TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

WILLIAM LORD CRAVEN,

BARON OF HAMSTED-MARSHAM.

MY LORD,

as the

Many of these poems have, for several impressions, wandered up and down, trusting (as well as they might) upon the author's reputation: neither do they now complain of any injury, but what may proceed either from the kindness of the printer, or the courtesy of the reader; the one, by adding something too much, lest any spark of this sacred fire might perish undiscerned ; the other, by putting such an estimation upon the wit and fancy they find here, that they are content to use it as their own ; as if a man should dig out the stones of a royal amphitheatre, to build a stage for a country show. Amongst all the monsters this unlucky age has teemed with, I find none so prodigious

poets of these later times, wherein men, as if they would level understandings too, as well as estates, acknowledging no inequality of parts and judgments, pretend as indifferently to the chair of wit as to the pulpit, and conceive themselves no less inspired with the spirit of poetry, than with that of religion: so it is not only the noise of drums and trumpets which have drowned the Muse's harmony, or the fear that the church's ruin will destroy the priests' likewise, that now frights them from this country, where they have been so ingeniously received; but these rude pretenders to excellencies they unjustly own, who, profanely rushing into Minerva's temple, with noisome airs blast the laurel, which thunder cannot hurt. In this sad condition, these learned sisters are fled over to beg your lordship’s protection, who have been so certain a patron both to arts and arms, and who, in this general confusion, have so entirely preserved your honour, that in your lordship we may still read a most perfect character of what England was in all her

pomp

and greatness. So that although these poems were formerly written upon several occasions to several persons, they now unite themselves, and are become one pyramid to set your lordship’s statue upon ; where you may stand, like armed Apollo, the defender of the Muses, encouraging the poets now alive to celebrate your great acts, by affording your countenance to his poems, that wanted only so noble a subject.

My Lord,

your most humble servant,

JOHN DONNE.

HEXASTICON BIBLIOPOLE.

I sex in his last preach'd and printed book,
His picture in a sheet ; in Paul's I look,
And see his statue in a sheet of stone;
And sure his body in the grave hath one :
Those sheets present him dead, these if you buy,
You have bim living to eternity.

JO. MAR.

HEXASTICON AD. BIBLIOPOLAM,

INCERTI.

1

In thy impression of Donne's poems rare,
For his eternity thou hast ta'en care:
T was well and pious; and for ever may
He live : yet I show thee a better way;
Print but his sermons, and if those we buy,
He, we, and thou, shall live t' eternity.

TO JOHN DONNE.

Donne, the delight of Phoebus, and each Muse,
Who, to thy one, all other brains refuse;
Whose ev'ry work of thy most early wit,
Came forth example, and remain so yet:
Longer a knowing, than most wits do live;
And which no' affection praise enough can give!
To it thy language, letters, arts, best life,
Which might with half mankind maintain a strife;
All which I mean to praise, and yet I would;
But leave, because I cannot as I should !

BEN JONSON.

POEMS

OF

JOHN DONNE, D.D.

me, is ;

And now good-morrow to our waking souls,
THE FLEA.

Which watch not one another out of fear;
For love all love of other sights controls,

And makes one little room an every-where.
ARR but this flea, and mark in this,

Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone,

Let maps to other worlds our world have shown, Me it suck'd first, and now sucks thee,

Let us possess one world; each hath one, and is one. And in this fea our two bloods mingled be; Confess it. This cannot be said

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears, A sin, or shame, or loss of maidenhead,

And true plain hearts do in the faces rest; Yet this enjoys, before it woo,

Where can we find two fitter hemispheres And pamper'd swells with one blood made of two, Without sharp north, without declining west? And this, alas! is more than we could do.

Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally;

If our two loves be one, both thou and I Oh stay, three lives in one flea spare,

Love just alike in all, none of these loves can die.
Where we almost, nay more than marry'd are.
This flea is you and I, and this
Our marriage bed and marriage temple is ;
Though parents grudge, and you, w are met,
And cloister'd in these living walls of jet.

SONG.
Though use make you apt to kill me,
Let not to that self-murder added be,

Go, and catch a falling star,
And sacrilege, three sins in killing three.

Get with child a mandrake root, Cruel and sudden, hąst thou since

Tell me where all times past are, Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence ?

Or who cleft the Devil's foot. Wherein could this flea guilty be,

Teach me to hear mermaids singing, Except in that blood, which it suck'd from thee?

Or to keep off envy's stinging, Yet thou triumph'st, and say'st that thou

And find, Find'st not thyself nor me the weaker now;

What wind 'T is true; then learn how false fears be:

Serves to advance an honest mind. Just so much honour, when thou yield'st to mee,

If thon be'st born to strange sights,
Will waste, as this flea's death took life from thee.

Things invisible go see,
Ride ten thousand days and nights,

Till age suow white hairs on thee.

Thou, when thou return'st, wilt tell me
THE GOOD-MORROW.

All strange wonders, that befell thee,

And swear,
I voren, by my troth, what thou and I

No where
Did, till we lovdwere we not wean'd till then, Lives a woman true and fair.
But suck'd on childish pleasures sillily?
Or slumbred we in the seven-sleepers den?

If thou find'st one, let me know, 'T was so; but as all pleasures fancies be,

Such a pilgrimage were sweet ;
If ever any beauty I did see,

Yet do not, I would not go,
Which I desir'd, and got, 't was hut a dream of thee. Though at next door we might meet.

Though she were true when you met her,
And last, till you write your letter,

THE SUN RISING.
Yet she
Will be

Busy old fool, unruly Sun,
False, ere I come, to two or three.

Why dost thou thus,
Through windows and through curtains, look on us?
Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run?

Sawcy pedantic wretch, go, chide

Late school-boys, or sour 'prentices,
WOMAN'S CONSTANCY.

Go tell court-buntsmen, that th: king will ride,
Call country ants to harvest offices;

Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime,
Now thou hast lov'd me one whole day,

Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time. 'To morrow when thou leav'st, what wilt thou say? Wilt thou then antedate some new-made vow?

Thy beams, so reverend and strong,
Or say, that now

Dost thou not think
We are not just those persons, which we were ? I could eelipse, and cloud them with a wink,
Or, that oaths, made in reverential fear

But that I would not lose her sight so long?
Of Love and his wrath, any may forswear?

If her eyes have not blinded thine, Or, as true deaths true marriages untie,

Look, and to morrow late tell me, So lovers' contracts, images of those,

Whether both th' Indias of spice and mine Bind but till sleep, death's image, them unloose? Be where thou left them, or lie here with me; Or, your own end to justify

Ask for those kings, whom thou saw'st yesterday,
For having purpos'd change and falsehood, you And thou shalt hear, All here in one bed lay.
Can have no way but falsehood to be true ?
Vain lunatic, against these scapes I could

She's all states, and all princes I,
Dispute, and conquer, if I would;

Nothing else is.
Which I abstain to doe,

Princes do but play us; compar'd to this,
Por by to morrow I may think so too.

All honour 's mimic; all wealth alchymy;

Thou Sun art half as happy' as we,

In that the world 's contracted thus.
Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that 's done in warming us.

Shine here to us, and thou art every where;
THE UNDERTAKING.

This bed thy centre is, these walls thy sphere. I HAVE done one braver thing,

Than all the worthies did;
And yet a braver thence doth spring,
Which is, to keep that hid.

THE INDIFFERENT.

“ I can love both fair and brown; It were but madness now t' impart

Her whom abundance melts, and her whom want The skill of specular stone,

betrays;

[plays; When he, which can have learn'd the art

Her who loves loneness best, and her who sports and To cut it, can find none.

Her whom the country form'd, and whom the town;

Her who believes, and her who tries;
So, if I now should utter this,

Her who still weeps with spungy eyes,
Others (because no more

And her who is dry cork, and never cries;
Such stuff, to work upon, there is)

I can love her, and her, and you, and you,
Would love but as before.

I can love any, so she be not true.
Be he, who loveliness within

Will no other vice content you?
Hath found, all outward loathes;

Will it not serve your turn to do, as did your mothers! For he, who colour loves and skin,

Or have you all old vices worn, and now would find Loves but their oldest clothes.

out others ?

Or doth a fear, that men are true, torment you?. If, as I bave, you also do

Oh, we are not, be not you so ; Virtue in woman see,

Let me; and do you twenty know. And dare love that, and say so too,

Rob me, but bind me not, and let me go ; And forget the be and she;

Must I, who came to travail thorough you,

Grow your fix'd subject, because you are true ?” And if this love, though placed so,

Venus heard me sing this song, From profane men you hide,

And by love's sweetest sweet, variety, she swore, Which will no faith on this bestow,

She heard not this till now; it should be so no more. Or, if they do, deride :

She went, examin'd, and return'd ere long,

And said, “ Alas! some two or three Then you have done a braver thing,

Poor heretics in love there be, Than all the worthies did,

Which think to stablish dangerous constancy, And a braver thence will spring;

But I have told them, since you will be true, Which is, to keep that hid.

You shall be true to them, who 're false to you."

We 'll build in sonnets pretty rooms.
LOVE'S USURY.

As well a well-wrought urn becomes
The greatest ashes, as half-acre tombs;

And by tbose hymns all shall approve
For every hour that thou wilt spare me now,

Us canoniz'd for love:
I will allow,
Usurious god of love, twenty to thee,

And thus invoke us, you whom reverend love
When with my brown my grey hairs equal be; Made one another's hermitage;
Till then, Love, let my body range, and let You to who love was peace, that now is rage,
Me travail, sojourn, snatch, plot, have, forget, Who did the whole world's soul contract, and drove
Resome my last years' relict: think that yet Into the glasses of your eyes,
We had never met.

So made such mirrors, and such spies,

That they did all to you epitomize;
Let me think any rival's letter mine,

Countries, towns, courts, beg from above
And at next nine

A pattern of our love.
Keep midnight's promise; mistake by the way
The maid, and tell the lady of that delay,
Only let me love none, no not the sport,
From country grass to comfitures of court,
Or city's quelque-choses, let not report

THE TRIPLE FOOL ·
My mind transport.

I AM two fools, I know,

For loving, and for saying so
This bargain's good; if, when I'am old, I be

In whining poetry ;
Inflam'd by thee,

But where's that wise man, that would not be I, If thine own honour, or my shame, or pain,

If she would not deny? Thou covet most, at that age thou shalt gain;

Then as th’ Earth's inward narrow crooked lanes Do thy will then, then subject and degree, And fruit of love, Love, I submit to thee;

Do purge sea water's fretful salt away,

I thought, if I could draw my pains
Spare me till then, I 'll bear it, though she be
One that loves me.

Through rhyme's vexation, I should them allay.

Grief brought to number cannot be so fierce,
For he tames it, that fetters it in verse.

But when I have done so,
Some man, his art or voice to show,

Doth set and sing my pain,
CANONIZATION.

And, by delighting many, frees again

Grief, which verse did restrain.
For God's sake hold your tongue, and let me love, To love and grief tribute of verse belongs,
Or chide my palsy, or my gout,

But not of such as pleases, when 't is read,
My five grey hairs, or ruin'd fortunes flout;

Both are increased by such songs: With wealth your state, your mind with arts improve, For both their triumphs so are published, Take you a course, get you a place,

And I, which was two fools, do so grow three: Observe his honour or his grace,

Who are a little wise, the best fools be.
Or the king's real or his stampted face
Contemplate; what you will, approve,

So you will let me love.
Alas, alas! who's injur'd by my love?

LOVER'S INFINITENESS.
What merchant's ships have my sighs drown’d? Ir yet I have not all thy love,
Who says my tears have overflow'd his ground?

Dear, I shall never have it all,
When did my colds a forward spring remove? I cannot breathe one other sigh, to move;
When did the heats, which my reins fill,

Nor can entreat one other tear to fall;
Add one more to the plaguy bill?

And all my treasure, which should purchase thee, Soldiers find wars, and lawyers find out still

Sighs, tears, and oaths, and letters I have spent; Litigious men, whom quarrels move,

Yet no more can be due to me, Though she and I do love.

Than at the bargain made was meant :

If then thy gift of love was partial, Call's what you will, we are made such by love;

That some for me, some should to others fall, Call her one, me another fly;

Dear, I shall never have it all,
Ware tapers too, and at our own cost die;
And we in us find th' eagle and the dove;

Or, if then thou giv'st me all,
The phenix riddle hath more wit

All was but all, which thou hadst then: By us, we two being one, are it:

But if in thy heart since there be, or shall So to one neutral thing both sexes fit.

New love created be by other men, We die and rise the same, and prove

Which have their stocks entire, and can in tears, Mysterious by this love.

In sighs, in oaths, in letters outbid me,

This new love may beget new fears, We can die by it, if not live by love.

For this love was not vow'd by thee. And if unfit for tomb or hearse

And yet it was thy gift being general; Our legend be, it will be fit for verse;

The ground, thy heart, is mine, whatever shall And if no piece of chronicle we prave,

Grow there, dear, I should have it all. VOL V.

K