l. 59. As men to our prisons, new soules to us are sent, &c.: 'new' is the reading of 1633 only, 'now' followed or preceded by a comma of the other editions and the MSS. It is difficult to decide between them, but Donne speaks of 'new souls' elsewhere: 'The Father creates new souls every day in the inanimation of Children, and the Sonne creates them with him.' Sermons 50. 12. 100. 'Our nature is Meteorique, we respect (because we partake so) both earth and heaven; for as our bodies glorified shall be capable of spirituall joy, so our souls demerged into those bodies, are allowed to partake earthly pleasure. Our soul is not sent hither, only to go back again; we have some errand to do here; nor is it sent into prison, because it comes innocent; and he which sent it, is just.' Letters (1651), p. 46.
l. 68. Two new starres. See Introductory Note to Letters.
Page 198, l. 72. Stand on two truths: i.e. the wickedness of the world and your goodness. You will believe neither.
Page 198. To the Countesse of Bedford.
On New-yeares day.
l. 3. of stuffe and forme perplext: i.e. whose matter and form are a perplexed, intricate, difficult question:
Whose what, and where in disputation is.
Donne cannot mean that the matter and form are 'intricately intertwined or intermingled', using the words as in Bacon: 'The formes of substances (as they are now by compounding and transplanting multiplied) are so perplexed.' Bacon, Adv. Learn. ii. 7. § 5. The question of meteors in all their forms was one of great interest and great difficulty to ancient science. Seneca, who gathers up most of what has been said before him, recurs to the subject again and again. See the Quaestiones Naturales, i. 1, and elsewhere. Aristotle, he says, attributes them to exhalations from the earth heated by the sun's rays. They are at any rate not falling stars, or parts of stars, but 'have their origin below the stars, and—being without solid foundation or fixed abode—quickly perish'. But there was great uncertainty as to their what and where. Donne compares himself to them in the uncertainty of his position and worldly affairs. 'Wind is a mixt Meteor, to the making whereof divers occasions concurre with exhalations.' Sermons 80. 31. 305.
Page 199, l. 19. cherish, us doe wast. The punctuation of 1633 is odd at the first glance, but accurate. If with all the later editions one prints 'cherish us, doe wast', the suggestion is that 'wast' is intransitive—'in cherishing us they waste themselves,' which is not Donne's meaning. It is us they waste.
Page 200, l. 44. Some pitty. I was tempted to think that Lowell's conjecture of 'piety' for 'pitty' must be right, the more so that the spelling of the two words was not always differentiated. But it is improbable that Donne would say that 'piety' in the sense of piety to God could ever be out of place. What he means is probably that at Court pity, which elsewhere is a virtue, may not be so if it induces a lady to lend a relenting ear to the complaint of a lover.
Beware faire maides of musky courtiers oathes