Quotes from John Donne

I am two fools, I know, For loving, and for saying so.

Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.

More than kisses, letters mingle souls.

To know and feel all this and not have the words to express it makes a human a grave of his own thoughts.

And who understands? Not me, because if I did I would forgive it all.

Yet nothing can to nothing fall, Nor any place be empty quite; Therefore I think my breast hath all Those pieces still, though they be not unite; And now, as broken glasses show A hundred lesser faces, so My rags of heart can like, wish, and adore, But after one such love, can love no more.

Licence my roving hands, and let them go Before, behind, between, above, below.

Death is an ascension to a better library.

Love, built on beauty, soon as beauty, dies.

Then love is sin, and let me sinful be.

Come live with me, and be my love, And we will some new pleasures prove Of golden sands, and crystal brooks, With silken lines, and silver hooks.

And to 'scape stormy days, I choose an everlasting night.

Nature's great masterpiece, an elephant; the only harmless great thing.

Up then, fair phoenix bride, frustrate the sun; Thyself from thine affection Takest warmth enough, and from thine eye All lesser birds will take their jollity. Up, up, fair bride, and call Thy stars from out their several boxes, take Thy rubies, pearls, and diamonds forth, and make Thyself a constellation of them all; And by their blazing signify That a great princess falls, but doth not die. Be thou a new star, that to us portends Ends of much wonder; and be thou those ends.

Love's mysteries in souls do grow, But yet the body is his book.

In Heaven, it is always Autumn.

Sir, more than kisses, letters mingle souls; For, thus friends absent speak.

I am a little world made cunningly.

Reason is our soul's left hand Faith her right. By this we reach divinity.

Thy face is mine eye, and mine is thine.

When one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language.

Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice.

More than kisses, letters mingle souls.