen (mine hearts Solicitor) 103 + + Loe her's a man worthy indeede to travell 129 + + No want of duty did my mind possess 7 + + Stay, view this Stone, and if thou beest not such 213 + + This Lifes a play groaned out by natures Arte 268 + Thou send'st me prose and rimes, I send for those 160 + Though Ister have put down the Rhene 261 + 'Tis not a coate of gray or Shepheardes Life 141 + Titus the brave and valorous young gallant 101 + + Whoso termes love a fire, may like a poet 52 + Wotton the country and the country swaine 141 + + + + + * * * * * + + Oxford: Horace Hart, M.A., Printer to the University + + * * * * * + + + + +Transcriber's note: + + Although Scotland had accepted the Gregorian calendar in 1600, + until 1752, England still followed the Julian calendar (after + Julius Caesar, 44 B.C.), and celebrated New Year's Day on March + 25th (Annunciation Day). Most Catholic countries accepted the + Gregorian calendar (after Pope Gregory XIII) from some time + after 1582 (the Catholic countries of France, Spain, Portugal, + and Italy in 1582, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Switzerland + within a year or two, Hungary in 1587, and Scotland in 1600), + and celebrated New Year's Day on January 1st. England finally + changed to the Gregorian calendar in 1752. + + This is the reason for the double dates in the early months of + the years in some parts of this book. e.g., there is a + statement, on page 134, that "He died February 7, 1627/8. (i.e. + 1627 in England; 1628 in Scotland). Only after March 25th + (Julian New Years Day) was the year the same in the two + countries. The Julian calendar was known as 'Old Style', and + the Gregorian calendar as 'New Style' (N.S.). + + + Page lxiv, Footnote 9: 'Garrard att his quarters in ??' + Perhaps ϑermyte with U+03D1 GREEK THETA SYMBOL: thermyte ? + perhaps meaning "(at the sign of) The Hermit"? + (The printer, rightly or wrongly, seems to have used a + 'theta' at the beginning of the word). + + Page lxv, a facsimile of a Title Page, split a cross-page + paragraph. One sentence was on page lxiv; the rest of the + paragraph was on page lxvi. In the interest of a link to the + page, it seemed beneficial to leave the paragraph as it was + split. + + Page lxv: 'VVith' is as printed. + + Page lxxxvi: 'Lo:' retained, although 'Ld.' is printed above. + From the context, 'Lo:' may not be a typo, as this form occurs + elsewhere. + + "and the _Obsequies to the Lo: Harrington_." + + Page cxvi, footnote 39 (cont.: '17-8.' corrected to '17-18.'. + + "_To Sr Henry Wotton_, p. 180, ll. 17-18." + + Page cxxx: 'p. 406' corrected to 'p. 412' + + "'Dear Love, continue nice and chaste' (p. 412)" + + Pages cxxxi-cxxxii: missing word at page-turn? 'and' added in + brackets. + + "And as one is ascribed to Roe on indisputable (and) three on + very strong evidence,..." + + Page 23: 'll. 140-6' corrected to 'll. 440-6' + + "_The Second Anniversary_, ll. 440-6 (p. 264)" + + Page 34: 'coporales' corrected to 'corporales'. + + "'quanto subtilius huiusmodi immutationes occultas corporales + perpendunt.'" + + Page 84: 'p. 308, ll. 27-8' corrected to p. 308, ll. 317-8 + + "in the _Progresse of the Soule_, p. 308, ll. 317-8:" + + Page 187: (See Pearsall Smith, _Life and Letters of Sir Henry + Wotton_ (1907). is as printed. + + Page 214: p. 416 corrected to p. 422. + + "For the relation of this _Elegie_ to that beginning 'Death, + be not proud' (p. 422) see _Text and Canon, &c._, p. cxliii." + + Page 213: 'p. 404' corrected to p. 410' + + "('Shall I goe force an Elegie,' p. 410)" + + + Pages 235, 263: The inscriptions have a character which + looks like a reversed capital C, but which is actually a + ROMAN NUMERAL REVERSED ONE HUNDRED Ↄ (U+2183 or Ↄ). + + On Page 235, the date of Anne (More) Donne's death is given as + CIↃ. DC. XVII. + i.e. hundreds, ten, (1000) plus 600 plus 17, or the year 1617, + which is correct. + + On Page 263, the date given is CIↃ. IↃC. XXIII. + + CIↃ = 1000; + IↃC =500+100 (600), + XXIII = 23, so the date is 1623. + + (Reference for page 263: [http:// hypotheses.org/17871] ... 'Le + latin de Locke ... Goudae apud Justum Ab Hoeve + + CIↃ IↃC LXXXIX ... + CIↃ = 1000 + IↃC se décompose en IↃ = 500 + C = 100 soit 600 + LXXXIX = 89 + La date correspondante est 1689*. + + * 2011 serait CIↃ CIↃ XI '.) + + (So 2015 would be CIↃ CIↃ XV '). + + + Page 251: _S69_ corrected to _S96_ + + "_S96_ and _O'F_ differ from the third group...." + + Page 275: Erratum, p. 274.... This has been corrected. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE POEMS OF JOHN DONNE, VOLUME II +(OF 2)*** + + +******* This file should be named 48772-0.txt or 48772-0.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/4/8/7/7/48772 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, +and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive +specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this +eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook +for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, +performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given +away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks +not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the +trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. + +START: FULL LICENSE + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full +Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at +www.gutenberg.org/license. + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or +destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your +possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a +Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound +by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the +person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph +1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this +agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the +Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection +of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual +works in the collection are in the public domain in the United +States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the +United States and you are located in the United States, we do not +claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, +displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as +all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope +that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting +free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm +works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the +Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily +comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the +same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when +you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are +in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, +check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this +agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, +distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any +other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no +representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any +country outside the United States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other +immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear +prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work +on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, +performed, viewed, copied or distributed: + + This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and + most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no + restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it + under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this + eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the + United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you + are located before using this ebook. + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is +derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not +contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the +copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in +the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are +redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply +either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or +obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm +trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any +additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms +will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works +posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the +beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including +any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access +to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format +other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official +version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site +(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense +to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means +of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain +Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the +full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +provided that + +* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed + to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has + agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project + Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid + within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are + legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty + payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project + Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in + Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg + Literary Archive Foundation." + +* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all + copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue + all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm + works. + +* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of + any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of + receipt of the work. + +* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than +are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing +from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The +Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm +trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project +Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may +contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate +or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other +intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or +other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or +cannot be read by your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium +with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you +with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in +lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person +or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second +opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If +the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing +without further opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO +OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT +LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of +damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement +violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the +agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or +limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or +unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the +remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in +accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the +production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, +including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of +the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this +or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or +additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any +Defect you cause. + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of +computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It +exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations +from people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future +generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see +Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at +www.gutenberg.org + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by +U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the +mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its +volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous +locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt +Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to +date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and +official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact + +For additional contact information: + + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND +DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular +state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To +donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project +Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be +freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and +distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of +volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in +the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not +necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper +edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search +facility: www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + |