Jesse Sharpe PhD thesis - Research@StAndrews:FullText ...

Donne’s Incarnating Words 83
Why are wee by all Creatures’. Donne opens the poem by asking ‘Why are wee by all
creatures waited on?’; 71 the poem begins by setting forth the dilemma that the creatures
that brought sin, death, and division to the world are also considered to be the reigning
creature in the world. Donne appropriately asks why this is the case, and although he does
not provide an answer for this question by the end of the poem, he does point the reader
back to the sacrifice of Jesus and the redemption available to all. The contemplation of the
earth and beasts that reside on it, in regards to their relationship with humanity, brings
forth the same paradox of high versus low found in the doctrine of the Incarnation, and so
Donne writes
Why doe the prodigall elements supply
Life and food to mee, being more pure then I,
Simple, and further from corruption?
Why brook’st thou, ignorant horse, subjection?
Why dost thou bull, and bore so seelily
Dissemble weaknesse, and by’one mans stroke die,
Whose whole kinde, you might swallow and feed upon? (2-8)
As nature, whose spiritual superiority can be argued for, subjects itself to a position of
servitude, death, and food for humanity, mirroring the work of Christ, Donne has to admit
that there is no logical reason for nature and its creatures to suffer in such a way because of
humans’ mistakes. The Christ-like sacrifice of nature and beasts for the benefit of
humanity leads Donne back to humanity’s sins and so he writes
71 All quotations from the ‘Holy Sonnets’ are from C. A. Patrides (ed.), John Donne: The Complete English
Poems (London, 1994).