The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Poems of John Donne, Volume II (of 2), by John Donne, Edited by Sir Herbert John Clifford Grierson

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Title: The Poems of John Donne, Volume II (of 2)

Edited from the Old Editions and Numerous Manuscripts

Author: John Donne

Editor: Sir Herbert John Clifford Grierson

Release Date: April 24, 2015 [eBook #48772]

Language: English

Character set encoding: UTF-8

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Volume I

THE POEMS OF JOHN DONNE

EDITED FROM THE OLD EDITIONS AND NUMEROUS MANUSCRIPTS,

WITH INTRODUCTIONS & COMMENTARY

BY

HERBERT J. C. GRIERSON M.A.

CHALMERS PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE

IN THE UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN

VOL. II

INTRODUCTION AND COMMENTARY

OXFORD

AT THE CLARENDON PRESS

1912

HENRY FROWDE, M.A.
PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
LONDON, EDINBURGH, NEW YORK
TORONTO AND MELBOURNE

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

I

THE POETRY OF DONNE

Donne's position among English poets, regarded from the historical and what we like to call scientific point of view, has been defined with learning and discrimination by Mr. Courthope in his History of English Poetry. As a phenomenon of curious interest for the student of the history of thought and literary fashions, there it is. Mr. Courthope is far too well-informed and judicious a critic to explain Donne's subtle thought and erudite conceits by a reference to 'Marini and his followers'. Gongora and Du Bartas are alike passed over in silence. What we are shown is the connexion of 'metaphysical wit' with the complex and far-reaching changes in men's conception of Nature which make the seventeenth century perhaps the greatest epoch in human thought since human thinking began.

The only thing that such a criticism leaves unexplained and undefined is the interest which Donne's poetry still has for us, not as an historical phenomenon, but as poetry. Literary history has for the historian a quite distinct interest from that which it possesses for the student and lover of literature. For the historian it is a matter of positive interest to connect Donne's wit with the general disintegration of mediaeval thought, to recognize the influence on the Elizabethan drama of the doctrines of Machiavelli, or to find in Pope's achievement in poetry a counterpart to Walpole's in politics. For the lover of literature none of these facts has any positive interest whatsoever. Donne's wit attracts or repels him equally whatever be its source; Tamburlaine and Iago lose none of their interest for us though we know nothing of Machiavelli; Pope's poetry is not a whit more or less poetical by being a strange by-product of the Whig spirit in English life. For the lover of literature, literary history has an indirect value. He studies history that he