"The Canonization"
By John Donne

Transcription, correction, editorial commentary, and markup by Students and Staff of the University of Virginia, Rachel Retica

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Sources

London : M. F. for John Marriot, 1633We have taken our text from the Text Creation Partnership's digitized version of the 1633 edition of Donne's poems: https://github.com/textcreationpartnership/A69225/blob/master/A69225.xml. Donne's poems circulated in manuscript during his life time, and were not issued in a print version until this edition, which came out after Donne's death in 1632. The long "s" of the original has been modernized, but we have otherwise kept the original spelling. The title page has been sourced from Princeton University Special Collections.

Editorial Statements

Research informing these annotations draws on publicly-accessible resources, with links provided where possible. Annotations have also included common knowledge, defined as information that can be found in multiple reliable sources. If you notice an error in these annotations, please contact lic.open.anthology@gmail.com.

Original spelling and capitalization is retained, though the long s has been silently modernized and ligatured forms are not encoded.

Hyphenation has not been retained, except where necessary for the sense of the word.

Page breaks have been retained. Catchwords, signatures, and running headers have not.

Materials have been transcribed from and checked against first editions, where possible. See the Sources section for more information.

Citation

Donne, John. "The Canonization". Poems, by J. D., With Elegies on the Authors Death, M. F. for John Marriot, 1633 , 200 . Literature in Context: An Open Anthology. http://anthologydev.lib.virginia.edu/work/Donne/donne-canonization. Accessed: 2024-11-21T10:27:54.763Z

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TEST Audio

[TP] POEMS,
By J. D[onne].
WITH
ELEGIES
ON THE AUTHOR'S
Death.

LONDON.
Printed by M. F. for [J]OHN MARRIOT,
and are to be sold at his shop in St Dunstans
Church-yard in Fleet-street. 1633. The Canonization. 1FOr Godsake hold your tongue, and let me love, 2Or chide my palsie, or my gout, 3My five gray haires, or ruin'd fortune flout, 4With wealth your state, your minde with Arts improve 5Take you a course, get you a place, 6Observe his honour, or his grace, 7Or the Kings reall, or his stamped face 8Contemplate, what you will, approve, 9So you will let me love. 10Alas, alas, who's injur'd by my love? 11What merchants ships have my sighs drown'd? 12Who saies my teares have overflow'd his ground? 13When did my colds a forward spring remove? 14When did the heats which my veines fill 15Adde one more, to the plaguie Bill? 16Soldiers finde warres, and Lawyers finde out still 17Litigious men, which quarrels move, 18Though she and I do love. 19Call us what you will, wee are made such by love; 20Call her one, mee another flye, 21We'are Tapers too, and at our owne cost die, 22And wee in us finde the'Eagle and the dove, 23The Phoenix ridle hath more wit 24By us, we two being one, are it. 25So, to one neutrall thing both sexes fit. 26Wee dye and rise the same, and prove 27Mysterious by this love. 28Wee can dye by it, if not live by love, 29And if unfit for tombes and hearse 30Our legends bee, it will be fit for verse; 31And if no peece of Chronicle wee prove, 32We'll build in sonnets pretty roomes; 33As well a well wrought urne becomes 34The greatest ashes, as halfe-acre tombes, 35And by these hymnes, all shall approve 36Us Canoniz'd for Love. 37And thus invoke us; You whom reverend love 38Made one anothers hermitage; 39You, to whom love was peace, that now is rage, 40Who did the whole worlds soule contract, & drove 41Into the glasses of your eyes 42So made such mirrors, and such spies, 43That they did all to you epitomize, 44Countries, Townes, Courts: Beg from above 45A patterne of our love.