No man is an island entire of itself;
every man is a piece of the continent,
a part of the main;
if a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less,
as well as if a promontory were,
as well as any manner of thy friends or of thine own were;
any man's death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
it tolls for thee.
-- John Donne (1572- 1631) English priest and poet, excerpt from Meditation XVII, in Devotions on Divergent Occasions, 1624. Although broken into a poetic form, the full meditation is in prose.
Image: The White Cliffs of Dover, from itv.com
No comments:
Post a Comment