How Donne Read Augustine

Abstract

This chapter presents the first sustained study of Donne's reading and his scholarly methods, through paying detailed attention to his use of Saint Augustine's works. The chapter situates Donne's approach to Augustine in the context of Renaissance patristic scholarship and demonstrates the breadth and range of Donne's Augustinian reading. The chapter focuses on Donne's patristic sources: how many (and which) of Augustine's works he cited; whether Donne consulted the original Augustinian texts or intermediary sources, and how he dealt with these different types of patristic recourse. A survey is provided of the patristic editions that were available to divines in the early modern period, concentrating on the three sixteenth-century editions of Augustine's Works. The chapter then turns to Donne's philosophy of quotation, explaining his scholarly protocols, and the moral and theological thought which underpins them.