Free Donne by John Donne Page A

of times are all determined)
    But long shee’ath beene away, long, long, yet none
    Offers to tell us who it is that’s gone.
    But as in states doubtfull of future heyres,
    When sickenes without remedy, empayres
    The present Prince, they’re loth it should be said,
    The Prince doth languish, or the Prince is dead:
    So mankind feeling now a generall thaw,
    A strong example gone equall to law,
    The Cyment which did faithfully compact
    And glue all vertues, now resolv’d, and slack’d,
    Thought it some blasphemy To say sh’was dead;
    Or that our weakenes was discovered
    In that confession; therefore spoke no more
    Then tongues, the soule being gone, the losse deplore.
    But though it be too late to succour thee,
    Sicke world, yea dead, yea putrified, since shee
    Thy’ntrinsique Balme, and thy preservative,
    Can never be renew’d, thou never live,
    I (since no man can make thee live) will trie,
    What we may gaine by thy Anatomy.
    Her death hath taught us dearely, that thou art
    Corrupt and mortall in thy purest part.
    Let no man say, the world it selfe being dead,
    ’Tis labour lost to have discovered
    The worlds infirmities, since there is none
    Alive to study this dissectione;
    For there’s a kind of world remaining still,
    Though shee which did inanimate and fill
    The world, be gone, yet in this last long night,
    Her Ghost doth walke; that is, a glimmering light,
    A faint weake love of vertue and of good
    Reflects from her, on them which understood
    Her worth; And though she have shut in all day,
    The twi-light of her memory doth stay;
    Which, from the carcasse of the old world, free,
    Creates a new world; and new creatures be
    Produc’d: The matter and the stuffe of this,
    Her vertue, and the forme our practice is.
    And though to be thus Elemented, arme
    These Creatures, from hom-borne intrinsique harme,
    (For all assum’d unto this Dignitee,
    So many weedlesse Paradises bee,
    Which of themselves produce no venemous sinne,
    Except some forraine Serpent bring it in)
    Yet, because outward stormes the strongest breake,
    And strength it selfe by confidence growes weake,
    This new world may be safer, being told
    The dangers and diseases of the old:
    For with due temper men do then forgoe,
    Or covet things, when they their true worth know.
    There is no health; Physitians say that we
    At best, enjoy, but a neutralitee.
    And can there be worse sicknesse, then to know
    That we are never well, nor can be so?
    We are borne ruinous: poore mothers crie,
    That children come not right, nor orderly,
    Except they headlong come, and fall upon
    An ominous precipitation.
    How witty’s ruine? how importunate
    Upon mankinde? It labour’d to frustrate
    Even Gods purpose; and made woman, sent
    For mans reliefe, cause of his languishment.
    They were to good ends, and they are so still,
    But accessory, and principall in ill.
    For that first mariage was our funerall:
    One woman at one blow, then kill’d us all,
    And singly, one by one, they kill us now.
    We doe delightfully our selves allow
    To that consumption; and profusely blinde,
    We kill our selves, to propagate our kinde.
    And yet we doe not that; we are not men:
    There is not now that mankinde, which was then
    When as the Sunne, and man, did seeme to strive,
    (Joynt tenants of the world) who should survive.
    When Stag, and Raven, and the long-liv’d tree,
    Compar’d with man, dy’de in minoritee.
    When, if a slow-pac’d starre had stolne away
    From the observers marking, he might stay
    Two or three hundred yeares to see’t againe,
    And then make up his observation plaine;
    When, as the age was long, the sise was great:
    Mans growth confess’d, and recompenc’d the meat:
    So spacious and large, that every soule
    Did a faire Kingdome, and large Realme controule:
    And when the very stature thus erect,
    Did that soule a good way towards Heaven direct.
    Where is this mankind now? who lives to age,
    Fit to be made
Methusalem
his page?
    Alas, we scarse live long enough to