| Nicholson & Lee, eds. The Oxford Book of English Mystical Verse. 1917. |
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| 9. From ‘The Crosse’ |
| By John Donne (1573–1631) |
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| WHO can blot out the Crosse, which th’instrument | |
| Of God, dew’d on mee in the Sacrament? | |
| Who can deny mee power, and liberty | |
| To stretch mine armes, and mine owne Crosse to be? | |
| Swimme, and at every stroake, thou art thy Crosse; | 5 |
| The Mast and yard make one, where seas do tosse; | |
| Looke downe, thou spiest out Crosses in small things; | |
| Looke up, thou seest birds rais’d on crossed wings; | |
| All the Globes frame, and spheares, is nothing else | |
| But the Meridians crossing Parallels. | 10 |
| Material Crosses then, good physicke bee, | |
| But yet spirituall have chiefe dignity. | |
| These for extracted chimique medicine serve, | |
| And cure much better, and as well preserve; | |
| Then are you your own physicke, or need none, | 15 |
| When Still’d, or purg’d by tribulation. | |
| For when that Crosse ungrudg’d, unto you stickes, | |
| Then are you to your selfe, a Crucifixe. | |
| As perchance, Carvers do not faces make, | |
| But that away, which hid them there, do take; | 20 |
| Let Crosses, soe, take what hid Christ in thee, | |
| And be his image, or not his, but hee. | |
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