85

90

Till, like the sea, they compass all the land,
From Scots to Wight from Mount to Dover strand:
And when rank widows purchase luscious nights,
Or when a Duke to Jansen punts at White's,
Or city-heir in mortgage melts away;
Satan himself feels far less joy than they.
Piecemeal they win this acre first, then that,
Glean on, and gather up the whole estate.
Then strongly fencing ill-got wealth by law,
Indenture, covenants, articles, they draw,
Large as the fields themselves, and larger far 95
Than civil codes, with all their glosses, are;
So vast, our new Divines, we must confess,
Are Fathers of the Church for writing less.
But let them write for you, each rogue impairs
The deeds, and dextrously omits, ses heires:
No commentator can more slily pass

O'er a learn'd, unintelligible place;

Or, in quotation, shrewd divines leave out

100

Those words, that would against them clear the

doubt.

So Luther thought the Pater-noster long,

When doom'd to say his beads and even-song;

NOTES.

105

dition was the power and glory clause, was to satirize his ambition; and both together, to insinuate, that from a monk, he was become totally secularized. About this time of his life Dr. Donne had a strong propensity to the Roman Catholic religion, which appears from several strokes in these Satires. We find amongst his works, a short satirical thing called a Catalogue of rare Books, one article of which is intitled, M. Lutherus de abbreviatione Orationis Dominica, alluding to Luther's omission of the concluding Doxology in his two Catechisms; which shews the Poet was fond of his joke.

Each day his beads; but having left those laws, Adds to Christ's prayer, the Power and Glory clause ;)

But when he sells or changes land, he impaires The writings, and (unwatch'd) leaves out, ses heires, As slily as any commenter goes by

Hard words, or sense; or, in divinity,

As controverters in vouch'd texts leave out

Shrewd words, which might against them clear the doubt.

Where are these spread woods which cloath'd heretofore

Those bought lands? not built, not burnt within door.

Where the old landlords' troops, and almes? In halls Carthusian fasts, and fulsome Bacchanals

Equally I hate. Means blest. In rich men's homes I bid kill some beasts, but no hecatombs;

None starve, none surfeit so. But (oh) we allow Good works as good, but out of fashion now,

NOTES.

In this catalogue (to intimate his sentiments of reformation) he puts Erasmus and Reuchlin in the rank of Lully and Agrippa. I will only observe, that it was written in imitation of Rabelais's famous Catalogue of the Library of St. Victor, one of the finest passages in that extravagant Satire, which was the Manual of the Wits of this time. It was natural therefore, to think, that the Catalogue of the Library of St. Victor would become, as it did, the subject of many imitations. The best of which are this of Dr. Donne's, and one of Sir Thomas Brown's. Dr. Donne afterwards took orders in the Church of England. We have a large volume of his sermons in the false taste of that time. But the book which made his fortune was his Pseudo-martyr, to prove that Papists ought to take

the

But having cast his cowl, and left those laws, Adds to Christ's prayer, the Power and Glory clause.

The lands are bought; but where are to be found Those ancient woods that shaded all the ground? We see no new-built palaces aspire,

No kitchens emulate the vestal fire.

Where are those troops of poor, that throng'd of

yore

The good old landlord's hospitable door?

Well, I could wish that still in lordly domes 115 Some beasts were kill'd, though not whole heca

tombs ;

That both extremes were banish'd from their walls,
Carthusian fasts, and fulsome Bacchanals;

And all mankind might that just mean observe,
In which none e'er could surfeit, none could starve.
These as good works, 'tis true, we all allow,
But oh! these works are not in fashion now :

NOTES.

the oath of allegiance. In this book, though Hooker had then written his Ecclesiastical Policy, he has approved himself entirely ignorant both of the Origin and End of Civil Government. In the 168th page, and elsewhere, he holds, that when men congregate to form the body of civil society, then it is, that the soul of society, SOVEREIGN POWER, is sent into it immediately from God, just as he sends the soul into the human embryo, when the two sexes propagate their kind. In the 91st page, and elsewhere, he maintains that the office of the civil sovereign extends to the care of souls. For this absurd and blasphemous trash, James I. made him Dean of St. Paul's; all the wit and sublimity of his genius having never enabled him to get bread throughout the better part of his life. Warburton.

Like old rich wardrobes. But my words none

draws

Within the vast reach of the huge statutes' jaws.

NOTES.

Ver. 121. These as good works, &c.] Dr. Donne says: "But (oh) we allow

Good works as good, but out of fashion now."

The popish doctrine of good works was one of those abuses in religion which the Church of England condemns in its articles. To this the Poet's words satirically allude. And having throughout this satire given several malignant strokes at the Reformation, which it was penal, and then very dangerous, to abuse, he had reason to bespeak the reader's candor, in the concluding lines : "But my words none draws

Within the vast reach of the huge statutes' jaws."

Warburton.

Like rich old wardrobes, things extremely rare,
Extremely fine, but what no man will wear.
Thus much I've said, I trust, without offence;
Let no court sycophant pervert my sense,
Nor sly informer watch these words to draw
Within the reach of treason, or the law.

NOTES.

126

Ver. 125. Thus much I've said,] These three additional lines are redundant. And two strong epithets in the last line of Donne, vast and huge, were too emphatical to be omitted.

Warton.