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HOLY
SONNET
XII

JOHN DONNE

MARIE SINGLETON
SECTION L3
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Sonnet Annotation Lines 1-3

n Why are we by all creatures waited on?

n Begins with a question. Presents the mood and theme for
the sonnet.

n Why do the prodigal elements supply

n Prodigal elements – animals in nature

n Life and food to me, being more pure than I,

n Author is curious as to why humans were picked to be
superior, considering their sinful nature
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Sonnet Annotation 4-6

n Simpler, and further from corruption?

n Questioning why animals are not put above
humans, as they are “simpler, and further from
corruption”

n Why brook'st thou, ignorant horse, subjection?

n Questions why we subject horses (and in essence,
all creautres) to our will.

n Why dost thou, bull, and bore so seelily,

n Again, questions other animals as to their
subjection.
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Sonnet Annotation 7-9

n Dissemble weakness, and by one man's stroke die,

n Asserts man’s dominance over creatures by exhibiting
the ability to kill easily

n Whose whole kind you might swallow and feed upon?

n Questions why animals do not dominate humans because
of their ingrown nature to kill and feed upon others.
Most animals are larger and therefore should dominate
humans.

n Weaker I am, woe is me, and worse than you,

n Author states that humans are, in fact, weaker than
animals.
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Sonnet Annotation 10-12

n You have not sinned, nor need be timorous.

n States the pure nature of animals who have never
committed or had the chance to commit sins.

n But wonder at a greater wonder, for to us

n Asks the creatures to ponder upon the one who made us
(God).

n Created nature doth these things subdue

n Asserts that God made the creatures and therefore, chose
the ones to subdue to humans.
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Sonnet Annotation 13-14

n But their Creator, whom sin nor nature tied,

n Believes God has no correlation to sin or nature, but is
rather a distant, unconnected power.

n For us, His creatures, and His foes, hath died.

n Asserts that creatures, animals and humans alike, and
those tempted by the Devil have been saved because
God sent his son, Jesus to save all.


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SOUND RECORDING
(Click on the speakerphone.)

This sound recording by David Barnes allows

listeners to distinguish pauses and stops as
John Donne intended them.

Think about the meter.

Think about the rhyme scheme.

How is this different from other poems you have

heard?

Barnes, David. Holy Sonnet XII. By John Donne. Librivox. Audio download. Date uploaded: October 07,
2007. Date accessed: March 02, 2010. http://librivox.org/holy-sonnets-by-john-donne/
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“He [Donne] marvels that the
Creator of all creatures died for
humans, the most corrupt of his
creations.”
n This one line summation of the sonnet tells the reader
almost all he or she would need to know. The sonnet
is, in fact, about Donne’s awe that Jesus Christ died
for such a corrupt and deceitful group of creatures
when other creations are more worthy of his love and
sacrifice.

Bromberg, Howard. “Holy Sonnets.” Masterplots II: Christian Literature. Pasadena, California: Salem
Press Inc. 2008. Accessed online: March 02, 2010. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?
direct=true&db=lfh&AN=MOL9830002025&site=lrc-live.
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Ezekiel 18:4.

n “Behold
, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the
.”

n In this quote from Ezekiel comes the idea that all who
sin will die. This begs the questio – what becomes of
animals after their death? They do not sin, as stated
in Holy Sonnet 12, so do they experience the same
afterlife as humans? Are animals more worthy of
salvation and a pleasant afterlife than humans who
sin? If so, then why did God send his Son to save
humans? Is it so they can experience this same
afterlife?

n Holy Bible. King James Edition.

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The Algebra of Holy Sonnet 12.
n States that this sonnet holds nothing to be called “figurative”;
rather, a straightforward sonnet
n Believes the first lines are a comparison of the three terms :
Elements, Animals, Man
n States that it is “simple algebra” as to hierarchy
n Elements, Animals > Man; yet,
n Man > Elements, Animals

n Line 12 adds Created Nature to list bringing the hierarchy to

n Created Nature > Elements and Animals > Man

n By introducing a fifth term – God – to the mix, the hierarchy is yet

again changed. God is higher than the highest, yet lower than the
lowest.
n God > Created Nature > Elements and Animals > Man > God

n God created all and is superior, yet a servant, to all



n Fenner, Arthur. "Donne's 'Holy Sonnet XII'." Explicator 40.4 (1982):

14-15. MLA International Bibliography. EBSCO. Web. 2 Mar. 2010.
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Original sin.
n It should be duly noted that many of Donne’s sonnets explore the
theme of Original Sin. In this annotation, we will look at a sonnet
closely related to Holy Sonnet XII.

n “It is because of this conviction of man’s unworthiness that the Holy

Sonnets are so concerned with Original Sin.”

n “The final mystery of our salvation, the poet agrees, lies in the
tremendous act of a “Creator, whom sin, nor nature tyed,” but who
made of himself a blood sacrifice “for us, his Creatures, and his
foes.” (Holy Sonnet XIII).

n This article explores how Donne uses Original Sin in his Holy Sonnets.
In Holy Sonnet XII, Donne is perplexed as to how a race as sinful
and corrupt as humans, can be dominant over pure and simple
animals. This idea so perplexed Donne that it is explored
throughout his series of Holy Sonnets and yet, never quite solved. It
is something to be accepted and something to live with, not
something that Donne has the power to change or the mental
capacity to understand.

n Augustinian Spirituality and the Holy Sonnets of John DonnePatrick

GrantELH, Vol. 38, No. 4 (Dec., 1971), pp. 542-561Published by: The
Johns Hopkins University PressStable URL:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2872265
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Pity for the Animals.

n Yetanother theme in Holy Sonnet XII is that of pity for the

animals. Renaker takes Holy Sonnet IX:
n If poysonous mineralls, and if that tree,
n Whose fruit threw death on else immortall us,
n If lecherous goats, if serpents envious
n Cannot be damn'd; Alas; why should I bee?
n Why should intent or reason, borne in mee,
n Make sinnes, else equall, in mee, more heinous?
n And mercy being easie, and glorious
n To God, in his sterne wrath, why threatens hee?
n But who am I, that dare dispute with thee
n ?O God,Oh!of thine only worthy blood,
n And my teares, make a heavenly Lethean flood,
n And drowne in it my sinnes blacke memorie.
n That thou remember them,some claime as debt,
n I thinke it mercy, if thou wilt forget.
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Pity for the Animals (cont.)
n In the previous sonnet, Donne exhibits an anger and
almost hatred toward animals for not being
“damned” as he is. Animals who do not have to
experience sin are considered “better off.”
n However, by Holy Sonnet XII, this hatred and anger
becomes “concession and pity at their inability to the
Incarnation.”
n

n Renaker, David. "Do Donne's Holy Sonnets Tell a

Story?" The Atheist Seventeenth Century Website.
N.p., 2002-2004. Web. 4 Mar. 2010.
n
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Punctuation. Matters.

n “Do you think that the punctuation of the last line of this sonnet
is merely an insignificant detail? The sonnet begins with a
valiant struggle with death calling on all the forces of intellect
and drama to vanquish the enemy. But it is ultimately about
overcoming the seemingly insuperable barriers separating life,
death and eternal life.”

n This quote serves to signify the importance of Donne’s

punctuation in his sonnets. In Holy Sonnet XII, Donne uses
semi-colons to separate his thoughts, yet keep them connected
and organized. There are no exclamation marks – no hysterical
emotion, but a tone of resignation and wonder.

n His language may be hard to follow for the modern analyzer :

n Seelily - sillily

n Margaret Edson, Wit: A Play. Faber & Faber. (1999) ISBN: 10-
0571198775
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No Drama.
n Compares Sonnets IV, XI, XII, XIII, XV, XVI.
n All lack dramatic impact.
n “Without that sense of crisis and disorder which is central to the
other poems, there is a loss of immediacy. We might also feel
that, while never complacent, the sonnets of this last gtoup
[group] reflect more a crisis lived through and overcome than a
crisis presently experienced in the act of writing. They are
essentially contemplative in nature and their starting point is
an image, a question or a stated truth which is posited in the
first part of the poem and elaborated or answered in the
second.”
n “There is an "audience" as present as in the secular poems. It
might consist of listening Soul, it might even be bull, boar, and
ignorant horse, as in XII, but the effect is constant: the speaker
can answer, demonstrate and resolve as he could not when
lacking both audience and authority.”

n Bellette, Anthony F. "Little Worlds Made Cunningly: Significant

Form in Donne's 'Holy Sonnets' and 'Goodfriday, 1613'".
Studies in Philology, Vol. 72, No. 3. University of North Carolina