Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

John Donne (1572–1631). The Poems of John Donne. 1896.

Elegies

XI. The Bracelet

NOT that in colour it was like thy hair,

For armlets of that thou mayst let me wear;

Nor that thy hand it oft embraced and kiss’d,

For so it had that good, which oft I miss’d;

Nor for that silly old morality,

That, as these links were knit, our love should be,

Mourn I that I thy sevenfold chain have lost;

Nor for the luck sake; but the bitter cost.

O, shall twelve righteous angels, which as yet

No leaven of vile solder did admit;

Nor yet by any way have stray’d or gone

From the first state of their creation;

Angels, which heaven commanded to provide

All things to me, and be my faithful guide;

To gain new friends, to appease great enemies;

To comfort my soul, when I lie or rise;

Shall these twelve innocents, by thy severe

Sentence, dread judge, my sin’s great burden bear?

Shall they be damn’d, and in the furnace thrown,

And punish’d for offences not their own?

They save not me, they do not ease my pains,

When in that hell they’re burnt and tied in chains.

Were they but crowns of France, I carèd not,

For most of these their country’s natural rot,

I think, possesseth; they come here to us

So pale, so lame, so lean, so ruinous.

And howsoe’er French kings most Christian be,

Their crowns are circumcised most Jewishly.

Or were they Spanish stamps, still travelling,

That are become as Catholic as their king;

Those unlick’d bear-whelps, unfiled pistolets,

That—more than cannon shot—avails or lets;

Which, negligently left unrounded, look

Like many-angled figures in the book

Of some great conjurer that would enforce

Nature, as these do justice, from her course;

Which, as the soul quickens head, feet and heart,

As streams, like veins, run through th’ earth’s every part,

Visit all countries, and have slily made

Gorgeous France, ruin’d, ragged and decay’d,

Scotland, which knew no state, proud in one day,

And mangled seventeen-headed Belgia.

Or were it such gold as that wherewithal

Almighty chemics, from each mineral

Having by subtle fire a soul out-pull’d,

Are dirtily and desperately gull’d;

I would not spit to quench the fire they’re in,

For they are guilty of much heinous sin.

But shall my harmless angels perish? Shall

I lose my guard, my ease, my food, my all?

Much hope which they should nourish will be dead;

Much of my able youth, and lustihead

Will vanish; if thou love, let them alone,

For thou wilt love me less when they are gone;

And be content that some loud squeaking crier,

Well-pleas’d with one lean thread-bare groat for hire,

May like a devil roar through every street,

And gall the finder’s conscience, if he meet.

Or let me creep to some dread conjurer,

That with fantastic scenes fills full much paper;

Which hath divided heaven in tenements,

And with whores, thieves, and murderers stuff’d his rents

So full, that though he pass them all in sin,

He leaves himself no room to enter in.

But if, when all his art and time is spent,

He say ’twill ne’er be found; yet be content;

Receive from him that doom ungrudgingly,

Because he is the mouth of destiny.

Thou say’st, alas! the gold doth still remain,

Though it be changed, and put into a chain.

So in the first fallen angels resteth still

Wisdom and knowledge, but ’tis turn’d to ill;

As these should do good works, and should provide

Necessities; but now must nurse thy pride.

And they are still bad angels; mine are none;

For form gives being, and their form is gone.

Pity these angels yet; their dignities

Pass Virtues, Powers, and Principalities.

But thou art resolute; thy will be done;

Yet with such anguish, as her only son

The mother in the hungry grave doth lay,

Unto the fire these martyrs I betray.

Good souls—for you give life to everything—

Good angels—for good messages you bring—

Destined you might have been to such an one,

As would have loved and worshipp’d you alone;

One that would suffer hunger, nakedness,

Yea death, ere he would make your number less;

But, I am guilty of your sad decay;

May your few fellows longer with me stay.

But O! thou wretched finder whom I hate

So, that I almost pity thy estate,

Gold being the heaviest metal amongst all,

May my most heavy curse upon thee fall.

Here fetter’d, manacled, and hang’d in chains,

First mayst thou be; then chain’d to hellish pains;

Or be with foreign gold bribed to betray

Thy country, and fail both of it and thy pay.

May the next thing thou stoop’st to reach, contain

Poison, whose nimble fume rot thy moist brain;

Or libels, or some interdicted thing,

Which negligently kept thy ruin bring.

Lust-bred diseases rot thee; and dwell with thee

Itching desire, and no ability.

May all the evils that gold ever wrought;

All mischief that all devils ever thought;

Want after plenty, poor and gouty age,

The plagues of travellers, love, marriage

Afflict thee, and at thy life’s last moment,

May thy swollen sins themselves to thee present.

But, I forgive; repent thee, honest man!

Gold is restorative; restore it then:

But if from it thou be’st loth to depart,

Because ’tis cordial, would ’twere at thy heart.