Et caput abscisum calido
viventeque
trunco
Servat humi voltum vitalem oculosque patentis,
Donec reliquias animai reddidit omnes.
Servat humi voltum vitalem oculosque patentis,
Donec reliquias animai reddidit omnes.
John Donne
The comma has
been accidentally dropped. There is no comma in _1635-69_, which print
'types'.
PAGE =241=, ll. 343-4. _As a compassionate Turcoyse, &c. _ Compare:
And therefore Cynthia, as a turquoise bought,
Or stol'n, or found, is virtueless, and nought,
It must be freely given by a friend,
Whose love and bounty doth such virtue lend,
As makes it to compassionate, and tell
By looking pale, the wearer is not well.
Sir Francis Kynaston, _To Cynthia_.
Saintsbury, _Caroline Poets_, ii. 161.
PAGE =251=, ll. 9-18. The source of this simile is probably Lucretius,
_De Rerum Natura_, III. 642-56.
Falciferos memorant currus abscidere membra
Saepe ita de subito permixta caede calentis,
Ut tremere in terra videatur ab artubus id quod
Decidit abscisum, cum mens tamen atque hominis vis
Mobilitate mali non quit sentire dolorem;
Et semel in pugnae studio quod dedita mens est,
Corpore reliquo pugnam caedesque petessit,
Nec tenet amissam laevam cum tegmine saepe
Inter equos abstraxe rotas falcesque rapaces,
Nec cecidisse alius dextram, cum scandit et instat.
Inde alius conatur adempto surgere crure,
Cum digitos agitat propter moribundus humi pes.
Et caput abscisum calido viventeque trunco
Servat humi voltum vitalem oculosque patentis,
Donec reliquias animai reddidit omnes.
PAGE =259=, ll. 275-6. _so that there is
(For aught thou know'st) piercing of substances. _
'Piercing of substances,' the actual penetration of one substance by
another, was the Stoic as opposed to the Aristotelian doctrine of
mixture of substance ([Greek: krasis]), what is now called chemical
combination. The Peripatetics held that, while the qualities of the
two bodies combined to produce a new quality, the substances remained
in juxtaposition. Plotinus devotes the seventh book of the _Enneades_
to the subject; and one of the arguments of the Stoics which he cites
resembles Donne's problem: 'Sweat comes out of the human body without
dividing it and without the body being pierced with holes. ' The pores
were apparently unknown. See Bouillet's _Enneades de Plotin_, I. 243
f. and 488-9, for references.
PAGE =368=. HYMNE TO GOD MY GOD, IN MY SICKNESSE.
Professor Moore Smith has at the last moment reminded me of a fact,
the significance of which should have been discussed in the note on
the _Divine Poems_, that a copy of this poem found (Gosse, _Life &c. _
ii. 279) among the papers of Sir Julius Caesar bears the statement
that the verses were written in Donne's 'great sickness in December
1623'.
been accidentally dropped. There is no comma in _1635-69_, which print
'types'.
PAGE =241=, ll. 343-4. _As a compassionate Turcoyse, &c. _ Compare:
And therefore Cynthia, as a turquoise bought,
Or stol'n, or found, is virtueless, and nought,
It must be freely given by a friend,
Whose love and bounty doth such virtue lend,
As makes it to compassionate, and tell
By looking pale, the wearer is not well.
Sir Francis Kynaston, _To Cynthia_.
Saintsbury, _Caroline Poets_, ii. 161.
PAGE =251=, ll. 9-18. The source of this simile is probably Lucretius,
_De Rerum Natura_, III. 642-56.
Falciferos memorant currus abscidere membra
Saepe ita de subito permixta caede calentis,
Ut tremere in terra videatur ab artubus id quod
Decidit abscisum, cum mens tamen atque hominis vis
Mobilitate mali non quit sentire dolorem;
Et semel in pugnae studio quod dedita mens est,
Corpore reliquo pugnam caedesque petessit,
Nec tenet amissam laevam cum tegmine saepe
Inter equos abstraxe rotas falcesque rapaces,
Nec cecidisse alius dextram, cum scandit et instat.
Inde alius conatur adempto surgere crure,
Cum digitos agitat propter moribundus humi pes.
Et caput abscisum calido viventeque trunco
Servat humi voltum vitalem oculosque patentis,
Donec reliquias animai reddidit omnes.
PAGE =259=, ll. 275-6. _so that there is
(For aught thou know'st) piercing of substances. _
'Piercing of substances,' the actual penetration of one substance by
another, was the Stoic as opposed to the Aristotelian doctrine of
mixture of substance ([Greek: krasis]), what is now called chemical
combination. The Peripatetics held that, while the qualities of the
two bodies combined to produce a new quality, the substances remained
in juxtaposition. Plotinus devotes the seventh book of the _Enneades_
to the subject; and one of the arguments of the Stoics which he cites
resembles Donne's problem: 'Sweat comes out of the human body without
dividing it and without the body being pierced with holes. ' The pores
were apparently unknown. See Bouillet's _Enneades de Plotin_, I. 243
f. and 488-9, for references.
PAGE =368=. HYMNE TO GOD MY GOD, IN MY SICKNESSE.
Professor Moore Smith has at the last moment reminded me of a fact,
the significance of which should have been discussed in the note on
the _Divine Poems_, that a copy of this poem found (Gosse, _Life &c. _
ii. 279) among the papers of Sir Julius Caesar bears the statement
that the verses were written in Donne's 'great sickness in December
1623'.
