I have worked with his edition
constantly beside me.
constantly beside me.
Donne - 2
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Philobiblon Society several 'Unpublished Poems of Donne'.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.
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.
