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The difference between the reason of man and the instinct of the beast is this, that the beast does but know, but the man knows that he knows.
John Donne
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John Donne
Died: 1631
Died: March 31
Lawyer
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London
England
Very Rev. John Donne
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Doe
Reason
Men
Beast
Instinct
Difference
More quotes by John Donne
And when a whirl-winde hath blowne the dust of the Churchyard into the Church, and man sweeps out the dust of the Church into the Church-yard, who will undertake to sift those dusts again, and to pronounce, This is the Patrician, this is the noble flower, and this the yeomanly, this the Plebian bran.
John Donne
All whom war, dearth, age, agues, tyrannies, Despair, law, chance, hath slain.
John Donne
To a large degree, since the beginning of time, charisma or the lack of it has impacted upon those in quest of acclaim. As media expands, this has become ever more vital. Thus, demeanor if unappealing, can defeat one's likelihood of success, causing the death of prospects whilst they are still embryonic.
John Donne
As virtuous men pass mildly away, and whisper to their souls to go, whilst some of their sad friends do say, the breath goes now, and some say no.
John Donne
If they be two, they are two so As stiff twin compasses are two, Thy soul the fixt foot, makes no show To move, but doth, if the other do.
John Donne
I would not that death should take me asleep. I would not have him merely seize me, and only declare me to be dead, but win me, and overcome me. When I must shipwreck, I would do it in a sea, where mine impotency might have some excuse not in a sullen weedy lake, where I could not have so much as exercise for my swimming.
John Donne
To rage, to lust, to write to, to commend, All is the purlieu of the god of love.
John Donne
Commemoration of Pandita Mary Ramabai, Translator of the Scriptures, 1922 A memory of yesterday's pleasures, a fear of tomorrow's dangers, a straw under my knees, a noise in my ear, a light in my eye, an anything, a nothing, a fancy, a chimera in my brain, troubles me in my prayers.
John Donne
That subtle knot which makes us man So must pure lovers souls descend T affections, and to faculties, Which sense may reach and apprehend, Else a great Prince in prison lies.
John Donne
Let man's soul be a sphere, and then, in this, The intelligence that moves, devotion is.
John Donne
We can die by it, if not live by love, And if unfit for tombs and hearse Our legend be, it will be fit for verse And if no peace of chronicle we prove, We'll build in sonnet pretty rooms As well a well wrought urne becomes The greatest ashes, as half-acre tombs.
John Donne
Humiliation is the beginning of sanctification.
John Donne
At most, the greatest persons are but great wens, and excrescences men of wit and delightful conversation, but as morals for ornament, except they be so incorporated into the body of the world that they contribute something to the sustentation of the whole.
John Donne
No spring nor summer beauty hath such grace as I have seen in one autumnal face.
John Donne
And swear No where Lives a woman true, and fair.
John Donne
God himself took a day to rest in, and a good man's grave is his Sabbath.
John Donne
What gnashing is not a comfort, what gnawing of the worm is not a tickling, what torment is not a marriage bed to this damnation, to be secluded eternally, eternally, eternally from the sight of God?
John Donne
Men are sponges, which, to pour out, receive Who know false play, rather than lose, deceive. For in best understandings sin began, Angels sinn'd first, then devils, and then man. Only perchance beasts sin not wretched we Are beasts in all but white integrity.
John Donne
Love's mysteries in souls do grow, But yet the body is his book.
John Donne
Old grandsires talk of yesterday with sorrow, And for our children we reserve tomorrow.
John Donne
