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ASTER JOHN DONNE was born in London, in the year 1573, of good and virtuous parents: and though his own learning and other multiplied merits may justly appear sufficient to dignify both himself and his posterity, yet the reader may be pleased to know, that his father was masculinely and lineally descended from a very ancient family in Wales, where many of his name now live, that deserve and have great reputation in that country.*

* The ancient house of Dwnn, of Kidwelley, co. Caermarthen, the parent stock of the several families of that patronymic, bore for arms az. a wolf saliant, ar. as did Dr. Donne. Sir Daniel Donne, D. C. L., F. S. A. Master of the Requests, who died in 1617; and John Donne, of "Martinfield," or "St. Martin's-in-the-Field," gentleman of the Privy Chamber to king James I., bore the same coat charged with an ermine spot, for difference.-Harl. MS. 1541, f. 36; Fun. Cert. 1619.

The immediate ancestor of Dr. Donne, was John Donne, Citizen and Ironmonger of London, residing in the parish of St. Nicholas Olave, Bread Street. From the books of the Ironmongers' Company, it appears that he had been initiated into the mysteries of trade by Mr. James, afterwards Alderman Harvey, (whose families became united by marriage in the persons of their grand-children,) and acquired the privileges of the city freedom in the year 1556. In 1559, he is found in the service and high in estimation of Mrs. Agnes Lewin, widow of Alderman Lewin, Citizen and Ironmonger (a considerable benefactor to the poor and to his com

By his mother he was descended of the family of the famous and learned Sir Thomas More,* some time lord chancellor of

pany); and with Master Richard Chamberlayn (Sheriff of London, 1562,) was appointed one of the executors of her will. She died 26th October, of the year last named; and Master Henry Machyn, Cit. and Merchant Taylor, in his interesting Diary, mentions the ceremony of her funeral, the xxxj. October, "all ye craft of Yronmongers being present." In her will, dated 8th January, 1559, she bequeathed to "her servant, John Donne, now free of the said company, the lease of the house she had promised him, and xxx. pounds of money," with a discharge for all things he had of her as gifts; and by a codicil, she bequeathed all her property, including "her ship, if it came home in safety," to her executors, in equal shares, for the payment of her legacies; and she appointed them residuary legatees.

In 1563, the Ironmongers' Company had possession of Thomas Lewin's "great messuage and garden, in the parish of St. Nicholas Olave, and fourteen other messuages there," which passed to them under the trusts of his will, at the decease of his widow; and the same year John Donne found himself, a merchant in trade, in possession of premises, and probably half-owner of a trading ship.

In 1567, he was elected to the livery of his Company; and in 1574 served the office of Warden. But in the high road to civic honors, his brief though successful career was terminated by death the following year. In his will, by which he was a liberal benefactor to the poor, he desired to be buried in the church of St. Nicholas Olave, the parish in which he resided; but there no record of him remains that ancient edifice, with the entire neighbourhood, was destroyed by the fire of London, in 1666; and the parish registers which recorded the birth of his children, shared the same fate; or, as circumstances induce the belief, passed into private hands, and have become lost to public utility.

* " By his mother's side, greate-greate grandchilde to Sir Thomas More, whom he much resembled in his endowments."-Fuller, Ch. Hist., b. x., p. 112. The learned Sir Thomas More, of high honor and integrity, both as a member of the legislature and as a judge, was a determined and conscientious supporter of the Romish faith and papal authority; and lost his head for opposing the king's supremacy, and the divorce of Catherine of Arragon, so intimately associated with its maintenance. Besides his son, John, Sir Thomas had three daughters: the eldest, Margaret, an accomplished woman, well read in the learned languages, married William Roper, esq., of Eltham, in Kent, elder brother of the ancestor of the lords Teynham, and died in 1544. It was she, who after her parent's execution, found means to obtain possession of the head from its traitors' place on London-bridge, and being apprehended and taken before the council, suffered a short imprisonment for her filial devotion. It is said she kept it many years in a leaden box; and that it was placed with her in the vault beneath the chapel of the Roper family, in the church of St. Dunstan, Canterbury. Of the other daughters of Sir Thomas More, Elizabeth married John, son of Sir John Dancey; and Cecilia, Giles Heron, esq., of Shacklewell.

Thomas, great-grandson and biographer of Sir Thomas More, took orders at Rome, and became an active agent of the English Roman Catholics in Spain.

England; as also from that worthy and laborious judge Rastall,* who left posterity the vast statutes of the law of this nation most exactly abridged.

He had his first breeding in his father's house, where a private tutor had the care of him, until the tenth year of his age; and, in his eleventh year, was sent to the University of Oxford,+ having at that time a good command both of the French and Latin tongue. This, and some other of his remarkable abilities, made one then give this censure of him: "That this age had brought And his last lineal descendant was abbess of the Augustine nunnery at Bruges,a venerable woman of dignified appearance, and endowed with a superior mind. Prior to the peace of Amiens, she resided several years at Hengrave, the seat of Sir Thomas Gage, into whose family her ancestor, Crisacre More, great-grandson of the Chancellor, had married. She died in the early part of the present century. * William Rastall, son of John Rastall, a celebrated printer, who married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John, and sister of Sir Thomas More. William Rastall was born in London in 1508. He studied at Oxford, and afterwards entered at Lincoln's Inn; but on the change of religion, retired to Louvain. On the accession of Queen Mary, he returned to England, and in 1554, was made a serjeant-atlaw, one of the commissioners for the prosecution of heretics, and, in 1558, a little before Mary's death, one of the justices of Common Pleas. Queen Elizabeth renewed his patent as justice, but he preferred retiring to Louvain, where he died in 1565. His wife was Winefred, daughter of Dr. John Clement, (tutor to the children of Sir Thomas More,) who also died in voluntary exile. Judge Rastall published the works of his uncle Sir Thomas More; as also “An Abregement of the Statutes in force and in use;" a work often re-printed ; " Les Termes de la Ley," &c. A brother of the Judge, was John Rastall, a Justice of the Peace, whose daughter Elizabeth, became wife of Robert Lougher, L.L.D., Chancellor of Exeter.

+ Anthony-à-Wood states that John Donne, accompanied by his younger brother, Henry, was entered of Hart Hall, in Michaelmas Term, 1584; and that he remained there three years -Athen. Oxon., v. ii., p. 502. Circumstances later in life concur to shew that Dr. Donne had relatives at Oxford, which may account for himself and brother having been sent to the University at an age earlier than was even at that time customary. In the will of their father occur bequests to his "brother Dawson, of the city of Oxford," to his sister, and to their two children.

i. e. Judgment, opinion. In the "Complete Angler," Walton says: "yet I am sure I have found a high content in the search and conference of what is here offered to the reader's view and censure.”—(Introd. p. lxvii.) And Sir Henry Wotton writes to the king: "I have reserved a private and voluntary subject, which I have taken the freedom most humbly to present unto your majesty's benign -Reliq. Wotton., p. 248. Thus also Shakspere:

censure.

Madam, the king is old enough himself
To give his censure.-2 Hen. VI., i., 3.

forth another Picus Mirandula;* of whom story says, that he was rather born than made wise by study."

There he remained some years, in Hart Hall,+ having for the advancement of his studies, tutors of several sciences to attend and instruct him, till time made him capable, and his learning, expressed in public exercises, declared him worthy to receive his first degree in the schools, which he forbore, by advice from his friends, who, being for their religion of the Romish persuasion, were conscionably averse to some parts of the oath that is always tendered at those times, and not to be refused by those that expect the titulary honour of their studies.

About the fourteenth year of his age, he was transplanted from Oxford to Cambridge, where, that he might receive nourishment from both soils, he stayed till his seventeenth year; all which time he was a most laborious student, often changing his studies, but endeavouring to take no degree, for the reasons formerly mentioned.

* John Piens, prince of Mirandula, was born in 1463, and his father dying shortly afterwards, his education was commenced by his mother. He is said to have made such rapid progress in his studies, that at the age of eighteen, he understood twenty-two languages; and at twenty-four, discoursed on every branch of knowledge with equal success. He travelled, disputed and studied in many parts of Italy, forming an extensive literary acquaintance; but the death of his friend Lorenzo de Medicis, so much affected him, that, resigning his sovereignty to his nephew, he died in retirement, at Florence, in 1494. As a prodigy of learning, he was honoured with an epitaph of pompous significance; and his life was written by his nephew, with much elegance of language: but, as if to add mental attainments to the vanities of worldly ambition, "his name," says Dr. Johnson, "then celebrated in the remotest corners of the earth, is now almost forgotten; and his works, then studied, admired, and applauded, are now mouldering in obscurity.”—Works, v. ii., p. 273.

+ So named from Elias de Hertford, who lived in the time of Edward I., A. D. 1282.-Le Neve. In 1740, by royal charter, it was erected into a college by the name of "Hertford College, in the University of Oxford." In the present century, Hertford College, decayed and reverting to the crown, has merged into that of Magdalene.

To Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was fellow pupil with Mr. Samuel Brooke, after mentioned. "And now," says Winstanley, "like a laborious bee, desirous to gather from more flowers than one, he was translated from Oxford to Cambridge, our other renowned nursery of learning, where he much improved his studies."-Eng. Worthies, p. 398.

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About the seventeenth year of his age, he was removed to London, and then admitted into Lincoln's Inn,* with an intent to

From the Admission Book of the Society, it appears that "Johēs Donne, generosus," was entered there, the 6th May, in the 34th year of queen Elizabeth, (1592), having previously been a student of Thavies Inn, an Inn of Chancery for preliminary study, appurtenant to the parent society. On this occasion, his friend, Christopher Brooke, became one of his bondsmen. Some portion, however, of the interval of time from his quitting the University appears to have been passed in a campaign with the forces of the United Provinces. In his Juvenilia are several "Epigrams to the Prince of Orange, on his famous victory over the Spaniards at Duke's Wood :"-

Now golden fruit, Prince, hang on Duke's Wood boughs,
Since it with laurel crown'd thy conquering brows.

Spaniards no more call golden fleeces thine,

Since the bright name of Orange most doth shine.

No. 56, is "A Panegyric on the Hollanders being lords of the sea, occasioned by the Author being in their army at Duke's Wood."

Heathen! no more thy Neptune boast; here see
A neptune more lord of the sea than he!
Whom fruitful Holland feeds; Holland, sea bred,
And neighb'ring Zealand folds in watery bed:
Neptune's a Dutch God!.....

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The Afric sands to thee large tributes send,
And Asia glories to be stiled thy friend;
America's rich mines grow in thy lands,

And at thy conquests Europe wond'ring stands !

The next essay of the young poet, is an Epigram "To Sleep, stealing upon him as he stood upon the guard in the corner of a running trench, at the siege of Duke's Wood."

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Why dost besiege mine eyes, untimely Sleep!
And o'er my limbs with thy dull fetters creep
Hence, hence, depart: to roofs well tiled repair;
To beds of down, and minds unvex'd with care.
To men oppress'd with grief, who 'count thy charms;
And men unbusied, lend thy opium arms.
Here guards are kept, and from yond' watchful towers,
The crafty foe vyes broken sleep with ours-
Seeking by slye plots, what pitch'd fields deny :
Hence, hence, then, Morpheus, from our quarters fly!

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Whilst each man here stands grasping of a pike,
Waiting stol'n onsets with our weary spears;
Doubts of the coming foe with hopes are mixt,
And all eyes are on his approaches fixt,-

All passengers we summon..

Ask who they are, and question them for spies.

If well-known friends, they pass; if not, they stay

Till we their doubtful answers strictly weigh.

Will not this serve, sleep?-will not all this affright thee?
See then a night turn'd into day, to light thee.

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