John Donne's Meditation 17

566 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: What is the meaning of life philosophy essay

Life for people today is full of technology that helps extend our lives. It connects us and keeps us together as a whole. The meaning of life is a philosophical question concerning the purpose of existence. Not everyone in the world is ready to face death, even though we all have to hit the hay at some point in our lives. We humans believe we are invincible whether we mean to think that or not. Perhaps one of John Donne’s most famous written works is called “Meditation 17” and it highlights on death, society, and isolation. In John Donne’s “Meditation 17,” the bell tolls on a church which signifies that a death has occurred. All people are connected through the church, according to Donne. What happens to one person affects every person. Someone who dies is not lost but is translated into heaven because “God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God’s hand is in every translation.” The bell rings for prayer, for the suffering, and those who have died. Almost any person believes that the bell tolls for him...

Show More
Related

  • The Life of Eustace Conway: A Modern Transcendentalist

    983 Words  | 2 Pages

    live in the wilderness can recognize the central truth of existence, which is that death lives right beside us at all times, as close and as relevant as life itself, and that this reali...

    Read More

  • The Stranger a Novel by Albert Camus

    882 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...orm to society’s expectations. The idea of death makes one aware of one's life, one's vital being – that which is impermanent and will one day end.  When this vitality is appreciate, one feels free – for there is no urgency to perform some act that will cancel the possibility of death, seeing as though there is no such act.  In this sense, all human activity is absurd, and the real freedom is to be aware of life in it’s actually and totally, of its beauty and its pain.

    Read More

  • Exterminate All the Brutes by Sven Lindqvist

    984 Words  | 2 Pages

    Is it possible to live without fear of death? If you can, does it change your life and who you are as a whole? Lindqvist believes so. Early in the book he proposes the idea that with fear of death life has a deeper meaning. That only with the fear of death do...

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Denial Of Death By Ernest Becker

    1544 Words  | 4 Pages

    According to Ernest Becker, “The main thesis of this book is that it explains: the idea of death, the fear of death that haunts humans like nothing else; the mainspring of human activity designed to avoid the fatality of death, to overcome it by denying in some way that it is the final destiny for man” (“Becker” ix). The author of this book describes and quotes many other psychological thinkers views on the different kinds of fear and what contributes to the fear of death in man. The author explores several topics like self-worth, heroism, fear, anxiety, depression and many other issues throughout this book.

    Read More

  • Questioning the Meaning of Life

    1961 Words  | 4 Pages

    It might be thought that the first task in considering the question of the `Meaning of Life' is to define the key terms: `Life' and `Meaning'. However, the meanings of `Meaning' are many; and `Life' itself could be seen as not so much a separate entity, but rather, the totality of those meanings to which I have alluded. Anyway, I shall take `Life' in this context to mean HUMAN life, and the meaning of this life as, specifically, the condition of our existence so far as we bring this into question.

    Read More

  • Terror Management Theory

    907 Words  | 2 Pages

    Terror management theory (TMT) asserts that human beings have natural tendency for self-preservation if there is threat to one’s well–being (Greenberg, Solomon, & Pyszczynski, 1997). It notes that we are the cultural animals that pose self-awareness on the concept of past and future, as well as the understanding that one day we will die. We concern about our life and death but aware that it is unexpected by everything. The worse matter is that we become aware of our vulnerability and helplessness when facing death-related thoughts and ultimate demise (Pyszczynski & Greenberg, 1992). The inevitable death awareness or mortality salience provides a ground for experiencing the existential terror, which is the overwhelming concern of people’s mortality and existence. In order to avoid the continued existence of threats, people need faith in a relatively affirmative and plausive cultural worldview and meaning of life (Greenberg, Pyszczynski, & Solomon, 1995). Cultural worldview is a perceptual construction in the society which explaining the origins of life and the existence of afterlife. We have to invest a set of cultural worldviews by ourselves that are able to provide meaning, stability and order to our lives and to offer the promise of death transcendence (Solomon, Greenberg, & Pyszczynski, 2004). On the other hand, we hold a belief that one is living up to the standards of value prescribed by that worldview and social norm shared by a group of people. This belief is derived by self-esteem of individual. We maintain the perception and confident that we are fulfilling the cultural prescriptions for value in the society and are thus eligible for some form of personal immortality (Landau & Greenberg, 2006). We Together with the assump...

    Read More

  • Holy Sonnet 10

    956 Words  | 2 Pages

    William Penn, an English philosopher and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, once said that, “For death is no more than a turning of us over from time to eternity.” He is saying that death is not the end of our lives, but just another stage. In the poem “Holy Sonnet 10” by John Donne, the poet talks to death itself and gives his opinion on his view of death and others’ views: it is something that cannot control anything, can be replaced by others things, and is not the end of a person’s life. Through the use of his figurative language, Petrachan form, and tone and language, Mr. Donne expresses the message that death is not to be feared because one lives on in heaven.

    Read More

  • Cultural Analysis On Death And The Afterlife

    1074 Words  | 3 Pages

    The concept of human mortality and how it is dealt with is dependent upon one’s society or culture. For it is the society that has great impact on the individual’s beliefs. Hence, it is also possible for other cultures to influence the people of a different culture on such comprehensions. The primary and traditional way men and women have made dying a less depressing and disturbing idea is though religion. Various religions offer the comforting conception of death as a begining for another life or perhaps a continuation for the former.

    Read More

  • Perception of Death in the Play “Everyman"

    1112 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the play “everyman” death is depicted as something that is terribly feared as no one seemed ready for it, death is perceived as something that takes one away from the pleasures of this world.

    Read More

  • Interpretation of A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning

    1035 Words  | 3 Pages

    In arguing against mourning and emotional confusion, Donne uses a series of bold and unexpected comparisons for the love between himself and his lady. Donne makes his first surprising analogy in the first stanza when he compares the approaching separation of the lovers to death. "he speaker compares his parting from his lover to the parting of the soul from a virtuous man at death. According to the speaker, "virtuous men pass mildly away" (line 1) because the virtue in their lives has assured them of glory and happiness in the afterlife; therefore, they die in peace without fear and emotion. By this he suggests that the separation of the lovers is parrallel to the separation caused by death.

    Read More

  • Critical Analysis Of The Last Night Of The World

    828 Words  | 2 Pages

    Perhaps of the greatest fears possessed by humanity is the fear of death. There is no real idea of what happens when one dies, and that terrifying uncertainty leads most to avoid even the thought of it at all costs. With an invisible clock ticking human existence away, there remains the question of what is the meaning of life? Ray Bradbury’s short story The Last Night of the World not only forces its audience to reflect on the hypothetical of today being the last day, it offers an idea of what is important about the time people have on Earth. Through clever ambiguity, subtle mood building, and reflective dialogue, Bradbury suggests that it isn’t from the world on the grand scale that the answer is found, nor is it in personal grandeur or fast

    Read More

  • Exit The King Eugene Ionesco Analysis

    1334 Words  | 3 Pages

    What is the purpose of life? But ultimately, what is the purpose of death? Why are we born just to die? These are two major wonders in the play "Exit the King" by Eugene Ionesco. For example, King Berenger asks the question, "Why was I born, if it wasn't forever?" This question wouldn't be of great significance if nobody possessed the desire to live forever. Our natural instinct is in the existence of life itself. It's an inborn pattern of survival. Furthermore, not only does the play "Exit the King" execute the theme of mankind wanting to be immortal, but it also shows how we need to prepare inwardly for when our time of demise draws near. My viewpoint on this play is that we tend to live our lives by putting off the fact that we will eventually die. The words of Queen Marie seem to be the motto of today's world, "Until death comes, you are still here." In other words, it's synonymous to the meaning of "live in the moment." The hard truth is that we are dying human beings. And it's our duty to accept this cruel fact. I would recommend the play "Exit the King" in view of the fact that it is an attempt to teach us by showing that we can learn how to die, instead of trying to avoid a fate that is impossible to

    Read More

  • Power Of Death

    700 Words  | 2 Pages

    With the use of metaphors, imagery, and symbolization both authors show the power that death has over one’s body. Through personification both authors show how death can be thought of as a leader—either a gentle leader or strong, mighty leader—grabbing you out of your busy life and leading you to eternity. Dickinson painted the picture of death through the setting suns gazing grains, and the children playing in the yard, reminiscing on her beautiful life that was filled with happiness and joy. Whereas Donne showed how he conquered death and how death was a slave to chance rather than a powerful being. Both poems showed their ride to eternity and their perspectives on Death himself.

    Read More

  • Death, Be Not Proud by John Donne

    766 Words  | 2 Pages

    John Donne will not accept death as the finale, his religious conviction supports in the belief of eternal life proceeding death. Throughout the poem Donne’s main purpose was the personification of death, his use of figurative language gave death humanistic characteristics and made death vulnerable and unintimidating. The structure of three quatrains and a couplet for the poem allowed for easier understanding of the context because the layout and rhyme scheme helped the poem flow and also revealed the tones. The imagery of death described by Donne breaks down death’s pride and bravado, as well as shine an encouraging light past the process of dying, on to the hope of delivery to eternal life. Each element played a significant role in the interpretation of the paradox of the poem, that ultimately death is not the universal destroyer of life.

    Read More

  • Is Suicide the Solution?

    1534 Words  | 4 Pages

    Throughout time, death has been viewed in a negative light. In general, it is an event to be mourned and is seen by some as the end to existence. People do not usually seek death as an answer to their problems. In various pieces of literature, however, suicide is contemplated by the characters as the only solution to the pain and grief that they experience.

    Read More

More about John Donne's Meditation 17

Open Document