No More Learning

354 (published by Edward Flugel in _Anglia_ xxv. 220). The poetry is
very poor and I need not quote. The interesting feature is the list
of petitions 'Vnto the ffader', 'ye sonne', 'ye holy gost', 'the
trinite', 'our lady', 'ye angelles'. 'ye propre angell', 'John
baptist', 'ye appostiles', 'ye martires', 'the confessours', 'ye
virgins', 'unto all sayntes'. Donne, it will be observed, includes
the patriarchs and the prophets, but omits any reference to a guardian
angel and to the saints. Other references in his poems and sermons
show that he had the thought of a guardian angel often in his mind:
'As that Angel, which God hath given to protect thee, is not weary of
his office, for all thy perversenesses, so, howsoever God deale with
thee, be not thou weary of bearing thy part, in his Quire here in the
Militant Church. ' _Sermons_ 80. 44. 440.

PAGE =339=, l. 34. _a such selfe different instinct
Of these;_

'As the three persons of the Trinity are distinguished as Power (The
Father), Knowledge (The Son), Love (The Holy Ghost), and are yet
identical, not three but one, may in me power, love, and knowledge be
thus at once distinct and identical. ' The comma after 'these' in _D_,
_H49_, _Lec_ was accidentally dropped. In _1635-69_ a comma was then
interpolated after 'instinct' and 'Of these' was connected with what
follows: 'Of these let all mee elemented bee,' 'these' being made to
point forward to the next line.
Chambers and the Grolier Club editor
both read thus. But _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ show what was the original
punctuation. Without 'Of these' it is difficult to give a precise
meaning to 'instinct'. It would be easy to change 'a such' to 'such
a' with most of the MSS. , but Donne seems to have affected this order.
Compare _Elegie X: The Dreame_, p. 95, l. 17:

After a such fruition I shall wake.

PAGE =341=, l. 86. _In Abel dye. _ Abel was to the early Church a type
of Christ, as being the first martyr.

PAGE =343=, ll. 122-4. One might omit the brackets in these lines and
substitute a semicolon after 'hearken too' and a comma after 'and
do', and make the sense clearer. The MSS.