Letters to severall persons of honour written by John Donne ... ; published by John Donne, Dr. of the civill law.

To Sir H. G.

SIR,

I Hope you are now welcome to London, and well, and well comforted in your Fathers health and love, and well conten∣ted that we ask you how you doe, and tell you how we are, which yet I cannot of my self; If I knew that I were ill, I were well; for we consist of three parts, a Soul, and Bo∣dy, and Minde: which I call those thoughts and affections and passions, which neither soul nor body hath alone, but have been be∣gotten by their communication, as Mu∣sique results out of our breath and a Cornet. And of all these the diseases are cures, if they be known. Of our souls sicknesses, which are sinnes, the knowledge is, to acknow∣ledge, and that is her Physique, in which we are not dieted by drams and scruples, for we cannot take too much. Of our bo∣dies infirmities, though our knowledge be partly ab extrinseco, from the opinion of the Physitian, and that the subject and matter

be flexible, and various; yet their rules are certain, and if the matter be rightly applyed to the rule, our knowledge thereof is also certain. But of the diseases of the minde, there is no Criterium, no Canon, no rule; for, our own taste and apprehension and interpretation should be the Judge, and that is the disease it self. Therefore sometimes when I finde my self transported with jol∣lity, and love of company, I hang Leads at my heels; and reduce to my thoughts my fortunes, my years, the duties of a man, of a friend, of a husband, of a Father, and all the incumbencies of a family: when sad∣nesse dejects me, either I countermine it with another sadnesse, or I kindle squibs about me again, and flie into sportfulnesse and company: and I finde ever after all, that I am like an exorcist, which had long la∣boured about one, which at last appears to have the Mother, that I still mistake my disease. And I still vex my self with this, because if I know it not, no body can know it. And I comfort my self, because

I see dispassioned men are subject to the like ignorances. For divers mindes out of the same thing often draw contrary con∣clusions, as Augustine thought devout Antho∣ny to be therefore full of the holy Ghost, be∣cause not being able to read, he could say the whole Bible, and interpret it; and Thyreus the Jesuit for the same reason doth thinke all the Anabaptists to be possessed. And as often out of contrary things men draw one conclusion. As to the Roman Church, magnificence and splendor hath ever been an argument of Gods favour, and poverty & affliction, to the Greek. Out of this variety of mindes it proceeds, that though our souls would goe to one end, Heaven, and all our bodies must go to one end, the earth: yet our third part, the minde, which is our naturall guide here, chooses to every man a severall way: scarce any man likes what another doth, nor advisedly, that which himself. But Sir, I am beyond my purpose; I mean to write a Letter, and I am fallen into a discourse, and I do not only

take you from some businesse, but I make you a new businesse by drawing you into these meditations. In which let my open∣nesse be an argument of such love as I would fain expresse in some worthier fa∣shion.