CREEDE HINSHAW: Donne’s reminder: Prepare for death

A friend gave me a volume of “Donne’s Sermons: Selected Passages” with an Essay by Logan Pearsall Smith (Oxford House Press). John Donne (1572-1631) was a poet, essayist and Anglican priest, perhaps known for his words “No man is an island,” “for whom the bell tolls,” and the sonnet “Death Be Not Proud.” My friend’s gift has greatly expanded my appreciation for this great clergyman, one of whose recurring themes was how the Christian should approach death.

The following passage, which I read this morning, is quite appropriate for Lent. Though the words and phrasing are quaint, and though some of the references are to customs long since passed, Donne’s call to prayer, fasting, and preparedness for our own death is as modern as today’s news:

“He that will die with Christ upon Good Friday, must hear his own bell toll all Lent; he that will be partaker of Jesus’ passion at last, must conform himself to his discipline of prayer and fasting before. Is there any man, that in his chamber hears a bell toll for another man, and does not kneel down to pray for that dying man? And then when his charity breaths out upon another man, does he not also reflect upon himself, and dispose himself as if he were in that state of that dying man?

“We begin to hear Christ’s bell toll now, and is not our bell in the chime? We must be in his grave, before we come to his resurrection, and we must be in his death bed before we come to his grave: we must do as he did, fast and pray, before we can say as he said, ‘In manus tuas, into thy hands O Lord I commend my Spirit.’

“You would not go into a Medicinal Bath without some preparatives; presume not upon that Bath, the blood of Christ Jesus, in the Sacrament then, without preparatives neither. Neither say to your selves, we shall have preparatives enough, warnings enough, many more sermons before it come to that, and so it is too soon yet; you are not sure you shall have more; not sure you shall have all this; not sure you shall be affected with any.

“If you be, when you are, remember that as in that good custom in these cities, you hear cheerful street music in the winter mornings, but yet there was a sad and doleful bell man, that waked you, and called upon you two or three hours before that music came; so for all that blessed music which the servants of God shall present to you in this place, it may be of use, that a poor bell man waked you before, and though, by his noise, prepared you for their music.”

Church bells no longer ring to announce the death of a friend. Bells hardly ring in churches at all, but Donne’s conclusion is inescapable. We should prepare ourselves for death and resurrection. Lent is a good time to start.

Email Creede Hinshaw at [email protected].