'John Donne and Reformation\r'

' prank Donne was born in clams Street, capital of the United Kingdom in 1572 to a prosperous Romilitary personnel Catholic family †a precarious thing at a cartridge holder when anti-Catholic sentiment was rife in England. His eng give uper, John Donne, was a well-to-do ironmonger and citizen of London. Donnes father died suddenly in 1576, and left the three children to be raised by their mother, Elizabeth, who was the daughter of epigrammatist and playwright John Heywood and a relative of Sir doubting Thomas More. [Family tree. ] Donnes first teachers were Jesuits.\r\nAt the age of 11, Donne and his progenyer brother Henry were entered at Hart Hall, University of Oxford, where Donne studied for three years. He worn-out(a) the next three years at the University of Cambridge, alone took no degree at either university because he would not deliberate the Oath of Supremacy require at graduation. He was admitted to study law as a member of Thavies society (1591) and Lincoln s Inn (1592), and it seemed subjective that Donne should embark upon a legal or diplomatical career. In 1593, Donnes brother Henry died of a febricity in prison after being arrested for full-gr consume sanctuary to a proscribed Catholic priest.\r\nThis do Donne begin to question his faith. His first book of poems, Satires, indite during this period of hearth in London, is considered one of Donnes or so important literary efforts. Although not immediately published, the meretriciousness had a fairly wide readership through reclusive circulation of the manuscript. Same was the case with his love poems, Songs and Sonnets, assumed to be written at about the same time as the Satires. Having inherited a considerable fortune, young â€Å"Jack Donne” spent his money on womanizing, on books, at the theatre, and on travels.\r\nHe had alike be paladined Christopher Brooke, a poet and his roommate at Lincolns Inn, and Ben Jonson who was part of Brookes circle. In 1596, Donne l inked the naval expedition that Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, led against Cadiz, Spain. In 1597, Donne joined an expedition to the Azores, where he wrote â€Å"The Calm”. Upon his supply to England in 1598, Donne was positive toffee-nosed secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton, manufacturer Keeper of the Great Seal, afterward Lord Ellesmere. Donne was beginning a promising career. In 1601, Donne became MP for Brackley, and sat in Queen Elizabeths last Parliament.\r\n further in the same year, he secretly get hitched with Lady Egertons niece, seventeen-year-old Anne More, daughter of Sir George More, Lieutenant of the Tower, and effectively affiliated career self-destruction. Donne wrote to the livid father, saying: â€Å"Sir, I make out my fault to be so great as I dare scarce offer any other prayer to you in mine own behalf than this, to believe that I neither had dishonest end nor means. But for her whom I tender much much than my fortunes or life (else I would, I superpower neither joy in this life nor enthral the next) I humbly beg of you that she may not, to her danger, touch sensation the terror of your sudden anger. 1 Sir George had Donne thrown in Fleet Prison for some weeks, along with his cohorts Samuel and Christopher Brooke who had help the equals clandestine affair. Donne was dismissed from his post, and for the next decade had to seek near poverty to support his growing family. Donne later(prenominal) summed up the experience: â€Å"John Donne, Anne Donne, Undone. ” Annes cousin offered the couple refuge in Pyrford, Surrey, and the couple was helped by friends kindred Lady Magdalen Herbert, George Herberts mother, and Lucy, Countess of Bedford, women who also played a swelled role in Donnes literary life.\r\nThough Donne salve had friends left, these were bitter years for a man who knew himself to be the intellectual superior of most, knew he could have come up to the highest posts, and yet found no preferment. I t was not until 1609 that a reconciliation was effected between Donne and his father-in-law, and Sir George More was in conclusion induced to pay his daughters dowry. In the intervening years, Donne adept law, but they were lean years for the Donnes. Donne was employed by the religious pamphleteer Thomas Morton, later Bishop of Durham.\r\nIt is possible that Donne co-wrote or ghost-wrote some of Mortons pamphlets (1604-1607). To this period, earlier reconciliation with his inlaws, belong Donnes prognosticate Poems (1607) and Biathanatos (pub. 1644), a radical piece for its time, in which Donne argues that suicide is not a sin in itself. As Donne approached forty, he published cardinal anti-Catholic polemics Pseudo-Martyr (1610) and Ignatius his Conclave (1611). They were closing public testimony of Donnes renunciation of the Catholic faith.\r\nPseudo-Martyr, which held that slope Catholics could pledge an oath of allegiance to crowd I, index of England, without compromising their religious loyalty to the Pope, won Donne the estimate of the King. In return for patronage from Sir Robert Drury of Hawstead, he wrote A Funerall Elegie (1610), on the decease of Sir Roberts 15-year-old daughter Elizabeth. At this time, the Donnes took residence on Drury Lane. The two Anniversaries†An Anatomy of the World (1611) and Of the hand of the Soul (1612) continued the patronage.\r\nSir Robert encour remote the publication of the poems: The branch Anniversary was published with the original elegy in 1611, and both were reissued with The Second Anniversary in 1612. Donne had refused to take Anglican orders in 1607, but King James persisted, finally announcing that Donne would receive no post or preferment from the King, unless in the church. In 1615, Donne reluctantly entered the ministry and was appointed a Royal Chaplain later that year. In 1616, he was appointed Reader in Divinity at Lincolns Inn (Cambridge had conferred the degree of Doctor of Divinity on h im two years earlier).\r\nDonnes style, full of elaborate metaphors and religious symbolism, his star for drama, his wide learning and his quick wit presently established him as one of the greatest preachers of the era. skilful as Donnes fortunes seemed to be improving, Anne Donne died, on 15 August, 1617, aged thirty-three, after giving birth to their twelfth child, a stillborn. Seven of their children survived their mothers death. Struck by grief, Donne wrote the seventeenth dedicated Sonnet, â€Å"Since she whom I lovd hath paid her last debt. According to Donnes friend and biographer, Izaak Walton, Donne was thereafter ‘crucified to the world. Donne continued to write poetry, notably his consecrate Sonnets (1618), but the time for love songs was over. In 1618, Donne went as chaplain with Viscount Doncaster in his embassy to the German princes. His Hymn to Christ at the Authors Last Going into Germany, written in front the journey, is lade with apprehension of death . Donne returned to London in 1620, and was appointed doyen of Saint Pauls in 1621, a post he held until his death. Donne excelled at his post, and was at last financially secure.\r\nIn 1623, Donnes eldest daughter, Constance, married the actor Edward Alleyn, then 58. Donnes private meditations, Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, written while he was convalescing from a serious illness, were published in 1624. The most illustrious of these is undoubtedly Meditation 17, which includes the immortal lines â€Å"No man is an island” and â€Å"never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee. ” In 1624, Donne was made vicar of St Dunstans-in-the-West. On sue 27, 1625, James I died, and Donne preached his first sermon for Charles I.\r\nBut for his ailing health, (he had intercommunicate sores and had experienced significant weight loss) Donne almost certainly would have become a bishop in 1630. preoccupy with the idea of death, Donne posed in a cut across à ¢â‚¬ the painting was completed a few weeks before his death, and later used to create an effigy. He also preached what was called his own funeral sermon, Deaths Duel, just a few weeks before he died in London on March 31, 1631. The last thing Donne wrote just before his death was Hymne to God, my God, In my Sicknesse. Donnes monument, in his shroud, survived the Great Fire of London and can still be seen today at St. Pauls.\r\n'