No More Learning

' The poems follow the same
order in the two manuscripts, but of poems not by Donne _RP31_
contains several which are not in _H40_, and, on the other hand,
of poems by Donne _H40_ inserts at various places quite a number,
especially of songs, which are not in _RP31_. The latter is, in short,
a miscellaneous collection of Elizabethan and early Jacobean poems,
including several of Donne's; the former, the same collection in which
Donne's poems have become by insertion the principal feature. I have
cited the readings of _H40_ throughout; those of _RP31_ only when
they differ from _H40_, or when I wish to emphasize their agreement.
Wherever derived from, the poems are generally carefully and
intelligently transcribed. They contain some unpublished poems of
Jonson, Sir Edward Herbert, and probably Daniel.


_L74. _ The Lansdowne MS. 740, in the British Museum, is an interesting
collection of Donne's mainly earlier and secular poems, along with
several by contemporaries. [28] The text of the _Satyres_ connects
this collection with _A18_, _N_, _TC_, but it is probably older, as
it contains none of the _Divine Poems_ and no poem written later
than 1610. Its interest, apart from the support which it lends to the
readings of other manuscripts, centres in the evidence it affords as
to the authorship of some of the unauthentic poems which have been
ascribed to Donne.


_S. _ The Stephens MS. , now in the Harvard College Library, Boston, is
the manuscript on which Dr. Grosart based his edition (though he does
not reproduce it either consistently or with invariable accuracy) in
1873--an unhappy choice even were it legitimate to adopt any
single manuscript in preference to the edition of 1633. Of all the
manuscripts I have examined (I know it only through the collation
made for me and from Dr. Grosart's citations) it is, I think, without
exception the worst, the fullest of obvious and absurd blunders. There
are too in it more evidences of stupid editing than in _P_, whose
blunders are due to careless copying by eye or to dictation, and
therefore more easy to correct.

The manuscript is dated, at the end, '19th July 1620,' and contains
no poems which are demonstrably later than this date, or indeed
than 1610. As, however, it contains several of the _Divine Poems_,
including _La Corona_, but _not_ the _Holy Sonnets_, it affords a
valuable clue to the date of these poems,--of which more elsewhere.
The collection is an ambitious one, and an attempt has been made at
classification. Six Satires are followed by twenty-seven Elegies (one
is torn out) under which head love and funeral elegies are included,
and these by a long series of songs with the _Divine Poems_
interspersed. Some of the songs, as of the elegies, are not by
Donne. [29]


_S96. _ Stowe MS. 961 is a small folio volume in the British Museum,
containing a collection of Donne's poems very neatly and prettily
transcribed. It cannot have been made before 1630 as it contains all
the three hymns written during the poet's last illnesses. Indeed it is
the only manuscript which I have found containing a copy of the _Hymne
to God, my God in my Sicknes_. It is a very miscellaneous collection.
Three satires are followed by the long obsequies to the Lord
Harington, and these by a sequence of Letters, Funeral Elegies,
Elegies, and Songs intermingled. It is regrettable that so
well-written a manuscript is not more reliable, but its text is poor,
its titles sometimes erroneous, and its ascriptions inaccurate. [30]

(3) In the third class I place manuscripts which are not primarily
collections of Donne's poems but collections of seventeenth-century
poems among which Donne's are included. It is not easy to draw a hard
and fast line between this class and the last because, as has been
seen, most of the manuscripts at the end of the last list contain
poems which are not, or probably are not, by Donne. Still, in these
collections Donne's work predominates, and the tendency of the
collector is to bring the other poems under his aegis. Initials like
J. R. , F. B. , J. H. disappear, or J. D. takes their place. In the case
of these last collections this is not so. Poems by Donne are included
with poems which the collector assigns to other wits. Obviously this
class could be made to include many different kinds of collections,
ranging from those in which Donne is a prominent figure to those
which include only one or two of his poems. But such manuscripts have
comparatively little value and no authority for the textual critic,
though they are not without importance for the student of the canon
of Donne's poetry. I shall mention only one or two, though I have
examined a good many more.


_A25. _ Additional MS. 25707, in the British Museum, is a large and
interesting collection, written in several different hands, of early
seventeenth-century poems, Jacobean and Caroline. It contains an
_Elegie_ by Henry Skipwith on the death of King Charles I, but most
of the poems are early Jacobean, and either the bulk of the collection
was made before this and some other poems were inserted, or it is
derived from older collections. Indeed, most of the poems by Donne
were probably got from some older collection or collections not
unlike some of those already described. They consist of twelve elegies
arranged in the same order as in _JC_, _W_, and to some extent _O'F_,
which is not the order of _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ and _1633_; a number of
_Songs_ with some _Letters_ and _Obsequies_ following one another
sometimes in batches, at times interspersed with poems by other
writers; the five _Satyres_, separated from the other poems and
showing some evidences in the text of deriving from a collection like
_Q_ or its duplicate in the Dyce collection. [31] The only one of the
_Divine Poems_ which _A25_ contains is _The Crosse_. No poem which can
be proved to have been written later than 1610 is included.

The poems by Donne in this manuscript are generally, but not always,
initialled J. D. , and are thus distinguished from others by F. B. , H.
K. , N. H. , H. W. , Sr H. G. , T. P. , T. G. , G. Lucy. , No. B. , &c. The
care with which this has been done lends interest to those poems which
are here ascribed to Donne but are not elsewhere assigned to him.
_A25_ (with its partial duplicate _C_) is the only manuscript which
attributes to 'J. D. ' the Psalm, 'By Euphrates flowery side,' that was
printed in _1633_ and all the subsequent editions. [32]


_C. _ A strange duplicate of certain parts of _A25_ is a small
manuscript in the Cambridge University Library belonging to the
Baumgartner collection. It is a thin folio, much damaged by damp, and
scribbled over. A long poem, _In cladem Rheensen_ ('Verses upon the
slaughter at the Isle of Rhees'), has been used by the cataloguer to
date the manuscript, but as this has evidently been inserted when the
whole was bound, the rest of the contents may be older or younger. The
collection opens with three of the _Elegies_ contained in _A25_. It
then omits eleven poems which are in _A25_, and continues with twenty
_Songs_ and _Obsequies_, following the order of _A25_ but omitting the
intervening poems. Some nine more poems are given, following the order
of _A25_, but many are omitted in _C_ which are found in _A25_, and
the poems in _C_ are often only fragments of the whole poems in _A25_.
Evidently _C_ is a selection of poems either made directly from _A25_,
or from the collection of Donne's poems (with one or two by Beaumont
and others) which _A25_ itself drew from.


_A10. _ Additional MS. 10309, in the British Museum, is a little octavo
volume which was once the property of Margaret Bellasis, probably
the eldest daughter of Thomas, first Lord Fauconberg. It is a very
miscellaneous collection of prose (Hall's _Characterismes of Vice_)
and verse. Of Donne's undoubted poems there are very few, but there
is an interesting group of poems by Roe or others (the authors are not
named in the manuscript) which are frequently found with Donne's, and
some of which have been printed as his. [33]


_M. _ This is a manuscript bought by Lord Houghton and now in the
library of the Marquis of Crewe. It is entitled

A Collection of

Original Poetry

written about the time of

Ben: Jonson

qui ob. 1637

A later hand, probably Sir John Simeon's, has added 'Chiefly in
the Autograph of Dr. Donne Dean of St. Pauls', but this is quite
erroneous. It is a miscellaneous collection of poems by Donne, Jonson,
Pembroke, Shirley, and others, with short extracts from Fletcher and
Shakespeare. Donne's are the most numerous, and their text generally
good, but such a collection can have no authority. It is important
only as supporting readings and ascriptions of other manuscripts. I
cite it seldom.


_TCD_ (_Second Collection_). [34] The large manuscript volume in
Trinity College, Dublin, contains two collections of poems (though
editors have spoken of them as one) of very different character and
value. The first I have already described. It occupies folios 1 to
292. On folio 293 a new hand begins with the song, 'Victorious Beauty
though your eyes,' and from that folio to folio 565 (but some folios
are torn out) follows a long and miscellaneous series of early
seventeenth-century poems. There are numerous references to
Buckingham, but none to the Long Parliament or the events which
followed, so that the collection was probably put together before
1640. The poems are ascribed to different authors in a very haphazard
and untrustworthy fashion. James I is credited with Jonson's epigram
on the Union of the Crowns; Donne's _The Baite_ is given to Wotton;
and Wotton's 'O Faithless World' to Robert Wisedom. Probably there
is more reliance to be put on the ascriptions of later and Caroline
poems, but for the student of Donne and early Jacobean poetry the
collection has no value. Some of Donne's poems occur, and it is
noteworthy that the version given is often a different one from that
occurring in the first part of the volume. Probably two distinct
collections have been bound up together.

Another collection frequently cited by Grosart, but of little
value for the editor of Donne, is the _Farmer-Chetham MS. _, a
commonplace-book in the Chetham Library, Manchester, which has been
published by Grosart. It contains one or two of Donne's poems, but
its most interesting contents are the 'Gulling Sonnets' of Sir John
Davies, and some poems by Raleigh, Hoskins, and others. Nothing could
be more unsafe than to ascribe poems to Donne, as Grosart did, because
they occur here in conjunction with some that are certainly his.

A similar collection, which I have not seen, is the
_Hazlewood-Kingsborough MS. _, as Dr. Grosart called it. To judge from
the analysis in Thorpe's Catalogue, 1831, this too is a miscellaneous
anthology of poems written by, or at any rate ascribed to,
Shakespeare, Jonson, Bacon, Raleigh, Donne, and others. There is no
end to the number of such collections, and it is absurd to base a text
upon them.


The _Burley MS. _, to which I refer once or twice, and which is a
manuscript of great importance for the editor of Donne's letters,
is not a collection of poems. It is a commonplace-book of Sir Henry
Wotton's in the handwriting of his secretaries. Amid its varied
contents are some letters, unsigned but indubitably by Donne; ten of
his _Paradoxes_ with a covering letter; and a few poems of Donne's
with other poems. Of the last, one is certainly by Donne (_H. W. in
Hibernia belligeranti_), and I have incorporated it. The others seem
to me exceedingly doubtful. They are probably the work of other
wits among Wotton's friends. I have printed a selection from them in
Appendix C. [35]


Of the manuscripts of the first two classes, which alone could put
forward any claim to be treated as independent sources of the text
of an edition of Donne's poems, it would be impossible, I think, to
construct a complete genealogy. Different poems, or different groups
of poems in the same manuscript, come from different sources, and
to trace each stream to its fountain-head would be a difficult task,
perhaps impossible without further material, and would in the end
hardly repay the trouble, for the difficulties in Donne's text are
not of so insoluble a character as to demand such heroic methods.
The interval between the composition of the poems and their first
publication ranges from about forty years at the most to a year or
two. There is no case here of groping one's way back through centuries
of transmission. The surprising fact is rather that so many of the
common errors of a text preserved and transmitted in manuscript should
have appeared so soon, that the text and canon of Donne's poems should
present an editor in one form or another with all the chief problems
which confront the editor of a classical or a mediaeval author.

The manuscripts fall into three main groups (1) _D_, _H49_, _Lec_.
These with a portion of _1633_ come from a common source. (2) _A18_,
_N_, _TCC_, _TCD_. These also come from a single stream and some parts
of _1633_ follow them. _L74_ is closely connected with them, at least
in parts. (3) _A25_, _B_, _Cy_, _JC_, _O'F_, _P_, _S_, _S96_, _W_.
These cannot be traced in their entirety to a single head, but in
certain groups of poems they tend to follow a common tradition which
may or may not be that of one or other of the first two groups. Of the
_Elegies_, for example, _A25_, _JC_, _O'F_ and _W_ transcribe twelve
in the same order and with much the same text. Again, _B_, _O'F_,
_S96_, and _W_ have taken the _Holy Sonnets_ from a common source,
but _O'F_ has corrected or altered its readings by a reference to a
manuscript resembling _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, while _W_ has a more correct
version than the others of the common tradition, and three sonnets
which none of these include. Generally, whenever _B_, _O'F_, _S96_,
and _W_ derive from the same source, _W_ is much the most reliable
witness.

Indeed, our first two groups and _W_ have the appearance of being
derived from some authoritative source, from manuscripts in the
possession of members of Donne's circle. All the others suggest, by
the headings they give to occasional poems, their misunderstanding
of the true character of some poems, their erroneous ascriptions of
poems, that they are the work of amateurs to whom Donne was not known,
or who belonged to a generation that knew Donne as a divine, only
vaguely as a wit.

These being the materials at our command, the question is, how are we
to use them to secure as accurate a text as possible of Donne's poems,
to get back as close as may be to what the poet wrote himself. The
answer is fairly obvious, though it could not be so until some effort
had been made to survey the manuscript material as a whole.

Of the three most recent editors--the first to attempt to obtain a
true text--of Donne's poems, each has pursued a different plan.
The late Dr. Grosart[36] proceeded on a principle which makes it
exceedingly difficult to determine accurately what is the source of,
or authority for, any particular reading he adopted. He printed now
from one manuscript, now from another, but corrected the errors of
the manuscript by one or other of the editions, most often by that of
1669. He made no estimate of the relative value of either manuscripts
or editions, nor used them in any systematic fashion.

The Grolier Club edition[37] was constructed on a different principle.
For all those poems which _1633_ contains, that edition was accepted
as the basis; for other poems, the first edition, whichever that
might be. The text of _1633_ is reproduced very closely, even when the
editor leans to the acceptance of a later reading as correct. Only
one or two corrections are actually incorporated in the text. But the
punctuation has been freely altered throughout, and no record of these
changes is preserved in the textual notes even when they affect the
sense. In more than one instance the words of _1633_ are retained
in this edition but are made to convey a different meaning from that
which they bear in the original.

The edition of Donne's poems prepared by Mr. E. K. Chambers[38] for
the _Muses Library_ was not based, like Dr. Grosart's, on a casual
use of individual manuscripts and editions, nor like the Grolier Club
edition on a rigid adherence to the first edition, but on an eclectic
use of all the seventeenth-century editions, supplemented by an
occasional reference to one or other of the manuscript collections,
either at first hand or through Dr. Grosart.

Of these three methods, that of the Grolier Club editor is, there can
be no doubt, the soundest. The edition of 1633 comes to us, indeed,
with no _a priori_ authority. It was not published, or (like the
sermons) prepared for the press[39] by the author; nor (as in the case
of the first folio edition of Shakespeare's plays) was it issued by
the author's executors.

But if we apply to _1633_ the _a posteriori_ tests described by
Dr. Moore in his work on the textual criticism of Dante's _Divina
Commedia_, if we select a number of test passages, passages where
the editions vary, but where one reading can be clearly shown to be
intrinsically the more probable, by certain definite tests,[40] we
shall find that _1633_ is, taken all over, far and away superior to
any other single edition, and, I may add at once, to any _single_
manuscript.

Moreover, any careful examination of the later editions, of their
variations from _1633_, and of the text of the poems which they print
for the first time, shows clearly that some method more trustworthy
than individual preference must be found if we are to distinguish
between those of their variations which have, and those which have
not, some authority behind them; those which are derived from a
fresh reference to manuscript sources, and those which are due to
carelessness, to misunderstanding, or to unwarrantable emendation.
Apart from some such sifting, an edition of Donne based, like Mr.
Chambers', on an eclectic use of the editions is exactly in the same
position as would be an edition of Shakespeare based on an eclectic
use of the Folios, helped out by a quite occasional and quite eclectic
reference to a quarto. A plain reprint of _1633_ like Alford's (of
such poems as he publishes) has fewer serious errors than an eclectic
text.

It is here that the manuscripts come to our aid. To take, indeed, any
single manuscript, as Dr. Grosart did, and select this or that reading
from it as seems to you good, is not a justifiable procedure. This is
simply to add to the editions one more possible source of error. There
is no single manuscript which could with any security be substituted
for _1633_. Our analysis of that edition has made it appear probable
that a manuscript resembling _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ was the source of
a large part of its text. But it would be very rash to prefer _D_,
_H49_, _Lec_ as a whole to _1633_. [41] It corrects some errors in that
edition; it has others of its own. Even _W_, which has a completer
version of some poems than _1633_, in these poems makes some mistakes
which _1633_ avoids.

If the manuscripts are to help us it must be by collating them, and
establishing what one might call the agreement of the manuscripts
whether universal or partial, noting in the latter case the
comparative value of the different groups. When we do this we get at
once an interesting result. We find that in about nine cases out of
ten the agreement of the manuscripts is on the side of those readings
of _1633_ which are supported by the tests of intrinsic probability
referred to above,[42] and on the other hand we find that sometimes
the agreement of the manuscripts is on the side of the later editions,
and that in such cases there is a good deal to be said for the later
reading. [43]

The first result of a collation of the manuscripts is thus to
vindicate _1633_, and to provide us with a means of distinguishing
among later variants those which have, from those which have not,
authority. But in vindicating _1633_ the agreement of the manuscripts
vindicates itself. If _B_'s evidence is found always or most often to
support _A_, a good witness, on those points on which _A_'s evidence
is in itself most probably correct, not only is _A_'s evidence
strengthened but _B_'s own character as a witness is established, and
he may be called in when _A_, followed by _C_, an inferior witness,
has gone astray. In some cases the manuscripts _alone_ give us what
is obviously the correct reading, e. g. p. 25, l. 22, 'But wee no more'
for 'But now no more'; p. 72, l. 26, 'his first minute' for 'his short
minute'.
These are exceptionally clear cases. There are some where, I
have no doubt, my preference of the reading of the manuscripts to that
of the editions will not be approved by every reader. I have adopted
no rigid rule, but considered each case on its merits. All the
circumstances already referred to have to be weighed--which reading
is most likely to have arisen from the other, what is Donne's usage
elsewhere, what Scholastic or other 'metaphysical' dogma underlies the
conceit, and what is the source of the text of a particular poem in
_1633_.

For my analysis of this edition has thrown light upon what of itself
is evident--that of some poems or groups of poems _1633_ provides a
more accurate text than of others, viz. of those for which its source
was a manuscript resembling _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, but possibly more
correct than any one of these, or revised by an editor who knew the
poems. But in printing some of the poems, e. g. _The Progresse of the
Soule_, a number of the letters to noble ladies and others,[44] the
_Epithalamion made at Lincolns Inne_, _The Prohibition_, and a few
others, for which _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ was not available, _1633_ seems
to have followed an inferior manuscript, _A18_, _N_, _TC_ or one
resembling it. In these cases it is possible to correct _1633_ by
comparing it with a better single manuscript, as _G_ or _W_, or group
of manuscripts, as _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. Sometimes even a generally
inferior manuscript like _O'F_ seems to offer a better text of an
individual poem, at least in parts, for occasionally the correct
reading has been preserved in only one or two manuscripts. Only _W_
among eleven manuscripts which I have recorded (and I have examined
others) preserves the reading in the _Epithalamion made at Lincolns
Inne_, p. 143, l. 57:

His steeds nill be restrain'd

--which is quite certainly right. Only three manuscripts have the, to
my mind, most probably correct reading in _Satyre I_, l. 58, p. 147:

The Infanta of London;

and only two, _Q_ and the _Dyce MS. _ which is its duplicate, the
tempting and, I think, correct reading in _Satyre IV_, l. 38, p. 160:

He speaks no language.

Lastly, there are poems for which _1633_ is not available. The
authenticity of these will be discussed later. Their text is generally
very corrupt, especially of those added in _1650_ and _1669_. Here
the manuscripts help us enormously. With their aid I have been able to
give an infinitely more readable text of the fine _Elegie XII_, 'Since
she must go'; the brilliant though not very edifying _Elegies XVII_,
_XVIII_, and _XIX_; as well as of most of the poems in the Appendixes.
The work of correcting some of these had been begun by Dr. Grosart and
Mr. Chambers, but much was still left to do by a wider collation. Dr.
Grosart was content with one or two generally inferior manuscripts,
and Mr. Chambers mentions manuscripts which time or other reasons did
not allow him to examine, or he could not have been content to leave
the text of these poems as it stands in his edition.

One warning which must be borne in mind when making a comparison
of alternative readings has been given by Mr. Chambers, and my
examination of the manuscripts bears it out: 'In all probability most
of Donne's poems existed in several more or less revised forms, and
it was sometimes a matter of chance which form was used for printing a
particular edition. ' The examination of a large number of manuscripts
has shown that it is not probable, but certain, that of some poems
(e. g. _The Flea_, _A Lecture upon the Shadow_, _The Good-Morrow_,
_Elegie XI. The Bracelet_) more than one distinct version was in
circulation. Of the _Satyres_, too, many of the variants represent,
I can well believe, different versions of the poems circulated by the
poet among his friends. And the same may possibly be true of variants
in other poems. Our analysis of _1633_ has shown us what versions
were followed by that edition. What happened in later editions was
frequently that the readings of two different versions were combined
eclectically. In the present edition, when it is clear that there
were two versions, my effort has been to retain one tradition pure,
recording the variants in the notes, even when in individual cases
the reading of the text adopted seemed to me inferior to its rival,
provided it was not demonstrably wrong.

In view of what has been said, the aim of the present edition may be
thus briefly stated:

(1) To restore the text of _1633_ in all cases where modern editors
have abandoned or disguised it, if there is no evidence, internal
or external, to prove its error or inferiority; and to show, in the
textual notes, how far it has the general support of the manuscripts.

(2) To correct _1633_ when the meaning and the evidence of the
manuscripts point to its error and suggest an indubitable or highly
probable emendation.

(3) To correct throughout, and more drastically, by help of the
manuscripts when such exist, the often carelessly and erroneously
printed text of those poems which were added in _1635_, _1649_,
_1650_, and _1669_.

(4) By means of the commentary to vindicate or defend my choice of
reading, and to elucidate Donne's thought by reference to his other
works and (but this I have been able to do only very partially) to his
scholastic and other sources.

As regards punctuation, it was my intention from the outset to
preserve the original, altering it only (_a_) when, judged by its own
standards, it was to my mind wrong--stops were displaced or dropped,
or the editor had misunderstood the poet; (_b_) when even though
defensible the punctuation was misleading, tested frequently by the
fact that it had misled editors. In doing this I frequently made
unnecessary changes because it was only by degrees that I came to
understand all the subtleties of older punctuation and to appreciate
some of its nuances. A good deal of my work in the final revision has
consisted in restoring the original punctuation. In doing this I
have been much assisted by the study of Mr. Percy Simpson's work on
_Shakespearian Punctuation_. My punctuation will not probably in the
end quite satisfy either the Elizabethan purist, or the critic who
would have preferred a modernized text. I will state the principles
which have guided me.

I do not agree with Mr. Chambers that the punctuation, at any rate
of _1633_, is 'exceptionally chaotic'. It is sometimes wrong, and in
certain poems, as the _Satyres_, it is careless. But as a rule it
is excellent on its own principles. Donne, indeed, was exceptionally
fastidious about punctuation and such typographical details as capital
letters, italics, brackets, &c. The _LXXX Sermons_ of 1640 are a model
of fine rhetorical and rhythmical pointing, pointing which inserted
stops to show you where to stop. The sermons were not printed in his
lifetime, but we know that he wrote them out for the press, hoping
that they might be a source of income to his son.

But Donne did not prepare his poems for the press. Their punctuation
is that of the manuscript from which they were taken, revised by the
editor or printer. One can often recognize in _D_ the source of a stop
in _1633_, or can see what the pointing and use of capitals would have
been had Donne himself supervised the printing. The printer's man was
sometimes careless; the printer or editor had prejudices of his own
in certain things; and Donne is a difficult and subtle poet. All these
circumstances led to occasional error.

The printer's prejudice was one which Donne shared, but not, I
think, to quite the same extent. Compared, for example, with the
_Anniversaries_ (printed in Donne's lifetime) _1633_ shows a fondness
for the semicolon,[45] not only within the sentence, but separating
sentences, instead of a full stop, when these are closely related in
thought to one another. In an argumentative and rhetorical poet like
Donne the result is excellent, once one grows accustomed to it, as
is the use of commas, where we should use semicolons, within the
sentence, dividing co-ordinate clauses from one another. On the other
hand this use of semicolons leads to occasional ambiguity when one
which separates two sentences comes into close contact with another
within the sentence. For example, in _Satyre III_, ll. 69-72,
how should an editor, modernizing the punctuation, deal with the
semicolons in ll. 70 and 71? Should he print thus? --

But unmoved thou
Of force must one, and forc'd but one allow;
And the right. Ask thy father which is shee;
Let him ask his.

With trifling differences that is how Chambers and the Grolier Club
editor print them. But the lines might run, to my mind preferably--

But unmoved thou
Of force must one, and forc'd but one allow.
And the right; ask thy father which is shee,
Let him ask his.

'And the right' being taken as equivalent to 'And as to the right'.
One might even print--

And the right? Ask, &c.

One of the semicolons is equivalent to a little more than a comma, the
other to a little less than a full stop.

Another effect of this finely-shaded punctuation is that the question
is constantly forced upon an editor, is it correct? Has the printer
understood the subtler connexion of Donne's thought, or has he placed
the semicolon where the full stop should be, the comma where the
semicolon? My solution of these difficulties has been to face and try
to overcome them. I have corrected the punctuation where it seemed
to me, on its own principles, definitely wrong; and I have, but more
sparingly, amended the pointing where it seemed to me to disguise the
subtler connexions of Donne's thought or to disturb the rhetoric and
rhythm of his verse paragraphs. In doing so I have occasionally taken
a hint from the manuscripts, especially _D_ and _W_, which, by the
kindness of Mr. Gosse and Professor Dowden, I have had by me while
revising the text. But if I occasionally quote these manuscripts in
support of my punctuation, it is only with a view to showing that I
have not departed from the principles of Elizabethan pointing. I do
not quote them as authoritative. On questions of punctuation none
of the extant manuscripts could be appealed to as authorities. Their
punctuation is often erratic and chaotic, when it is not omitted
altogether. Finally, I have recorded every change that I have made.
A reader should be able to gather from the text and notes combined
exactly what was the text of the first edition of each poem, whether
it appeared in _1633_ or a subsequent edition, in every particular,
whether of word, spelling, or punctuation. My treatment of the last
will not, as I have said, satisfy every reader. I can only say that I
have given to the punctuation of each poem as much time and thought as
to any part of the work. In the case of Donne this is justifiable.
I am not sure that it would be in the case of a simpler, a less
intellectual poet. It would be an easier task either to retain the
old punctuation and leave a reader to correct for himself, or to
modernize. With all its refinements, Elizabethan punctuation erred
by excess. A reader who gives thought and sympathy to a poem does not
need all these commands to pause, and they frequently irritate and
mislead.


[Footnote 1: _Englands Parnassus; or The Choysest Flowers
of our Moderne Poets: with their Poetical Comparisons.
Descriptions of Bewties, Personages, Castles, Pallaces,
Mountaines, Groves, Seas, Springs, Rivers etc. Whereunto
are annexed Other Various Discourses both Pleasaunt and
Profitable. Imprinted at London, For N. L. C. B. And T. H. _
1600. ]

[Footnote 2: _A Poetical Rhapsody Containing, Diuerse Sonnets,
Odes, Elegies, Madrigalls, and other Poesies, both in Rime and
Measured Verse. Never yet published. _ &c. 1602. The work was
republished in 1608, 1611, and 1621. It was reprinted by Sir
Samuel Egerton Brydges in 1814, by Sir Harris Nicolas in 1826,
and by A. H. Bullen in 1890.

_Englands Helicon_, printed in 1600, is a collection of songs
almost without exception in pastoral guise. The _Eclogue_
introducing the Somerset _Epithalamion_ is Donne's only
experiment in this favourite convention. Donne's friend
Christopher Brooke contributed an _Epithalamion_ to this
collection, but not until 1614. It is remarkable that Donne's
poem _The Baite_ did not find its way into _Englands Helicon_
which contains Marlowe's song and two variants on the theme.
In 1600 Eleazar Edgar obtained a licence to publish _Amours by
J. D. with Certen Oyr. _ (i. e. other) _sonnetes by W. S. _ Were
Donne and Shakespeare to have appeared together? The volume
does not seem to have been issued. ]

[Footnote 3: e. g. Among Drummond of Hawthornden's
miscellaneous papers; in Harleian MS. 3991; in a manuscript in
Emmanuel College, Cambridge. ]

[Footnote 4: So on the first page, and the opening sentences
of the letter defend the use of the word 'Understanders'.
Nevertheless the second and third pages have the heading,
running across from one to the other, 'The Printer to the
Reader. ']

[Footnote 5: 'Will: Marshall sculpsit' implies that Marshall
executed the plate from which the whole frontispiece is taken,
including portrait and poem, not that he is responsible for
the portrait itself. To judge from its shape the latter would
seem to have been made originally from a medallion. Marshall,
the _Dictionary of National Biography_ says, 'floruit c.
1630,' so could have hardly executed a portrait of Donne in
1591. Mr. Laurence Binyon, of the Print Department of the
British Museum, thinks that the original may have been by
Nicholas Hilyard (see II. p. 134) whom Donne commends in _The
Storme_. The Spanish motto suggests that Donne had already
travelled.

The portrait does not form part of the preliminary matter,
which consists of twelve pages exclusive of the portrait. It
was an insertion and is not found in all the extant copies.
The paper on which it is printed is a trifle smaller than the
rest of the book. ]

[Footnote 6: One or two copies seem to have got into
circulation without the _Errata_. One such, identical in other
respects with the ordinary issue, is preserved in the library
of Mr. Beverley Chew, New York. I am indebted for this
information to Mr. Geoffrey Keynes, of St. Bartholomew's
Hospital, who is preparing a detailed bibliography of Donne's
works. ]

[Footnote 7: Some such arrangement may have been intended by
Donne himself when he contemplated issuing his poems in 1614,
for he speaks, in a letter to Sir Henry Goodyere (see II.
pp. 144-5), of including a letter in verse to the Countess
of Bedford 'amongst the rest to persons of that rank'. The
manuscripts, especially the later and more ambitious, e. g.
_Stephens_ and _O'Flaherty_, show similar groupings; and in
_1633_, though there is no consistent sequence, the poems
fall into irregularly recurring groups. The order of the poems
within each of these groups in _1633_ is generally retained in
_1635_. In the _1633_ arrangement there were occasional errors
in the placing of individual poems, especially _Elegies_,
owing to the use of that name both for love poems and for
funeral elegies or epicedes. These were sometimes corrected in
later editions.

Modern editors have dealt rather arbitrarily and variously
with the old classification. Grosart shifted the poems about
according to his own whims in a quite inexplicable fashion.
The Grolier Club edition preserves the groups and their
original order (except that the _Epigrams_ and _Progresse of
the Soule_ follow the _Satyres_), but corrects some of the
errors in placing, and assigns to their relevant groups the
poems added in _1650_. Chambers makes similar corrections and
replacings, but he further rearranges the groups. In his first
volume he brings together--possibly because of their special
interest--the _Songs and Sonets_, _Epithalamions_, _Elegies_,
and _Divine Poems_, keeping for his second volume the _Letters
to Severall Personages_, _Funerall Elegies_, _Progresse of the
Soul_, _Satyres_, and _Epigrams_. There is this to be said
for the old arrangement, that it does, as Walton indicated,
correspond generally to the order in which the poems were
written, to the succession of mood and experience in Donne's
life. In the present edition this original order has been
preserved with these modifications: (1) In the _Songs and
Sonets_, _The Flea_ has been restored to the place which it
occupied in _1633_; (2) the rearrangement of the misplaced
_Elegies_ by modern editors has been accepted; (3) their
distribution of the few poems added in _1650_ (in two sheets
bound up with the body of the work) has also been accepted,
but I have placed the poem _On Mr. Thomas Coryats Crudities_
after the _Satyres_; (4) two new groups have been inserted,
_Heroical Epistles_ and _Epitaphs_. It was absurd to
class _Sappho to Philaenis_ with the _Letters to Severall
Personages_. At the same time it is not exactly an _Elegy_.
There is a slight difference again between the _Funerall
Elegy_ and the _Epitaph_, though the latter term is sometimes
loosely used. Ben Jonson speaks of Donne's _Epitaph on Prince
Henry_. (5) The _Letter, to E. of D. with six holy Sonnets_
has been placed before the _Divine Poems_. (6) The _Hymne to
the Saints, and to Marquesse Hamylton_ has been transferred
to the _Epicedes_. (7) Some poems have been assigned to an
Appendix as doubtful. ]

[Footnote 8: The edition of 1633 contained one Latin, and
seven English, letters to Sir Henry Goodyere, with one letter
to the Countess of Bedford, a copy of which had been sent
to Goodyere. To these were added in _1635_ a letter in Latin
verse, _De libro cum mutuaretur_ (see p. 397), and four prose
letters in English, one _To the La. G. _ written from _Amyens_
in February, 1611-2, and three _To my honour'd friend G.
G. Esquier_, the first dated April 14, 1612, the two last
November 2, 1630, and January 7, 1630. ]

[Footnote 9: In the copy of the 1633 edition belonging to the
Library of Christ Church, Oxford, which has been used for the
present edition, and bears the name 'Garrard att his quarters
in ϑermyte' (_perhaps_ Donne's friend George Garrard or
Gerrard: see Gosse: _Life and Letters &c. _ i. 285), are some
lines, signed J. V. , which seem to imply that the writer had
some hand in the publication of the poems; but the reference
may be simply to his gift:

An early offer of him to yo^r sight
Was the best way to doe the Author right
My thoughts could fall on; w^ch his soule w^ch knew
The weight of a iust Prayse will think't a true.
Our commendation is suspected, when
Wee Elegyes compose on sleeping men,
The Manners of the Age prevayling so
That not our conscience wee, but witts doe show.
And 'tis an often gladnes, that men dye
Of unmatch'd names to write more easyly.
Such my religion is of him; I hold
It iniury to have his merrit tould;
Who (like the Sunn) is righted best when wee
Doe not dispute but shew his quality.
Since all the speech of light is less than it.
An eye to that is still the best of witt.
And nothing can express, for truth or haste
So happily, a sweetnes as our taste.
W^ch thought at once instructed me in this
Safe way to prayse him, and yo^r hands to kisse.