Of his verse epigrams all the world knows Rose Aylmer and most people his of himself:
"I strove with none, for none was worth my strife,
Nature I loved, and next to Nature, Art;
I warmed both hands before the fire of life,
It sinks, and I am ready to depart."
It would be hard to improve upon the accuracy of that description or the artistry with which it is expressed.
"I shall dine late; but the dining-room will be well lighted, the guests few and select."
It is with the object of enticing you to join that group of eclectics that I have attempted to show you what manner of man he is who invites you to his table. The conversation will be rich, the viands delicious to an Epicurean palate, but if you have no taste and your talk is vulgar you will only be bored.
VIII
JOHN DONNE
Readers of Rupert Brooke will almost certainly have made the acquaintance of Donne the poet, admirers of Mr Logan Pearsall Smith will with equal certainty have dipped into the excellent selections which that versatile writer has made of Dr Donne's sermons.
But to search for a reason why everyone should read Donne we need go no further than George Saintsbury's words: