{ "id": "john-donne/the-progress-of-the-soul", "title": "The Progress of the Soul", "ordinal": null, "subtitle": "First Song", "poet": "John Donne", "poet_slug": "john-donne", "language": "en", "book": "Poems, by J. D. with Elegies on the Authors Death", "book_slug": "poems-1633", "book_kind": "volume", "sequence": null, "container": "Infinitati Sacrum Metempsychosis", "epigraph": null, "first_published": { "year": 1633, "venue": "Poems, by J. D. with Elegies on the Authors Death (1633)", "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.", "uncertain": false, "sources": [ "https://archive.org/details/donnepoems" ] }, "source": { "kind": "standard-ebooks", "repo": "standardebooks/john-donne_poetry", "file": "infinitati-sacrum.xhtml", "upstream": [ "https://archive.org/details/poemsofjohndonne01donn_1", "https://archive.org/details/poemswithelegie00chamgoog", "https://archive.org/details/poemswithelegie01chamgoog" ], "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)" }, "verification": { "level": "structural-only", "last_checked": "2026-08-19" }, "stats": { "n_lines": 520, "n_stanzas": 52, "n_parts": 52, "longest_line_chars": 66, "max_indent": 1 }, "site_ready": true, "parts": [ { "ordinal": "I", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 0, 1 ] }, { "ordinal": "II", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 1, 2 ] }, { "ordinal": "III", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 2, 3 ] }, { "ordinal": "IV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 3, 4 ] }, { "ordinal": "V", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 4, 5 ] }, { "ordinal": "VI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 5, 6 ] }, { "ordinal": "VII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 6, 7 ] }, { "ordinal": "VIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 7, 8 ] }, { "ordinal": "IX", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 8, 9 ] }, { "ordinal": "X", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 9, 10 ] }, { "ordinal": "XI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 10, 11 ] }, { "ordinal": "XII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 11, 12 ] }, { "ordinal": "XIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 12, 13 ] }, { "ordinal": "XIV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 13, 14 ] }, { "ordinal": "XV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 14, 15 ] }, { "ordinal": "XVI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 15, 16 ] }, { "ordinal": "XVII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 16, 17 ] }, { "ordinal": "XVIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 17, 18 ] }, { "ordinal": "XIX", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 18, 19 ] }, { "ordinal": "XX", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 19, 20 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 20, 21 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 21, 22 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 22, 23 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXIV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 23, 24 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 24, 25 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXVI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 25, 26 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXVII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 26, 27 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXVIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 27, 28 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXIX", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 28, 29 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXX", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 29, 30 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 30, 31 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 31, 32 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 32, 33 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXIV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 33, 34 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 34, 35 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXVI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 35, 36 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXVII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 36, 37 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXVIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 37, 38 ] }, { "ordinal": "XXXIX", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 38, 39 ] }, { "ordinal": "XL", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 39, 40 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 40, 41 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 41, 42 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 42, 43 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLIV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 43, 44 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLV", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 44, 45 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLVI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 45, 46 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLVII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 46, 47 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLVIII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 47, 48 ] }, { "ordinal": "XLIX", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 48, 49 ] }, { "ordinal": "L", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 49, 50 ] }, { "ordinal": "LI", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 50, 51 ] }, { "ordinal": "LII", "title": null, "stanza_range": [ 51, 52 ] } ], "stanzas": [ [ { "text": "I sing the progress of a deathless soul,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whom fate, which God made, but doth not control,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Placed in most shapes; all times, before the law", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Yoked us, and when, and since, in this I sing.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And the great world to his agèd evening", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "From infant morn, through manly noon, I draw.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "What the gold Chaldee, or silver Persian saw,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Greek brass, or Roman iron, is in this one;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A work to outwear Seth’s pillars, brick and stone,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And⁠—Holy Writ’s excepted⁠—made to yield to none.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Thee, eye of heaven, this great soul envies not.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "By thy male force is all we have begot;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In the first east thou now begin’st to shine,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Suck’st early balm, and island spices there,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And wilt anon in thy loose-rein’d career", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At Tagus, Po, Seine, Thames, and Danow dine,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And see at night thy western land of mine;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Yet hast thou not more nations seen than she,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That before thee one day began to be,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And thy frail light being quench’d, shall long, long outlive thee.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Nor holy Janus, in whose sovereign boat", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The church, and all the monarchies did float!", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That swimming college, and free hospital", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of all mankind, that cage and vivary", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of fowls, and beasts, in whose womb,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Destiny Us and our latest nephews did install", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "—From thence are all derived, that fill this All⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Didst thou in that great stewardship embark", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So divers shapes into that floating park,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As have been moved and inform’d by this heavenly spark.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Thou Great Destiny, the commissary of God,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That hast mark’d out a path and period", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For everything, who, where we offspring took,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Our ways and ends seest at one instant. Thou", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Knot of all causes, thou whose changeless brow", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Ne’er smiles nor frowns, O vouchsafe thou to look", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And show my story, in thy eternal book.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That⁠—if my prayer be fit⁠—I may understand", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So much myself, as to know with what hand,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "How scant or liberal this my life’s race is spann’d.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "To my six lustres almost now outwore,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Except thy book owe me so many more,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Except my legend be free from the lets", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of steep ambition, sleepy poverty,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Spirit-quenching sickness, dull captivity,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Distracting business, and from beauty’s nets,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And all that calls from this, and to others whets,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "O let me not launch out, but let me save", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Th’ expense of brain and spirit, that my grave", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His right and due, a whole unwasted man may have.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "But if my days be long, and good enough,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In vain this sea shall enlarge or enrough", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Itself; for I will through the wave and foam.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And shall in sad lone ways, a lively sprite,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Make my dark heavy poem light, and light.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For though through many straits and lands I roam,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "I launch at Paradise, and I sail towards home;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The course I there began shall here be stay’d,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Sails hoiséd there, struck here, and anchors laid", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In Thames, which were at Tigris and Euphrates weigh’d.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "For the great soul which here amongst us now", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Doth dwell, and moves that hand, and tongue, and brow,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which, as the moon the sea, moves us; to hear", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whose story with long patience you will long", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "—For ’tis the crown and last strain of my song⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This soul, to whom Luther and Muhammad were", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Prisons of flesh; this soul, which oft did tear", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And mend the wracks of th’ empire, and late Rome,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And lived when every great change did come,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had first in Paradise a low, but fatal room.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Yet nor low room, nor than the greatest, less,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "If as devout and sharp men fitly guess⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That Cross, our joy, and grief⁠—where nails did tie", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That All, which always was all, everywhere;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which could not sin, and yet all sins did bear;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which could not die, yet could not choose but die⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Stood in the selfsame room in Calvary,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where first grew the forbidden learned tree,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For on that tree hung in security", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This soul made by the Maker’s will from pulling free.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Prince of the orchard, fair as dawning morn,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Fenced with the law, and ripe as soon as born,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That apple grew, which this soul did enlive", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Till the then climbing serpent, that now creeps", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For that offence, for which all mankind weeps,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Took it, and to her whom the first man did wive", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "—Whom and her race only forbiddings drive⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He gave it, she to her husband; both did eat;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So perished the eaters, and the meat;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And we⁠—for treason taints the blood⁠—thence die and sweat.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Man all at once was there by woman slain,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And one by one we’re here slain o’er again", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "By them. The mother poison’d the wellhead,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The daughters here corrupt us, rivulets;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "No smallness ’scapes, no greatness breaks their nets;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "She thrust us out, and by them we are led", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Astray, from turning to whence we are fled.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Were prisoners judges, ’twould seem rigorous;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "She sinned, we bear; part of our pain is, thus", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To love them whose fault to this painful love yoked us.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "So fast in us doth this corruption grow,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That now we dare ask why we should be so.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Would God⁠—disputes the curious rebel⁠—make", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A law, and would not have it kept? Or can", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His creatures’ will cross His? Of every man", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For one, will God (and be just) vengeance take?", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who sinn’d? ’twas not forbidden to the snake", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor her, who was not then made; nor is ’t writ", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That Adam cropp’d, or knew the apple; yet", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The worm and she, and he, and we endure for it.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "But snatch me, heavenly spirit, from this vain", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Reckoning their vanities; less is their gain", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Than hazard still, to meditate on ill,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Though with good mind; their reason’s like those toys", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of glassy bubbles, which the gamesome boys", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Stretch to so nice a thinness through a quill", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That they themselves break, and do themselves spill.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Arguing is heretics’ game, and exercise", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As wrestlers perfects them. Not liberties", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of speech, but silence; hands, not tongues, end heresies.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Just in that instant when the serpent’s gripe", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Broke the slight veins, and tender conduit pipe,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Through which this soul from the tree’s root did draw", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Life and growth to this apple, fled away", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This loose soul, old, one and another day.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As lightning, which one scarce dares say he saw,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "’Tis so soon gone⁠—and better proof the law", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of sense than faith requires⁠—swiftly she flew", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To a dark and foggy plot; her, her fates threw", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "There through th’ earth-pores, and in a plant housed her anew.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "The plant thus abled to itself did force", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A place, where no place was; by nature’s course,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As air from water, water fleets away", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "From thicker bodies, by this root throng’d so", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His spongy confines gave him place to grow;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Just as in our streets, when the people stay", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To see the Prince, and so fill up the way", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That weasels scarce could pass, when she comes near", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "They throng and cleave up, and a passage clear,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As if for that time their round bodies flatten’d were.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "His right arm he thrust out towards the east,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Westward his left; th’ ends did themselves digest", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Into ten lesser strings; these fingers were;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And as a slumberer stretching on his bed,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This way he this, and that way scattered", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His other leg, which feet with toes upbear.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Grew on his middle part, the first day, hair,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To show that in love’s business he should still", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A dealer be, and be used well, or ill.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His apples kindle; he leaves force of conception kill.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "A mouth, but dumb, he hath; blind eyes, deat ears;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And to his shoulders dangle subtle hairs;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A young Colossus, there he stands upright;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And as that ground by him were conquered,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A leafy garland wears he on his head", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Enchased with little fruits, so red and bright,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That for them you would call your love’s lips white,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So, of a lone unhaunted place possess’d,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Did this soul’s second inn, built by the guest,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This living buried man, this quiet mandrake, rest.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "No lustful woman came this plant to grieve,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But ’twas because there was none yet but Eve;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And she⁠—with other purpose⁠—kill’d it quite.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Her sin had now brought in infirmities,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And so her cradled child the moist-red eyes", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had never shut, nor slept since it saw light.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Poppy she knew, she knew the mandrake’s might;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And tore up both, and so cool’d her child’s blood.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Unvirtuous weeds might long unvex’d have stood;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But he’s short-lived that with his death can do most good.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "To an unfetter’d soul’s quick nimble haste", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Are falling stars and hearts’ thoughts but slow-paced.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Thinner than burnt air flies this soul, and she", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whom four new coming and four parting suns", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had found, and left the mandrake’s tenant, runs", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Thoughtless of change, when her firm destiny", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Confined and enjail’d her, that seemed so free,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Into a small blue shell, the which a poor", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Warm bird o’erspread, and sat still evermore,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Till her enclosed child kick’d, and pick’d itself a door.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Out crept a sparrow, this soul’s moving inn,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "On whose raw arms stiff feathers now begin,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As children’s teeth through gums, to break with pain;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His flesh is jelly yet, and his bones threads;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All a new downy mantle overspreads;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A mouth he opes, which would as much contain", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As his late house, and the first hour speaks plain,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And chirps aloud for meat. Meat fit for men", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His father steals for him, and so feeds then", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "One that, within a month, will beat him from his hen.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "In this world’s youth wise Nature did make haste,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Things ripen’d sooner, and did longer last.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Already this hot cock in bush and tree", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In field and tent o’erflutters his next hen;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He asks her not, who did so taste, nor when,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor if his sister or his niece she be;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor doth she pule for his inconstancy", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "If in her sight he change, nor doth refuse", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The next that calls; both liberty do use.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where store is of both kinds, both kinds may freely choose.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Men, till they took laws which made freedom less,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Their daughters and their sisters did ingress", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Till now, unlawful, therefore ill ’twas not.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So jolly, that it can move this soul, is", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The body, so free of his kindnesses,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That self-preserving it hath now forgot,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And slackeneth so the soul’s and body’s knot,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which temperance straightens; freely on his she friends,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He blood, and spirit, pith, and marrow spends;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Ill steward of himself, himself in three years ends.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Else might he long have lived; man did not know", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of gummy blood, which doth in holly grow,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "How to make birdlime, nor how to deceive", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With feign’d calls, his nets, or enwrapping snare,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The free inhabitants of the pliant air.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Man to beget, and woman to conceive,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Ask’d not of roots, nor of cock-sparrows, leave.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Yet chooseth he, though none of these he fears,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Pleasantly three, than straiten’d twenty years,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To live, and to increase his race himself outwears.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "This coal with overblowing quench’d and dead,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The soul from her too active organs fled", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To a brook; a female fish’s sandy roe", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With the male’s jelly newly leaven’d was,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For they had intertouch’d as they did pass;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And one of those small bodies, fitted so,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This soul inform’d, and abled it to row", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Itself with finny oars, which she did fit.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Her scales seem’d yet of parchment, and as yet", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Perchance a fish, but by no name you could call it.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "When goodly, like a ship in her full trim,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A swan, so white that you may unto him", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Compare all whiteness, but himself to none,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Glided along, and as he glided watch’d,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And with his arched neck this poor fish catch’d.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "It moved with state, as if to look upon", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Low things it scorn’d, and yet before that one", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Could think he sought it, he had swallow’d clear", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This, and much such, and unblamed devour’d there", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All, but who too swift, too great, or well armed were.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Now swam a prison in a prison put,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And now this soul in double walls was shut,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Till melted with the swan’s digestive fire,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "She left her house, the fish, and vapour’d forth.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Fate not affording bodies of more worth", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For her as yet, bids her again retire", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To another fish, to any new desire", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Made a new prey; for he that can to none", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Resistance make, nor complaint, sure is gone.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Weakness invites, but silence feasts oppression.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Pace with the native stream this fish doth keep,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And journeys with her towards the glassy deep,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But oft retarded, once with a hidden net", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Though with great windows⁠—for when need first taught", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "These tricks to catch food, then they were not wrought", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As now, with curious greediness to let", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "None ’scape, but few and fit for use to get⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As in this trap a ravenous pike was ta’en,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who, though himself distress’d, would fain have slain", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This wretch; so hardly are ill habits left again.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Here by her smallness she two deaths o’erpass’d;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Once innocence ’scaped, and left the oppressor fast.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The net through-swum, she keeps the liquid path,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And whether she leap up sometimes to breathe", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And suck in air, or find it underneath,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or working parts like mills or limbecs hath", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To make the water thin, and air like faith,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Cares not, but safe the place she’s come unto", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where fresh with salt waves meet, and what to do", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "She knows not, but between both makes a board or two.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "So far from hiding her guests, water is,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That she shows them in bigger quantities", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Than they are. Thus her, doubtful of her way,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For game and not for hunger, a sea-pie", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Spied through this traitorous spectacle, from high,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The silly fish where it disputing lay,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And to end her doubts and her, bears her away.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Exalted she is, but to th’ exalter’s good;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "As are by great ones, men which lowly stood,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "It’s raised, to be the raiser’s instrument and food.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Is any kind subject to rape like fish?", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Ill unto man they neither do nor wish;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Fishers they kill not, nor with noise awake;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "They do not hunt, nor strive to make a prey", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of beasts, nor their young sons to bear away;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Fowls they pursue not, nor do undertake", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To spoil the nests industrious birds do make;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Yet them all these unkind kinds feed upon;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To kill them is an occupation,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And laws make fasts and Lents for their destruction.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "A sudden stiff land-wind in that self hour", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To seaward forced this bird, that did devour", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The fish; he cares not, for with ease he flies,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Fat gluttony’s best orator; at last,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So long he hath flown, and hath flown so fast,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That, leagues o’erpast at sea, now tired he lies,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And with his prey, that till then languish’d, dies.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The souls, no longer foes, two ways did err,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The fish I follow, and keep no calendar", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of th’ other; he lives yet in some great officer.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Into an embryon fish our soul is thrown,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And in due time thrown out again, and grown", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To such vastness, as if unmanacled", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "From Greece Morea were, and that, by some", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Earthquake unrooted, loose Morea swum;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or seas from Afric’s body had severed", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And torn the hopeful promontory’s head.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This fish would seem these, and, when all hopes fail,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A great ship overset, or, without sail", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Hulling might⁠—when this was a whelp⁠—be like this whale.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "At every stroke his brazen fins do take,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "More circles in the broken sea they make", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Than cannons’ voices, when the air they tear.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His ribs are pillars, and his high arch’d roof", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of bark, that blunts best steel, is thunder-proof.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Swim in him swallow’d dolphins without fear,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And feel no sides, as if his vast womb were", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Some inland sea; and ever as he went", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He spouted rivers up, as if he meant", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To join our seas with seas above the firmament.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "He hunts not fish, but, as an officer", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Stays in his court, at his own net, and there", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "All suitors of all sorts themselves enthrall,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So on his back lies this whale wantoning,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And in his gulf-like throat sucks everything", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That passeth near; fish chaseth fish, and all,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Flyer and follower, in this whirlpool fall.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Oh, might not states of more equality", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Consist? and is it of necessity", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That thousand guiltless smalls, to make one great, must die?", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Now drinks he up seas, and he eats up flocks,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He jostles islands, and he shakes firm rocks.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Now in a roomful house this soul doth float,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And like a prince she sends her faculties", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To all her limbs, distant as provinces.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The sun hath twenty times both crab and goat", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Parched, since first launch’d forth this living boat.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "’Tis greatest now, and to destruction", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nearest; there’s no pause at perfection;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Greatness a period hath, but hath no station.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Two little fishes, whom he never harm’d,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor fed on their kind, two not throughly arm’d", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With hope that they could kill him, nor could do", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Good to themselves by his death⁠—they did not eat", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His flesh, nor suck those oils, which thence out-streat⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Conspired against him; and it might undo", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The plot of all, that the plotters were two,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But that they fishes were, and could not speak.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "How shall a tyrant wise strong projects break,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "If wretches can on them the common anger wreak?", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "The flail-finn’d thresher, and steel-beak’d swordfish", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Only attempt to do what all do wish.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The thresher backs him, and to beat begins;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The sluggard whale yields to oppression,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And to hide himself from shame and danger, down", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Begins to sink; the swordfish upward spins,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And gores him with his beak; his staff-like fins", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So well the one, his sword the other plies,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That now a scoff, and prey, this tyrant dies,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And⁠—his own dole⁠—feeds⁠—with himself all companies.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Who will revenge his death? or who will call", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Those to account, that thought and wrought his fall?", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The heirs of slain kings, we see, are often so", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Transported with the joy of what they get,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That they revenge and obsequies forget;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor will against such men the people go,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Because he’s now dead to whom they should show", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Love in that act; some kings by vice being grown", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So needy of subjects’ love, that of their own", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "They think they lose, if love be to the dead prince shown.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "This soul, now free from prison and passion,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Hath yet a little indignation", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That so small hammers should so soon down beat", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "So great a castle. And having for her house", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Got the strait cloister of a wretched mouse", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "—As basest men, that have not what to eat,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor enjoy aught, do far more hate the great", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Than they who good reposed estates possess⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This soul, late taught that great things might by less", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Be slain, to gallant mischief doth herself address.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Nature’s great masterpiece, an elephant,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The only harmless great thing, the giant", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of beasts, who thought none had, to make him wise,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But to be just and thankful, loth to offend", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "—Yet nature hath given him no knees to bend", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Himself he up-props, on himself relies,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And foe to none, suspects no enemies⁠—", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Still sleeping stood; vex’d not his fantasy", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Black dreams; like an unbent bow carelessly", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His sinewy proboscis did remissly lie.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "In which, as in a gallery, this mouse", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Walk’d, and survey’d the rooms of this vast house,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And to the brain, the soul’s bedchamber, went,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And gnaw’d the life-cords there. Like a whole town", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Clean undermined, the slain beast tumbled down.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With him the murderer dies, whom envy sent", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To kill, not ’scape; for only he that meant", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To die, did ever kill a man of better room;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And thus he made his foe his prey and tomb.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who cares not to turn back, may any whither come.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Next, housed this soul a wolf’s yet unborn whelp,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Till the best midwife, nature, gave it help", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To issue. It could kill, as soon as go.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Abel, as white and mild as his sheep were", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "—Who, in that trade of church and kingdoms there", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Was the first type⁠—was still infested so", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With this wolf, that it bred his loss and woe;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And yet his bitch, his sentinel, attends", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The flock so near, so well warns and defends,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That the wolf⁠—hopeless else⁠—to corrupt her intends.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "He took a course, which since, successfully,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Great men have often taken, to espy", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The counsels, or to break the plots of foes.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To Abel’s tent he stealeth in the dark,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "On whose skirts the bitch slept; ere she could bark,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Attach’d her with straight grips; yet he call’d those", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Embracements of love; to love’s work he goes,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Where deeds move more than words; nor doth she show", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Nor much resist, nor needs he straiten so", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His prey, for, were she loose, she would nor bark nor go.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "He hath engaged her; his, she wholly bides;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Who not her own, none others’ secrets hides.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "If to the flock he come, and Abel there,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "She feigns hoarse barkings, but she biteth not;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Her faith is quite, but not her love forgot.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "At last a trap, of which some everywhere", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Abel had placed, ends all his loss and fear,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "By the wolf’s death; and now just time it was", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That a quick soul should give life to that mass", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of blood in Abel’s bitch, and thither this did pass.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Some have their wives, their sisters some begot,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "But in the lives of emperors you shall not", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Read of a lust, the which may equal this.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This wolf begot himself, and finished", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "What he began alive, when he was dead;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Son to himself, and father too, he is", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A riddling lust, for which schoolmen would miss", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A proper name. The whelp of both these lay", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "In Abel’s tent, and with soft Moaba,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His sister, being young, it used to sport and play.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "He soon for her too harsh and churlish grew,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And Abel⁠—the dam dead⁠—would use this new", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "For the field; being of two kinds thus made,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He, as his dam, from sheep drove wolves away,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And, as his sire, he made them his own prey.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Five years he lived, and cozen’d with his trade;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Then hopeless that his faults were hid, betray’d", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Himself by flight, and by all followed,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "From dogs, a wolf; from wolves, a dog he fled.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And, like a spy to both sides false, he perished.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "It quicken’d next a toyful ape, and so", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Gamesome it was, that it might freely go", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "From tent to tent, and with the children play.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His organs now so like theirs he doth find,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That why he cannot laugh and speak his mind,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He wonders. Much with all, most he doth stay", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With Adam’s fifth daughter, Siphatecia;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Doth gaze on her, and, where she passeth, pass,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Gathers her fruits, and tumbles on the grass;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And wisest of that kind, the first true lover was.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "He was the first that more desired to have", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "One than another; first that e’er did crave", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Love by mute signs, and had no power to speak;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "First that could make love faces, or could do", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The vaulter’s somersaults, or used to woo", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With hoiting gambols, his own bones to break,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To make his mistress merry, or to wreak", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Her anger on himself. Sins against kind", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "They easily do, that can let feed their mind", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "With outward beauty; beauty they in boys and beasts do find.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "By this misled, too low things men have proved,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And too high; beasts and angels have been loved.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This ape, though else through-vain, in this was wise,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He reached at things too high, but open way", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "There was, and he knew not she would say nay.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "His toys prevail not, likelier means he tries.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "He gazeth on her face with tear-shot eyes,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And uplifts subtly with his russet paw", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Her kidskin apron without fear or awe", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of nature; nature hath no gaol, though she hath law.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "First she was silly and knew not what he meant.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "That virtue, by his touches chafed and spent,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Succeeds an itchy warmth, that melts her quite;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "She knew not first, nor cares not what he doth,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And willing half, and more, more than half wroth,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "She neither pulls nor pushes, but outright", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Now cries and now repents; when Thelemite,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Her brother, entered, and a great stone threw", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "After the ape, who, thus prevented, flew.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "This house, thus batter’d down, the soul possess’d a new.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "And whether by this change she lose or win,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "She comes out next where th’ ape would have gone in.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Adam and Eve had mingled bloods, and now,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Like chemic’s equal fires, her temperate womb", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Had stew’d and form’d it; and part did become", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "A spongy liver, that did richly allow,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Like a free conduit on a high hill’s brow,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Life-keeping moisture unto every part;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Part hardened itself to a thicker heart,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Whose busy furnaces life’s spirits do impart.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Another part became the well of sense,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The tender well-arm’d feeling brain, from whence", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Those sinewy strings, which do our bodies tie,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Are ravell’d out, and fast there by one end,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Did this soul limbs, these limbs a soul attend.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And now they join’d, keeping some quality", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of every past shape; she knew treachery,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Rapine, deceit, and lust, and ills enow", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "To be a woman. Themech she is now,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Sister and wife to Caïn, Cain that first did plough.", "indent": 1 } ], [ { "text": "Whoe’er thou beest that read’st this sullen writ", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Which just so much courts thee, as thou dost it,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Let me arrest thy thoughts; wonder with me,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Why ploughing, building, ruling, and the rest,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Or most of those arts, whence our lives are blest,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "By cursed Caïn’s race invented be,", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "And blest Seth vex’d us with astronomy.", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "There’s nothing simply good, nor ill alone;", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "Of every quality Comparison", "indent": 0 }, { "text": "The only measure is, and judge, Opinion.", "indent": 1 } ] ], "notes": [ { "id": "fifty-two-parts-already", "kind": "defect", "raised": "2026-08-19", "what": "known-broken.md’s 2026-08-15 numbering examples named this poem. The 2026-08-19 sections run did not: n_parts is already 52, one roman numeral per stanza, matching Standard Ebooks and Chambers. It is a different poem from Of the Progress of the Soul (the Second Anniversary).", "consequence": "Left as one poem. Numbering already recorded. The flag list is not the split list.", "to_settle": "Nothing on the verse. The Infinitati Sacrum prose Epistle is in the source and not in the record; the schema stores verse.", "checked_against": [ "https://archive.org/details/poemswithelegie01chamgoog", "https://github.com/standardebooks/john-donne_poetry" ] } ] }