15 'this sunne' (probably a
misreading
of 'thie').
Donne - 2
_ 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.
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.
