To murder different hearts,
But in a calm, and godlike unity,
Preserves community.”
In Donne in his “Love’s Growth,” there is an expression of doubt whether his love can be as pure as he thought it was, because it seems to suffer an increase in the spring, and is not a thing without component elements. But if love is no quintessence, he says, it must be mixed with alien passions and thus not be pure. He silences his doubts, however, by explaining after the analogy of concentric rings of waves of water about the centre of disturbance how his love is one and unelemented.
“I scarce believe my love to be so pure
As I had thought it was,
Because it doth endure
Vicissitude, and season, as the grass;
Methinks I lied all winter, when I swore
My love was infinite, if spring make it more.