ence of the younger Donne himself. It has the following title-page POEMS BY J. D. | WITH | ELEGIES | ON THE AUTHOR'S DEATH. TO WHICH | Is added divers copies under his own hand | never before in print. | LONDON. | Printed for John Marriot, and are to be sold by Richard Marriot at his shop | by Chancery Lane end over against the Inner | Temple gate, 1650. The Printer to the Understanders is replaced by the dedication to Lord Craven ; and this is followed by the Hexastichon Bibliopolae, the Hexastichon ad Bibliopolam, and Ben Jonson's lines beginning "Donne, the delight of Phoebus and each Muse." At the end of the Divine Poems is inserted a kind of appendix, containing, besides some additional poems, two other sets of verses on Donne from Ben Jonson's Epigrams of 1616, a prose sketch entitled News from the very Country, already printed in the sixth edition of Sir Thomas Overbury's Characters (1615), a burlesque Latin Catalogus Librorum (see Appendix D), and what appears to be a Latin address to Convocation. Mr. Hazlitt, in the first series of his Collections, catalogues a copy of this edition, with the date r649, and the same date is given by Anthony Wood in his Athenae (s. v. DONNE). In this and the two following editions the Elegy by Tho. Browne was omitted, and three were added, signed respectively by Daniel Darnelly, Sidney Godolphin, and J. Chudleigh. The fifth edition of 1654 resembles that of 1650, except that it is "Printed by J. Flesher, and are to be sold by John Sweeting at the Angel in Popeshead Alley, 1654." The sixth and last of the seventeenth-century editions is that of 1669. This again has a new title-page, on which the author's name appears for the first time in full POEMS, etc. | BY JOHN DONNE, | late Dean of at the Sign of the Anchor, in the lower-walk of the New Exchange, 1669. Mr. Hazlitt (Handbook) states that pages 95 to 98 of this edition, containing Elegies XIX. and XX., were suppressed. All the editions contain, as well as the poems, thirteen prose letters, of which eight are to Sir Henry Goodyere, one to La[dy] G[oodyere ?], one to the Countess of Bedford, and three to Mr. George] G[arrard]. The book evidently underwent considerable revision in 1635, 1650, and again in 1669. Not only were additional poems printed from time to time, but also there exists great divergence of reading between the various copies. Even the editions of 1639 and 1654, though they differ very slightly from those of 1635 and 1650 respectively, cannot be said to be altogether identical with them. These variations, which are especially noticeable in the Songs and Sonnets and in the Satires, are not merely due to the printers. In all probability most of Donne's poems existed in several more or less revised forms, and it was something a matter of chance which form was used for printing a particular edition. Nor can it be said that any one edition always gives the best text; even for a single poem, sometimes one, sometimes another is to be preferred, though, as a rule, the edition of 1633 is the most reliable, and the readings of 1669 are in many cases a return to it. Certain unpublished poems of Donne's, together with others which are not really his, were collected by Waldron in his Collection of Miscellaneous Poetry (1802), and by Sir John Simeon in one of the Philobiblon Society's tracts (1856). A few others may be gathered from various printed and manuscript sources. These will be found in the appendices to this edition. The eighteenth-century and modern editions are mostly of little value. That by Dr. Grosart, privately printed in the Fuller Worthies Library, 1873, is a work of much zeal, industry and learning. I have derived benefit from it in many ways. But in contains many inaccuracies, and the text is spoilt throughout by being taken from bad MSS. instead of from the printed copies. E. K. C. THE PRINTER ΤΟ THE UNDERSTANDERS.1 FOR this time I must speak only to you: at another, Readers may perchance serve my turn; and I think this a way very free from exception, in hope that very few will have a mind to confess themselves ignorant. If you look for an Epistle, as you have before ordinary publications, I am sorry that I must deceive you; but you will not lay it to my charge, when you shall consider that this is not ordinary, for if I should say it were the best in this kind, that ever this kingdom hath yet seen ; he that would doubt of it must go out of the kingdom to inform himself, for the best judgments within it take it for granted. You may imagine (if it please you) that I could endear it unto you, by saying, that impor From the edition of 1633. tunity drew it on; that had it not been presented here, it would have come to us from beyond the seas (which perhaps is true enough); that my charge and pains in procuring of it hath been such, and such. I could add hereto, a promise of more correctness or enlargement in the next edition, if you shall in the meantime content you with this But these things are so common, as that I should profane this piece by applying them to it; a piece which whoso takes not as he finds it, in what manner soever, he is unworthy of it, sith a scattered limb of this author hath more amiableness in it, in the eye of a discerner, than a whole body of some other; or (to express him best by himself)— "A hand, or eye, By Hilyard drawn, is worth a history D If any man (thinking I speak this to inflame him for the vent of the impression) be of another opinion, I shall as willingly spare his money as his judgment. I cannot lose so much by him as he will by himself. For I shall satisfy myself with the conscience of well-doing, in making so much good, common. Howsoever it may appear to you, it shall suffice me to inform you, that it hath the best PRINTER TO THE UNDERSTANDERS. xlvii warrant that can be, public authority, and private friends. There is one thing more wherein I will make you of my counsel, and that is, that whereas it hath pleased some, who had studied and did admire him, to offer to the memory of the author, not long after his decease, I have thought I should do you service in presenting them unto you now; only whereas, had I placed them in the beginning, they might have served for so many encomiums of the author (as is usual in other works, where perhaps there is need of it, to prepare men to digest such stuff as follows after), you shall find1 them in the end, for whosoever reads the rest so far, shall perceive that there is no occasion to use them to that purpose; yet there they are, as an attestation for their sakes that knew not so much before, to let them see how much honour was attributed to this worthy man, by those that are capable to give it. Farewell. 1 1635, here find |