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The Book Index: Plutarch's Moralia And John Donne, John Shawcross

Quidditas

Thomas Carew's elegy on John Donne points up an important fact (and distinction); Donne little employed allusions to classical literature and learning such as authors like Edmund Spenser and John Milton did, much to the glee of teachers and the bane of students. But glosses on Donne's works also turn up relatively few contemporary or near-contemporary references to informational volumes, whether in English or in Latin. He knew Galileo's Siderus Nuncius, 1610, and he owned and used such works as Nicholas Harpsfield's Dialogi Sex contra Summi Pontificatus, Monasticae Vitae, Sanctorum, Sacrarum, Imaginum Oppugnatores, et pseudo-martyres, 1566, and …