Surrounded By Deep Water: No One Is Safe

No Man is an Island

No man is an island entire of itself,
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.

If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less,
As well as if a promontory were,
As well as any manor of thy friend's,
Or of thine own were.

Any man's death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.

John Dunne, “Meditation XVII” from Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, and severall steps in my Sicknes (sic)

John Donne’s “Meditation XVII” is one of a series of essays he wrote when he was seriously ill in the winter of 1623, and has since been popularly remembered for one excerpt: “No man is an island.”

Having come close to death, he described the illness he had suffered from and his thoughts throughout his recovery with "near super-human speed and concentration.” What disease Donne suffered from is not known. Writers have suggested typhus as a likely culprit, but Donne's writings on the subject reference multiple diseases. Devotions is one of only seven works attributed to Donne which were printed during his lifetime.

The poem is suggestive thought of man’s interconnectedness overruling the dictum of his individuality (or even insularity). A person cannot extricate himself from the rest of the living continuum and pretend to be complete of his own integrity. It is implausible for one man to grow and thrive in society without the love and affection of his fellow-citizens.

Likening the isolated and insular man to an island, Donne insists how the individual is but a component of the larger mass of humanity, the “continent,” and can only exist in conjunction with the world outside. It is evident Donne's illness has made him dependent upon many trusted others for his complete recovery.

“No man is an island entire of itself.”

The promontory jutting out of the sea is as exposed to the destruction by the forces of the sea and the wind as man is susceptible to the loss of what he holds near and dear. The poet might be condemning the superfluous nature of the materialistic life in stating that the loss of a rich friend’s manor (his prized possession) parallels a similar devastating loss shared by anyone else who loses a less valuable home.

“If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less,
As well as if a promontory were,
As well as any manor of thy friend's,
Or of thine own were.

It is a realization of universal humanity in which the life cycle of each mortal being is propelled towards inevitable death.

“Any man's death diminishes me.”

The verse exhibits the urgency of how man thrives in the company of his fellow human beings, and how he is but an insignificant component of the entire scheme, equipped with his own intrinsic set of functionalities and dispensations in the world-order.

“Because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.”

The death of an individual – signified by the tolling of the bell – is of value if it is understood by those who make good use of it. Donne argues that the death of any individual is something others can learn from, should they understand it properly.

Thus, the death of any one man strikes a knell – an alarm onto the world – which reminds us we are diminished by his “deletion,” and the poet sees that as a tragedy for the human race. A wholly isolated individual rejects this socially encoded existence.

A conspicuous exchange and a transaction forge a relationship among all people. Surely, human beings can learn from the sufferings and experiences of their fellow humans to better prepare themselves for their own deaths. In the end, the bell tolls for each and every one of us.