Letters to Severall Persons of Honour Part 4

_SIR_,

Though my friends.h.i.+p be good for nothing else, it may give you the profit of a tentation, or of an affliction: It may excuse your patience; and though it cannot allure, it shall importune you. Though I know you have many worthy friends of all rankes, yet I adde something, since I which am of none, would fain be your friend too. There is some of the honour and some of the degrees of a Creation, to make a friends.h.i.+p of nothing. Yet, not to annihilate my self utterly (for though it seem humblenesse, yet it is a work of as much almightinesse, to bring a thing to nothing, as from nothing) though I be not of the best stuffe for friends.h.i.+p, which men of warm and durable fortunes only are, I cannot say, that I am not of the best fas.h.i.+on, if truth and honesty be that; which I must ever exercise, towards you, because I learned it of you: for the conversation with worthy men, and of good example, though it sow not vertue in us, yet produceth and ripeneth it. Your mans haste, and mine to _Micham_ cuts off this Letter here, yet, as in littell paterns torn from a whole piece, this may tell you what all I am. Though by taking me before my day (which I accounted Tuesday) I make short payment of this duty of Letters, yet I have a little comfort in this, that you see me hereby, willing to pay those debts which I can, before my time.

_Your affectionate friend_ J. Donne.

_First Sat.u.r.day in_ March. 1607.

_You forget to send me the Apology; and many times, I think it an injury to remember one of a promise, lest it confesse a distrust. But of the book, by occasion of reading the Deans answer to it, I have sometimes some want._

[xxiii.]

_To the Countesse of_ Bedford.

_Happiest and worthiest Lady_,

I do not remember that ever I have seen a pet.i.tion in verse, I would not therefore be singular, nor adde these to your other papers. I have yet adventured so near as to make a pet.i.tion for verse, it is for those your Ladis.h.i.+p did me the honour to see in _Twicknam_ garden, except you repent your making; and having mended your judgement by thinking worse, that is, better, because juster, of their subject. They must needs be an excellent exercise of your wit, which speaks so well of so ill: I humbly beg them of your Ladis.h.i.+p, with two such promises, as to any other of your compositions were threatenings: that I will not shew them, and that I will not beleeve them; and nothing should be so used that comes from your brain or heart. If I should confesse a fault in the boldnesse of asking them, or make a faulte by doing it in a longer Letter, your Ladis.h.i.+p might use your style and old fas.h.i.+on of the Court towards me, and pay me with a Pardon. Here therefore I humbly kisse your Ladis.h.i.+ps fair learned hands, and wish you good wishes and speedy grants.

_Your Ladis.h.i.+ps servant_ J. Donne.

[xxiv.]

_To the Honourable Knight Sir_ H. Goodere.

Because things be conserved by the same means, which established them, I nurse that friends.h.i.+p by Letters, which you begot so: though you have since strengthened it by more solid aliment and real offices. In these Letters from the Country there is this merit, that I do otherwise unwillingly turn mine eye or thoughts from my books, companions in whom there is no falshood nor forwardnesse: which words, I am glad to observe that the holy Authours often joyne as expressers and relatives to one another, because else out of a naturall descent to that unworthy fault of frowardnesse, furthered with that incommodity of a little thinne house; I should have mistaken it to be a small thing, which now I see equalled with the worst. If you have laid my papers and books by, I pray let this messenger have them, I have determined upon them. If you have not, be content to do it, in the next three or four days. So, Sir, I kisse your hands; and deliver to you an intire and clear heart; which shall ever when I am with you be in my face and tongue, and when I am from you, in my Letters, for I will never draw Curtain between you and it.

_Yours very affectionately_ J. Donne.

_From your house at_ Micham _friday morning_.

_When you are sometimes at M._ Sackvills, _I pray aske if he have this book_, Baldvinus de officio pii hominis in controversiis; _it was written at the conference at_ Poissy, _where_ Beza _was, and he answered it; I long for it_.

[xxv.]

_To Sir_ H. G.

SIR,

I hope you are now well come to _London_, and well, and well comforted in your Fathers health and love, and well contented that we ask you how you doe, and tell you how we are, which yet I cannot of my self; If I knew that I were ill, I were well; for we consist of three parts, a Soul, and Body, and Minde: which I call those thoughts and affections and pa.s.sions, which neither soul nor body hath alone, but have been begotten by their communication, as Musique results out of our breath and a Cornet. And of all these the diseases are cures, if they be known. Of our souls sicknesses, which are sinnes, the knowledge is, to acknowledge, and that is her Physique, in which we are not dieted by drams and scruples, for we cannot take too much. Of our bodies infirmities, though our knowledge be partly _ab extrinseco_, from the opinion of the Physitian, and that the subject and matter be flexible, and various; yet their rules are certain, and if the matter be rightly applyed to the rule, our knowledge thereof is also certain. But of the diseases of the minde, there is no _Criterium_, no Canon, no rule; for, our own taste and apprehension and interpretation should be the Judge, and that is the disease it self. Therefore sometimes when I finde my self transported with jollity, and love of company, I hang Leads at my heels; and reduce to my thoughts my fortunes, my years, the duties of a man, of a friend, of a husband, of a Father, and all the inc.u.mbencies of a family: when sadnesse dejects me, either I countermine it with another sadnesse, or I kindle squibs about me again, and flie into sportfulnesse and company: and I finde ever after all, that I am like an exorcist, which had long laboured about one, which at last appears to have the Mother, that I still mistake my disease. And I still vex my self with this, because if I know it not, no body can know it. And I comfort my self, because I see dispa.s.sioned men are subject to the like ignorances.

For divers mindes out of the same thing often draw contrary conclusions, as _Augustine_ thought devout _Anthony_ to be therefore full of the holy Ghost, because not being able to read, he could say the whole Bible, and interpret it; and _Thyreus_ the Jesuit for the same reason doth thinke all the Anabaptists to be possessed. And as often out of contrary things men draw one conclusion: as to the _Roman_ Church, magnificence and splendor hath ever been an argument of G.o.ds favour, and poverty & affliction, to the _Greek_. Out of this variety of mindes it proceeds, that though all our souls would goe to one end, Heaven, and all our bodies must go to one end, the earth: yet our third part the minde, which is our naturall guide here, chooses to every man a severall way: scarce any man likes what another doth, nor advisedly, that which himself. But Sir, I am beyond my purpose; I meant to write a Letter, and I am fallen into a discourse, and I do not only take you from some businesse, but I make you a new businesse by drawing you into these meditations. In which yet let my opennesse be an argument of such love as I would fain expresse in some worthier fas.h.i.+on.

[xxvi.]

_To Sir_ G. F.

_SIR_,

I writ to you once this week before; yet I write again, both because it seems a kinde of resisting of grace, to omit any commodity of sending into _England_, and because any Pacquet from me into _England_ should go, not only without just fraight, but without ballast, if it had not a letter to you. In Letters that I received from Sir H. _Wotton_ yesterday from _Amyens_, I had one of the 8 of _March_ from you, and with it one from M{rs} _Danterey_, of the 28 of _January_: which is a strange disproportion. But, Sir, if our Letters come not in due order, and so make not a certain and concurrent chain, yet if they come as Atomes, and so meet at last, by any crooked, and casuall application, they make up, and they nourish bodies of friends.h.i.+p; and in that fas.h.i.+on, I mean one way or other, first or last, I hope all the Letters which have been addressed to us by one another, are safely arrived, except perchance that pacquet by the Cook be not, of which before this time you are cleare; for I received (as I told you) a Letter by M. _Nat. Rich_, and if you sent none by him, then it was that Letter, which the Cook tells you he delivered to M.

_Rich_; which, with all my criticismes, I cannot reconcile; because in your last Letter, I find mention of things formerly written, which I have not found. However, I am yet in the same perplexity, which I mentioned before; which is, that I have received no syllable, neither from her self, nor by any other, how my wife hath pa.s.sed her danger, nor do I know whether I be increased by a childe, or diminished by the losse of a wife.

I hear from _England_ of many censures of my book, of M{ris} _Drury_; if any of those censures do but pardon me my descent in Printing any thing in verse, (which if they do, they are more charitable then my self; for I do not pardon my self, but confesse that I did it against my conscience, that is, against my own opinion, that I should not have done so) I doubt not but they will soon give over that other part of that indictment, which is that I have said so much; for no body can imagine, that I who never saw her, could have any other purpose in that, then that when I had received so very good testimony of her worthinesse, and was gone down to print verses, it became me to say, not what I was sure was just truth, but the best that I could conceive; for that had been a new weaknesse in me, to have praised any body in printed verses, that had not been capable of the best praise that I could give. Presently after Easter we shall (I think) go to _Frankford_ to be there at the election, where we shall meet Sir _H.

Wotton_ and Sir _Ro. Rich_, and after that we are determined to pa.s.se some time, in the Palatinate. I go thither with a great deale of devotion for me thinkes it is a new kinde of piety, that as Pilgrims went heretofore to places which had been holy and happy, so I go to a place now, which shall be so, and more, by the presence of the worthiest Princess of the world, if that marriage proceed. I have no greater errand to the place then that at my return into _England_, I may be fitter to stand in her presence, and that after I have seen a rich and abundant Countrey, in his best seasons, I may see that Sun which shall always keep it in that height. Howsoever we stray, if you have leasure to write at any time, adventure by no other way, then M. _Bruer_ [_Brewer_], at the Queens Armes, a Mercer, in _Cheapside_. I shall omit no opportunity, of which I doubt not to finde more then one before we go from _Paris_. Therefore give me leave to end this, in which if you did not finde the remembrance of my humblest services to my Lady _Bedford_, your love and faith ought to try all the experiments of pouders, and dryings, and waterings to discover some lines which appeared not; because it is impossible that a Letter should come from me, with such an ungrateful silence.

_Your very true poor friend and servant and lover_ J. Donne.

_This day begins a history, of which I doubt not but I shall write more to you before I leave this town. Monsieur_ de Rohan, _a person for birth, next heire to the Kingdome of_ Navar, _after the Kings children, (if the King of_ Spaine _were weary of it) and for allyance, sonne in law to D._ Sully, _and for breeding in the wars and estate, the most renarkable man of the Religion, being Governour of S._ Jean d'Angeli, _one of the most important towns which they of the Religion hold for their security, finding that some distasts between the Lieutenant and the Maior of the town, and him, were dangerously fomented by great persons, stole from Court, rode post to the town and removed these two persons. He sent his secretary, and another dependent of his to give the Queen satisfaction, who is so far from receiving it, that his messengers are committed to the_ Bastile _likely to be presently tortured; all his friends here commanded to their houses, and the Queens companies of light horse sent already thitherward, and foot companies preparing, which troops being sent against a place, so much concerning those of the Religion to keep, and where they abound in number and strength, cannot chuse but produce effects worthy your hearing in the next Letter._

[xxvii.]

_To Sir_ H. G.

_SIR_,

Because I am in a place and season where I see every thing bud forth, I must do so too, and vent some of my meditations to you; the rather because all other buds being yet without taste or virtue, my Letters may be like them. The pleasantnesse of the season displeases me. Every thing refreshes, and I wither, and I grow older and not better, my strength diminishes, and my load growes, and being to pa.s.se more and more stormes, I finde that I have not only cast out all my ballast which nature and time gives, Reason and discretion, and so am as empty and light as Vanity can make me; but I have over fraught my self with Vice, and so am riddingly subject to two contrary wrackes, Sinking and Oversetting, and under the iniquity of such a disease as inforces the patient when he is almost starved, not only to fast, but to purge. For I have much to take in, and much to cast out; sometimes I thinke it easier to discharge my self of vice then of vanity, as one may sooner carry the fire out of a room then the smoake: and then I see it was a new vanity to think so. And when I think sometimes that vanity, because it is thinne and airie, may be expelled with vertue or businesse, or substantiall vice; I finde that I give entrance thereby to new vices. Certainly as the earth and water, one sad, the other fluid, make but one bodie: so to aire and Vanity, there is but one _Centium morbi_. And that which later Physicians say of our bodies, is fitter for our mindes: for that which they call Destruction, which is a corruption and want of those fundamentall parts whereof we consist, is Vice: and that _Collectio stercorum_, which is but the excrement of that corruption, is our Vanity and indiscretion: both these have but one root in me, and must be pulled out at once, or never. But I am so farre from digging to it, that I know not where it is, for it is not in mine eyes only, but in every sense, nor in my concupiscence only, but in every power and affection. Sir, I was willing to let you see how impotent a man you love, not to dishearten you from doing so still (for my vices are not infectious nor wandring, they came not yesterday, nor mean to go away to day: they Inne not, but dwell in me, and see themselves so welcome, and find in me so good bad company of one another, that they will not change, especially to one not apprehensive, nor easily accessible) but I do it, that your counsell might cure me, and if you deny that, your example shal, for I will as much strive to be like you as I will wish you to continue good.

[xxviii.]

_To the Honourable Kt S{r}_ H. Goodere _one of the Gent. of his Majesties privy Chamber_.

_SIR_,

You may remember that long since you delivered M{r} _Fowler_ possession of me, but the wide distance in which I have lived from Court, makes me reasonably fear, that now he knows not his right and power in me, though he must of necessity have all, to whom you and I joyn in a gift of me, as we did to him, so that perchance he hath a servant of me, which might be pa.s.sed in a book of concealment. If your leisure suffer it, I pray finde whether I be in him still, and conserve me in his love; and so perfect your own work, or doe it over again, and restore me to the place, which by your favour I had in him. For M{r} _Powell_ who serves her Ma{ty} as Clerk of her counsell, hath told me that M{r} _Fowler_ hath some purpose to retire himself; and therefore I would fain for all my love, have so much of his, as to finde him willing when I shall seek him at Court, to let me understand his purpose therein; for if my means may make me acceptable to the Queen and him, I should be very sorry he should make so farre steps therein with any other, that I should fail in it, onely for not having spoke to him soon enough. It were an injury to the forwardnesse of your love to adde more; here therefore I kisse your hands, and commend to you the truth of my love.

_Your very affectionate servant and lover_ Jo. Donne.

_From my lodging in the_ Strand, _whither I shall return on_ Munday, 13 June 1607.