John Donne's Funeral Sermon

John Donne, the English metaphysical poet, is one of few men, perhaps, who are said to have preached their own funeral sermon [the same is said of William Dodd (1729-1777) and Henry Peckwell (1747-1787)].

In the Puritan vein, he considered death often while living and his writings on the subject are often deeply profound.

John Donne, Holy Sonnet X, Death Be Not Proud:

Death be not proud, though some have callèd thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

As he was weak and dying in February 1631, he raised himself up to preach one more sermon, which became known as his own funeral sermon. The text was Psalm 68.20: He that is our God is the God of salvation; and unto GOD the Lord belong the issues from death. The sermon was entitled, Death's Duell, or a Consolation to the Soul against the Dying Life and Living Death of the Body. Soon after, on March 31, 1631, Donne's life on this earth was done.

On this anniversary of his death, we do well to consider his sublime meditation, "No Man is an Island."

John Donne, Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, Meditation XVII:

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 if a manor of thy friend's 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 bells tolls; it tolls for thee.