# Poems of John Donne/Volume 1

Layout 2
POEMS
OF
JOHN DONNE.
POEMS
OF
JOHN DONNE
EDITED BY
E. K. CHAMBERS
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
GEORGE SAINTSBURY
VOL. I.
LONDON: GEORGE ROUTLEDGE & SONS, LIMITED NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.
PREFACE.
John Donne’s Poems were originally undertaken for The Muses Library by Dr. Brinsley Nicholson. They were handed over to me shortly after his death in 1891. I have had the advantage of the material which Dr. Nicholson had brought together; but for the book as it stands, with the exception of the Introduction, which Mr. Saintsbury has kindly contributed, I am alone responsible.
The bulk of the text is based upon the principal seventeenth-century editions, those of 1633, 1635, 1650 and 1669. No one of these is of supreme authority, and therefore I have had no choice but to be eclectic. But at the same time I have endeavoured to give all variants, other than obvious misprints, in the footnotes. Here and there one or other of the innumerable MS. copies has been of service. I have modernized the spelling and corrected the exceptionally chaotic punctuation of the old ​editions. And so, though much remains obscure, I trust that I have provided a more intelligible version of the Poems than any that has yet appeared.
It should be understood that a reading attributed to any one of the printed editions in the footnotes is retained in the later editions, unless it is otherwise stated.
My thanks are due for various help to Dr. Grosart, to Mr. J. T. Brown of Edinburgh, and to Mr. A. H. Bullen. Dr. Nicholson’s notes contain abundant evidence of the similar debt which he owed to Mr. J. M. Thomson of Edinburgh.
E. K. C.
CONTENTS OF VOL. I.
page :
| | Preface | Preface | v |
| | Table of Contents | Table of Contents | vii |
| | Introduction | Introduction | xi |
| | Bibliographical Note | Bibliographical Note | xxxv |
| | The Printer to the Understanders | The Printer to the Understanders | xlv |
| | To the Right Honourable William Lord Craven | To the Right Honourable William Lord Craven | xlix |
| | Hexastichon Bibliopolae | Hexastichon Bibliopolae | li |
| | Hexastichon ad Bibliopolam | Hexastichon ad Bibliopolam | li |
| | To John Donne | To John Donne | lii |
| Songs and Sonnets — ||||
| | The Flea | The Flea | 1 |
| | The Good-Morrow | The Good-Morrow | 3 |
| | Song: Go and catch a falling star | Song: Go and catch a falling star | 4 |
| | Woman’s Constancy | Woman’s Constancy | 5 |
| | The Undertaking | The Undertaking | 6 |
| | The Sun Rising | The Sun Rising | 7 |
| | The Indifferent | The Indifferent | 9 |
| | Love’s Usury | Love’s Usury | 10 |
| | The Canonization | The Canonization | 12 |
| | The Triple Fool | The Triple Fool | 14 |
| | Lovers’ Infiniteness | Lovers’ Infiniteness | 15 |
| | Song: Sweetest love, I do not go | Song: Sweetest love, I do not go | 16 |
| | The Legacy | The Legacy | 18 |
| | A Fever | A Fever | 20 |
| | Air and Angels | Air and Angels | 21 ​ |
| | Break of Day | Break of Day | 22 |
| | | | 23 |
| | The Anniversary | The Anniversary | 24 |
| | A Valediction of my Name, in the Window | A Valediction of my Name, in the Window | 25 |
| | Twickenham Garden | Twickenham Garden | 29 |
| | Valediction to his Book | Valediction to his Book | 30 |
| | Community | Community | 33 |
| | Love’s Growth | Love’s Growth | 34 |
| | Love’s Exchange | Love’s Exchange | 35 |
| | Confined Love | Confined Love | 37 |
| | The Dream | The Dream | 38 |
| | A Valediction of Weeping | A Valediction of Weeping | 39 |
| | Love’s Alchemy | Love’s Alchemy | 41 |
| | The Curse | The Curse | 42 |
| | The Message | The Message | 43 |
| | A Nocturnal upon St. Lucy’s Day, being the Shortest Day | A Nocturnal upon St. Lucy’s Day, being the Shortest Day | 45 |
| | Witchcraft by a Picture | Witchcraft by a Picture | 47 |
| | The Bait | The Bait | 47 |
| | The Apparition | The Apparition | 49 |
| | The Broken Heart | The Broken Heart | 50 |
| | A Valediction Forbidding Mourning | A Valediction Forbidding Mourning | 51 |
| | The Ecstacy | The Ecstacy | 53 |
| | Love’s Deity | Love’s Deity | 56 |
| | Love’s Diet | Love’s Diet | 57 |
| | The Will | The Will | 59 |
| | The Funeral | The Funeral | 61 |
| | The Blossom | The Blossom | 63 |
| | The Primrose | The Primrose | 64 |
| | The Relic | The Relic | 66 |
| | The Damp | The Damp | 67 |
| | The Dissolution | The Dissolution | 69 |
| | A Jet Ring Sent | A Jet Ring Sent | 70 |
| | Negative Love | Negative Love | 71 |
| | The Prohibition | The Prohibition | 72 |
| | The Expiration | The Expiration | 73 |
| | The Computation | The Computation | 74 ​ |
| | The Paradox | The Paradox | 74 |
| | Song: Soul’s joy, now I am gone | Song: Soul’s joy, now I am gone | 75 |
| | Farewell to Love | Farewell to Love | 76 |
| | A Lecture upon the Shadow | A Lecture upon the Shadow | 78 |
| | A Dialogue between Sir Henry Wotton and Mr. Donne | A Dialogue between Sir Henry Wotton and Mr. Donne | 79 |
| | The Token | The Token | 80 |
| | Self-love | Self-love | 81 |
| Epithalamions, or Marriage Songs — ||||
| | On the Lady Elizabeth and Count Palatine | On the Lady Elizabeth and Count Palatine | 83 |
| | Eclogue: at the Marriage of the Earl of Somerset | Eclogue: at the Marriage of the Earl of Somerset | 88 |
| | Epithalamion Made at Lincoln’s Inn | Epithalamion Made at Lincoln’s Inn | 99 |
| Elegies — ||||
| | i : | Jealousy | 102 |
| | ii : | The Anagram | 103 |
| | iii : | Change | 106 |
| | iv : | The Perfume | 107 |
| | v : | His Picture | 110 |
| | vi : | | 111 |
| | vii : | | 113 |
| | viii : | The Comparison | 114 |
| | ix : | The Autumnal | 117 |
| | x : | The Dream | 119 |
| | xi : | The Bracelet | 120 |
| | xii : | | 125 |
| | xiii : | His Parting from Her | 128 |
| | xiv : | Julia | 132 |
| | xv : | A Tale of a Citizen and his Wife | 133 |
| | xvi : | The Expostulation | 136 |
| | xvii : | Elegy on his Mistress | 139 |
| | xviii : | | 141 |
| | xix : | | 144 |
| | xx : | To his Mistress Going to Bed | 148 ​ |
| Divine Poems — ||||
| | | To the E[arl] of D[oncaster], with Six Holy Sonnets | 151 |
| | 1. | La Corona | 152 |
| | 2. | Annunciation | 152 |
| | 3. | Nativity | 153 |
| | 4. | Temple | 153 |
| | 5. | Crucifying | 154 |
| | 6. | Resurrection | 155 |
| | 7. | Ascension | 155 |
| | | To the Lady Magdalen Herbert | 156 |
| | | Holy Sonnets: i.–xvi. | 157 |
| | | The Cross | 167 |
| | | Resurrection | 169 |
| | | The Annunciation and Passion | 170 |
| | | Good Friday, 1613, Riding Westward | 172 |
| | | A Litany | 174 |
| | | Upon the Translation of the Psalms by Sir Philip Sidney and the Countess of Pembroke | 188 |
| | | Ode : Vengeance will Sit above our Faults | 190 |
| | | To Mr. Tilman after he had Taken Orders | 191 |
| | | A Hymn to Christ | 193 |
| | | The Lamentations of Jeremy | 194 |
| | | Hymn to God, my God, in my Sickness | 211 |
| | | A Hymn to God the Father | 213 |
| | | To George Herbert | 214 |
| | | A Sheaf of Snakes Used heretofore to be my Seal | 215 |
| | | Translated out of Gazaeus | 216 |
| Notes to Vol. I. | Notes to Vol. I. | Notes to Vol. I. | 217 |