{
 "id": "john-donne/the-will",
 "title": "The Will",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "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": 12,
 "container": "Songs and Sonnets",
 "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": "songs-and-sonnets.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": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 54,
  "n_stanzas": 6,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 62,
  "max_indent": 3
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Before I sigh my last gasp, let me breathe,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Great Love, some legacies; I here bequeath",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Mine eyes to Argus, if mine eyes can see;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "If they be blind, then, Love, I give them thee;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My tongue to Fame; to ambassadors mine ears;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To women or the sea, my tears:",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou, Love, hast taught me heretofore",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "By making me serve her who had twenty more,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "That I should give to none, but such as had too much before.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "My constancy I to the planets give;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My truth to them who at the court do live;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Mine ingenuity and openness,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To Jesuits; to buffoons my pensiveness;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My silence to any, who abroad hath been;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My money to a Capuchin:",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou, Love, taught’st me, by appointing me",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "To love there, where no love received can be,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Only to give to such as have an incapacity.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "My faith I give to Roman Catholics;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "All my good works unto the Schismatics",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Amsterdam; my best civility",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And courtship to an University;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My modesty I give to soldiers bare;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My patience let gamesters share:",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou, Love, taught’st me, by making me",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Love her that holds my love disparity,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Only to give to those that count my gifts indignity.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I give my reputation to those",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Which were my friends; mine industry to foes;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To schoolmen I bequeath my doubtfulness;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My sickness to physicians, or excess;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To nature all that I in rhyme have writ;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And to my company my wit:",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou, Love, by making me adore",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Her, who begot this love in me before,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Taught’st me to make, as though I gave, when I do but restore.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "To him for whom the passing-bell next tolls,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I give my physic books; my written rolls",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Of moral counsels I to Bedlam give;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My brazen medals unto them which live",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "In want of bread; to them which pass among",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "All foreigners, mine English tongue:",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou, Love, by making me love one",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Who thinks her friendship a fit portion",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "For younger lovers, dost my gifts thus disproportion.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Therefore I’ll give no more, but I’ll undo",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The world by dying, because love dies too.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Then all your beauties will be no more worth",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Than gold in mines, where none doth draw it forth;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And all your graces no more use shall have,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Than a sundial in a grave:",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou, Love, taught’st me by making me",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "Love her who doth neglect both me and thee,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To invent, and practise this one way, to annihilate all three.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}