John Donne: Trending quotes (page 6)

“How deepe do we dig, and for how coarse gold?”

John Donne

Meditation 13
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions (1624)

“Nature's lay idiot, I taught thee to love.”

John Donne

No. 7, Natures Lay Idiot, line 1
Elegies

Love , Nature

“A man that is not afraid of a Lion is afraid of a Cat; not afraid of starving, and yet is afraid of some joint of meat at the table, presented to feed him; not afraid of the sound of drums, and trumpets, and shot, and those, which they seek to drown, the last cries of men, and is afraid of some particular harmonious instrument; so much afraid, as that with any of these the enemy might drive this man, otherwise valiant enough, out of the field.”

John Donne

VI. Metuit. The physician is afraid
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions (1624)

Men , Cats

“Go and catch a falling star,
Get with child a mandrake root,
Tell me where all past years are,
Or who cleft the Devil's foot,
Teach me to hear mermaids singing,
Or to keep off envy's stinging,
And find
What wind
Serves to advance an honest mind.”

John Donne

Song (Go and Catch a Falling Star), stanza 1

Star , Singing , Past , Envy

“Absence, hear thou my protestation
Against thy strength,
Distance, and length;
Do what thou canst for alteration”

John Donne

Poem Present in Absence http://www.bartleby.com/101/197.html
Attribution likely but not proven http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0026-7937(191107)6%3A3%3C383%3ATAO%22HT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-B

“I do nothing upon myself, and yet am mine own executioner.”

John Donne

Meditation 12
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions (1624)

“Send home my long strayed eyes to me,
Which (Oh) too long have dwelt on thee.”

John Donne

The Message, stanza 1

Home

“She is all states, and all princes, I,
Nothing else is.”

John Donne

The Sun Rising, stanza 3

“Batter my heart, three-personed God; for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend.”

John Donne book Holy Sonnets

No. 14, line 1
Holy Sonnets (1633)

God , Heart , Personality

“Take heed of loving me.”

John Donne

The Prohibition, stanza 1

Love

“No man is an Iland, intire of it selfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as well as if a Mannor of thy friends or of thine owne were; any mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.”

John Donne book Devotions upon Emergent Occasions

Modern version: No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
Meditation 17. This was the source for the title of Ernest Hemingway's novel.
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions (1624)

Self-confidence , Bee , Sea , Death

“At the round earth's imagin'd corners, blow
Your trumpets, angels, and arise, arise
From death, you numberless infinities
Of souls, and to your scattered bodies go.”

John Donne book Holy Sonnets

No. 7, line 1
Holy Sonnets (1633)

Soul , Angels , Death

“We then, who are this new soul, know
Of what we are composed and made,
For the' atomies of which we grow
Are souls, whom no change can invade.
But oh alas, so long, so far,
Our bodies why do we forbear?
They're ours, though they're not we; we are
The intelligences, they the spheres.”

John Donne

The Ecstasy, line 45

Soul , Intelligence , Change

“Ah cannot we
As well as cocks and lions jocund be,
After such pleasures?”

John Donne

Farewell to Love, stanza 3