Of “Coming to be and passing away”: Aristotelian Influence in Donne’s "Ayre and Angells”

The endeavor of this study is to read Donne’s “Ayre and Angells” as a poem of “coming to be and passing away” in the Aristotelian sense of the words (GC I.314^a1, p.512).[1] This study explores influences in “Ayre and Angells” derived from Aristotle’s work, On Generation and Corruption. Donne achieves Aristotle’s processes of “coming to be and passing away” in his poem using a syncretic system of thought implementing what we will call womb and parent words, the four elements, and alchemy. Aristotle’s notions of “coming to be and passing away” occur when the womb and parent words, the earthly elements and the alchemical theme meet certain Aristotelian criteria in the poem. What we have in “Ayre and Angells” is a poem depicting both creation and destruction, both love and loss. It is a poem encompassing the metamorphosis and transience that defines “coming to be and passing away.” “Ayre and Angells” is Donne’s alchemical experiment of words in which a little cosmos is born, twenty-eight lines of very deliberate words, dense and precise enough to define love in the earthly realm.

Love is Donne’s vehicle for syncretism in “Ayre and Angells.” The four earthly elements meet the Aristotelian criteria necessary to cause the cycle of  “coming to be and passing away” to occur under the conditions of love. The Aristotelian criteria that the four earthly elements meet in “Ayre and Angells” are as follows: 1. The four earthly elements are present; 2. the four elements initiate in their extreme states; 3. the four elements reach an Aristotelian mean; 4. the elements return to an inevitable state of extremes. Aristotle states that this “coming to be and passing away” is “eternal” and moves in a “circular motion” that is “continuous,” (GC II.336^b34-337^a2, pp.551-2).[2] It is this cyclical motion that Donne demonstrates in “Ayre and Angells.”

The first fourteen lines of “Ayre and Angells” demonstrate the Aristotelian notion of “coming to be.” The second half of the poem, lines fifteen through twenty-eight, demonstrate Aristotle’s ideal of “passing away.” There are two Aristotelian occurrences of a “coming to be” in the first half of the poem, the “Angells” in line four and the “chylde” in line seven.[3] The “Angells” and the “chylde” have a parallel metaphorical structure in that they are both born into the first half of “Ayre and Angells.” The presence of sexual innuendo and consummate love in the poem has been well documented by Achsah Guibbory and Stella Revard.[4] This study concurs with the presence of both sexual innuendo and consummate love as syncretic forms that allow Aristotle’s “coming to be” to occur. The second half of the poem also demonstrates the “passing away” of the “Angells.” What is uncertain in the second half of the poem is what else passes away. Is it the “chylde”? Is it a “parent”? Is it perhaps both?

The “coming to be” of the “Angells” in line four has already been explained by scholars, though not in a strictly Aristotelian sense. R.V. Young’s article and Michael Schoenfeldt’s additional comments note that line four is a reference to Thomas Aquinas’ theories regarding angelology.[5] The science of condensing the air surrounding an Angel’s heavenly body into clothing such that the Angel may be perceived in the earthly realm is a widely accepted early modern theory. We know that Aquinas read and was influenced by Aristotle.[6] Aquinas’ angelology works in syncretism with “coming to be and passing away,” with womb and parent words, the earthly elements and the alchemical theme in the poem. What has not yet been explained is the connection of the “Angells” to the “coming to be” of the child in an Aristotelian sense.  

According to Aristotle’s first criterion, for the cycle of a “coming to be and passing away” to initiate, the earthly elements must be present. Of all the twenty-eight lines in “Ayre and Angells,” the very first line has had the least amount of scholarship written about it in isolation.[7] However, much may be learned from line one of “Ayre” when looked at from an alchemical perspective, with the four earthly elements that cause a “coming to be” to occur in mind. The words “Twice” and “thrice” both contain the word, “ice” within them. “Ice” is a form of water. As early as the poem’s title (“Ayre and Angells” or the variant “Fire and Angells”) and into the first line of the sonnet, Donne is beginning to accrue the four earthly elements associated with alchemy and Aristotle’s notion of “coming to be and passing away,” earth, air, fire and water.[8] Furthermore, Donne is in line one, establishing a pattern of choosing primary words with equally important secondary words housed within them.[9] This pattern established in line one continues for the remainder of the poem. For the purposes of abbreviating this pattern we shall from here forward refer to the words housed within other words as womb words. The word in which the womb word is housed will from here forward be referred to as the parent word.

Donne houses the four elements associated with alchemy in the poem as womb and parent words to demonstrate the metamorphosis and transience in the process of “coming to be and passing away.” The process of “coming to be and passing away” is a transition from imperceptible to perceptible, just as the “Angells”  and “chylde” are born into the poem. As such, sounds become just as important as visual clues to locate the four earthly elements. Rhetorical clues manifest as the sounds of words nestled in the alchemical womb of other words.[10] Even in manuscripts where “Twice” and “thrice” are spelled variously as, “T-w-i-s-e” or “t-h-r-i-s-e” the sound of “ice” still remains embedded into the parent word.[11] Helen Vendler notices the same type of wordplay when studying Shakespeare’s sonnets.[12] It is also helpful to remember that Donne and his contemporaries were students of Latin, a language in which much information is embedded directly into a word.[13]

The alchemical theme, which begins subliminally in the form of parent and womb words begins to manifest more and more clearly as the poem continues. As “Ayre and Angells” progresses, Donne continues to accrue the earthly elements. Donne’s manifestation of the four earthly elements appear first subtly as parent and womb words and then more overtly as regular words (i.e. parent word “twice” and womb word “ice” versus the more obvious “flame”). The alchemical theme rises from the text and what was invisible becomes perceptible, in the same way the “Angells” manifest within the first portion of the poem. The tension here between invisible and visible, between the physical and spiritual, is a tension that defines the poem. 

Donne establishes his intentions to include the four earthly elements in accordance with Aristotle’s first criterion early in the poem. Meeting under the conditions of love, Donne accrues all four earthly elements in the time of “coming to be,” the first half of “Ayre and Angells.” Line two’s parent word “before” contains the womb word “four.”[14] “Four” is a clue to start counting the four earthly elements Donne embeds throughout the poem, the elements necessary for a “coming to be” to occur. In line three we see “flame” (i.e. fire) added to “ice” (i.e. water), and then in line four  “Angells” is symbolic for air.[15] In line eight Donne continues to add earthly elements with “limmes of flesh,” which is symbolic and synonymous here for earth.[16] By line eleven, there are four earthly elements embedded into the first half of the poem. 

Another alchemical clue is revealed in the womb word “ship” within the parent word “worship’d” in line four. While the “Angells” in line four are condensing air into clouds, the “ice” in line one and “flame” in line three are causing an alchemical process of their own. This is a hint to look for water, water which does not actually appear until line fifteen: “Whilst thus to Ballast love, I thought.” “Ballast” is a nautical term alluding to a vessel of some kind upon water.[17] As line fifteen begins, the ice from line one has melted into water on which the lovers attempt to “ballast” their “Pinnace.” The “ship” is now a small boat (i.e. pinnace), having transformed metaphorically from macrocosmic to microcosmic vessel between lines four and eighteen.[18] In the transformation of the “ship” into a “Pinnace,” we are able to see in Donne’s imagery a more thorough development in the theme of transience and metamorphosis. The “ship” is symbolic of the “Parent” and the “Pinnace” of the child.

In Donne’s cosmos that is “Ayre and Angells,” the four earthly elements must not only be present in the Aristotelian sense to create a “coming to be and passing away” to occur, they must also be present under the conditions of love. This distinction and requirement of love is what makes Donne’s system of syncretism uniquely his own, apart from Aristotle. Donne’s repetition of the word “love” is evidence that love is indeed the vehicle for the poem’s syncretism. The word “love” is used eleven times in the poem if one includes parent word “lovely,” and womb word “love” in line six. Parent word “womens” houses womb word “mens” in line twenty-eight to emphasize Donne’s specific definition of love: that of love between men and women in the earthly realm. 

Donne’s vehicle of love and the presence of the four earthly elements, as they meet the first Aristotelian criterion,  allow for the conception of a child and the perceptibility of the “Angells,” in the first half of the poem. The alchemical theme in “Ayre and Angells” exists in syncretism with the Aristotelian notion of “coming to be and passing away.” This alchemical theme is clearly demonstrated by the presence of the four earthly elements. However, the type of alchemy that Donne is presenting in “Ayre” is highly different from the applications of alchemy found in his other works.[19] It is apparent that Donne’s usage of alchemy in “Ayre” is not satirical, especially when compared to his usage noted by Linden in “Love’s Alchymie,” (p.157). It is also apparent that Donne is not speaking about the “production of gold” that Linden finds in “The Bracelet,” (p.158).[20] There is an intentional tension in “Ayre and Angells” between the expected and the unexpected in regard to literary conventions, and the alchemical theme is no exception. In the same way that Petrarchan tropes are subverted in the poem, so too is the traditional alchemical theme.[21] I would argue there is also an intentional confusion of the genders in the poem to demonstrate the moment of conception and the unity of mother, father and child.[22] No matter what type of alchemy that one is referencing, a process towards an end result is the overarching theme, which supports the Aristotelian notion of a “coming to be.” In “Ayre and Angells,” Donne is applying alchemy towards the conception of a child and the birth of the “Angells” into the first half of the poem. The vehicle for Donne’s alchemy is love and the criteria that the four elements meet under the conditions of love.

Initiation of the elements in an extreme state is the second Aristotelian criterion that Donne meets in “Ayre and Angells.” Aristotle’s first criterion has been accomplished as all the earthly elements are present in the the poem. However, according to Aristotle the earthly elements must not only be present, they must be present in their extreme states for a “coming-to-be” to occur. Aristotle writes, “Now comings-to-be result from contraries, and one pair of the contrary extremes is present; hence the other pair must also be present, so that every compound will include all the simple bodies,” (GC II. 335^a 7-9, p.548). Now, Donne might have chosen any number of ways to include the four earthly elements in the beginning of the poem. He might have chosen their more standard format and just say, “water” or “fire.” He might have chosen to use the terms “hot” and “cold” or “moist” if he wished us to simply understand the existence of the simple bodies in the poem. The “simple bodies” are defined by Aristotle thusly: “The simple bodies are indeed similar in nature to them [the earthly elements], but not identical with them. Thus the simple body corresponding to fire is fire-like, not fire; that which corresponds to air is air-like; and so on with the rest of them,” (GC II.330^b 23-26, p.541). Because of Aristotle’s distinction between the earthly elements and their corresponding simple bodies in his notion of “coming to be,” it is equally necessary for Donne to make this distinction as he adheres to the second Aristotelian criterion. Accordingly, what Donne chooses to do is show the moment when the contraries are “extremes,” the same extremes that Aristotle tells us are crucial for the type of “coming-to-be” that Donne is demonstrating. For Aristotle tells us clearly what he feels of fire and ice, “But fire is an excess of heat, just as ice is an excess of cold,” (GC II. 330^b 25-26, p.541). Further, Donne’s choice of “flame” in line three is very specific. Of flame, Aristotle states, “Moreover, this mode of Fire’s coming-to-be is confirmed by perception. For flame is par excellence Fire; but flame is burning smoke, and smoke consists of Air and Earth,” (GC II. 331^b 26-26, p.542). Donne chooses “flame” here instead of fire to demonstrate fire’s perceptible form of “coming-to-be.” Fire is imperceptible in its simple body state of contraries, hot and dry.[23] Once fire becomes flame it is united with earth and air and is in a sense, born into the world as something still “shapeless” yet detectable to the eye (l.3). Thus, as “fire” becomes “flame” in line three there is another transition moment in “Ayre” of a “coming to be,” analogous to the “Angells” in line four and also the “chylde” in line seven.[24]

The third Aristotelian criterion that Donne meets in “Ayre and Angells” is a transition of the four elements from a state of extremes into a “mean.” The four earthly elements begin in “Ayre and Angells” in their extreme states to demonstrate the initial stage in the cycle of an Aristotelian “coming-to-be.” However, the elements undergo a metamorphosis of states throughout the poem just as the “Angells” do. For the elements to create the life of the child they must do much more than simply condense air, according to Aristotle. Once a pair of “contrary extremes” and “all the simple bodies” are present the combinations must then reach a middle, more stable condition to create life. This is what Aristotle calls a “mean,” (GC II. 334^b 24-27, p.548).[25] We may again see why traditional Petrarchan conventions simply cannot be applicable to “Ayre and Angells.” Nothing truly remains “hot” or “cold” for the entirety of the poem, much less the male or female lovers. The poem’s constancy is change. As soon as the extremes of “ice” and “flame” are introduced into the poem, a “mean” is then achieved in the “limmes of flesh” of line eight and the “body” in line ten. The “mean” is maintained throughout the first fourteen lines of the poem with “body” again in line thirteen, and the anatomical “Lippe, Eye, and Browe,” of line fourteen. In the time of “coming to be” in the the first half of the poem, unity is created as the “mean” is achieved, and the “chylde” is formed. The soul’s love and consummate love work in tandem as a syncretic vehicle to create life.[26]

The fourth Aristotelian criterion that Donne meets in “Ayre and Angells” is a return of the four elements from a “mean” back to a state of extremes. The second half of the poem begins with a movement back into states of extremes, and irregular movement continues throughout the remainder of the sonnet. By line eighteen, despite the work of the male and female lover to “ballast love” and the “wares” (i.e. “chylde”), “loves Pinnace” is “overfraught” and in danger of sinking. Language of weight distribution issues can be found in line twenty’s “much to much.” We must remember that the “Pinnace” is the microcosmic counterpoint to the macrocosmic womb word “ship” in line four’s parent word “worship’d.” The “ship” exists in the time designated to “coming to be” and is a much more adequate vessel to “ballast” (l.15). The “Pinnace” exists in the time of “passing away,” and is too small a vessel to adequately “ballast” (l.15). The “ship” in line four represents movement towards the “mean” and the “Pinnace” a movement back into a state of extremes.

Line twenty-one demonstrates the push and pull of the cycle of “coming to be and passing away” in its self-opposition: “nor in Nothing, nor in things.” Love cannot exist in “nothing” and love can no longer exist in “things” either. The “Angells” in line four were able to exist for a time as a “coming-to-be” prior to their cloud clothing (i.e. as a “Nothing”). They were simultaneously a perceptible “coming-to-be” for a time inside the condensed air, or “in thinges.” Line twenty-one is a reversal of the movement and alchemical composition of line four. The “Angells” which came to be in the sublunary realm, for a time unified by love are now made disparate from their cloud clothing and can be perceived in the earthly sphere no more. The “mean” that allowed the earthly elements and their simple bodies to create a “chylde” in the first half of “Ayre” returns again to a state of contraries and extremes by line twenty-one and twenty-two, “For, nor in Nothing nor in thinges / Extreme and scattering bright can love inhere.” The reader is reminded in line twenty-three and twenty-four that the “Angell face, and winges” was always made of transient “Ayre.”  Similarly, parent word “Disparitee” contains the womb word “despair”  in line twenty-six.  We see the definite shift in tone from the beginning of the poem to the end, a shift from creation to destruction, and from the union of love to the rending.

Donne applies a careful manipulation of the word “pure” in his demonstration of the Aristotelian state of extremes located in the second half of “Ayre and Angells.” Donne uses the word “pure” twice in line twenty-four and once more in line twenty-seven as the womb word of “Puritee.” We know by line twenty-four that the poem has returned to an “Extream” state. What has “come to be” in the first half of the poem is now being rendered asunder and is “passing away.” Aristotle states of the simple bodies, that fire and earth “are extremes and purest,” (GC II. 330^b 34, p.541). An “Angell” in its purest state is an imperceptible, superlunary creature on Earth that cannot remain in a perceptible state for very long. The “Angells” from line four must return to their heavenly “spheare,” and must leave the sublunary realm just as their imagery fades from the poem. The cloud clothing belonging to the “Angells” is dispersed. The “Angells,” the earthly elements, and their simple bodies are returned to states of contraries and extremes, which though more disparate are by definition more “pure.” The “soul” in line seven is the parent of “love.” The “soul,” like the “Angells,” must return to the superlunary sphere from which it came to return to its most pure state. The “soul” must separate from the “limes of flesh” to become pure once more.[27] Donne’s deliberate manipulation of “pure” illuminates the theme of alchemy, and the Aristotelian criteria in the poem’s syncretism.

In “Ayre and Angells,” Donne has constructed a cosmos in which “coming to be and passing away” perpetually occur, just as Aristotle requires. We see evidence of this in the last three lines, “Just such Disparitee / As is twixt Ayre and Angells Puritee / Twixt womens love and mens will ever bee.” Aristotle and Donne demonstrate the same continuity of existence. However, Donne’s vehicle for perpetual existence is not just science, it is love. The emphasis on love is what makes Donne’s universe distinct from Aristotle’s. Donne’s syncretic system of the four elements, alchemy and the Aristotelian notion of “coming to be and passing away” is a cosmological system governed by love. Within the scope of this complex and unique cosmos in “Ayre and Angells,” Donne accomplishes the most ambitious of tasks: an intricate definition of love in the earthly realm.

Notes

[1] B32, British Library Copy Text, The Donne Variorum, http://donnevariorum.dh.tamu.edu.  

[2] Aristotle states, “Coming-to-be and passing away, will as we have said, always be continuous and will never fail owing to the cause we have stated,” (GC II.336^b25-26). Aristotle’s full quotation is as follows: “God therefore adopted the remaining alternative, and fulfilled the perfection of the universe by making coming-to-be uninterrupted; for the greatest coherence would thus be secured to existence, because coming-to-be should itself come-to-be perpetually is the closest approximation to eternal being” (GC II.336^b31-35). 

[3] Labriola hints at the possibility of child conception briefly. See page 79, “Thus analogies of parenthood and procreation suggest…”

[4] Guibbory notices a “’before and after’ meditative structure” to “Ayre” though Guibbory sees the poem as a “‘morning after’ poem” not an alchemical one (p.105). It is certainly clear that consummate love has occurred in the first stanza as Guibbory also writes, “It seems obvious from the bawdy innuendoes of ‘take a body’ and ‘assume thy body,’ which are amplified in the first half of stanza two, that the speaker and his mistress have had sexual relations,” (p.106).  Revard states that, “Stanza one gives us two angelic annunciations, first of the conception, then the birth of love,” (p.16).

[5] “Although air, in its abiding tenuousness, would not retain shape or color; when it is condensed, it can be shaped and colored, as is obvious in clouds. And thus angels assume bodies of air, condensing it by divine power to the extent required for the formation of the body to be assumed,”(Young, p.9). See also Schoenfeldt’s comments on Young’s notes regarding Aquinas (p.23).

[6] Aquinas’ A Commentary on Aristotle’s De anima tells us that he at least read On the Soul.

[7] See Young’s gloss of the first four lines (p.3), Stein’s comment (p.74), Labriola (p.78) and Guibbory (p.107).

[8] Donne Variorum manuscripts O21 and Y2 report the variant heading, “Fire and Angells.”  See also Shawcross’ notes on the variant heading, (p.35). See On Generation and Corruption, Book II 1-5, pp.538-45 for Aristotle’s comments on the earthly elements. 

[9] Herz’s assessment on the complexities of the words in the poem is helpful, “For there is hardly a word in this poem that cannot be read upside down or inside out,” (p.27).

[10] “alchemical womb” – “The sulphur-mercury theory also derives from aspects of the old worldview and is the basis. For Renaissance notions of the natural formation of metals and minerals in the earth and their artificial production through alchemy. The sulfur-mercury theory also draws on the idea of primary opposites inherent in Aristotelian view… These two principles interact in the form of subterranean vapors or exhalations (the former “male,” the latter “female”), and if the conjunction occurs under proper conditions- the degree of heat is especially crucial- new metals are produced within the womb of the earth,” (Linden, 19).  

[11] Manuscript Variants for “Twice” and “thrice” in line one are as follows: “Twice” and “thrise” B46, B7 & VA2; “Twise” and “thrise” O21 & Y3.  See Donne Variorum, http://donnevariorum.dh.tamu.edu.

[12] Shakespeare’s Sonnet 81 is a helpful example to use with “Ayre” when noting rhetorical devices in the early modern period. In reference to “death” and “breath” Vendler writes: “These words all act out mutatis mutandis” the central paradox that two such opposed words as death and breath differ only by their initial consonants; that is, they share more than they realize, and only the poet, who rhymes them, knows in his bones the ‘binding secret’ (Seamus Heaney’s words) between them. Language, and especially self-conscious rhyme, is thus seen as an access route to paradoxical but true relations among entities,” (p.361). See also Roberts’ comments on Pritchard’s 1982 article on the sounds of words in the poem (p.58).

[13] Donne and his coterie would have been well practiced at discerning heavily embedded language. “Walton speaks only of Donne’s early command of French and Latin;” (Bald, p.40).

[14] Prior to standardized spelling “four” may have been spelled “f-o-r-e.” Certainly, the early modern reader would have been accustomed to seeing “four” spelled in several different ways. The OED records variant spellings such as: “fure,” “fowr,” “foure,” “fovre,” and “fower” all c.1600 and prior. (OED “four”, adj. and noun, adj.1a).

[15] See R.V. Young’s article, p.1; Also, Linden, diagram and comments, pp.17-8.

[16] “Limmes of flesh” – 14.  figurative. Chiefly literary and poetic. a. The material of the human body, considered as derived from the ground; the human body or its substance. Frequently in  earth to earth with allusion to the Book of Common Prayer (see quot. 1549), Cf. clay n. 4a, although now regarded as a figurative use, this (originally) theological sense was not so considered until the modern period. [In quot. 1549   ultimately with allusion to Genesis 3:19; compare 1535   Bible (Coverdale) Gen. iii. 19   In the sweate of thy face shalt thou eate thy bred, tyll thou be turned agayne vnto earth [Heb. ʿal-haāḏāmah, L. in terram], whence thou art take: for earth thou art, and vnto earth shalt thou be turned (OED, “earth”, n.1).   Also, see Linden, “But following the blackness and death of this putrifactio (and continuing the analogy with Christ’s death, resurrection and man’s salvation), these base materials later appeared to be ‘reborn’ in the form of perfect, pure, and incorruptible gold,” (p.9).

[17] “Ballast”- “Any heavy material, such as gravel, sand, metal, water, etc., placed in the hold of a ship to weigh it down in the water and prevent it from capsizing when under sail or in motion,” (OED, n.1a).

[18] “Pinnace” – “A small sailing vessel,” (OED, n.I).  See also www.latindictionary.net “Pinnae:” A Latin word for a “water wheel” or a “wing” is “pinna” or “pinnae.” It also means a “battlement, parapet, steeple or sire,” all of which are decidedly phallic images.[18] If we use “pinnace” as the pinnacle word in “Ayre” it works as a central point of syncretism for the poem.

[19] See Darke Hierogliphicks. Linden (though he does not discuss “Ayre and Angells”) divides Donne’s application of alchemy into four categories as follows: “(1) poems treating alchemy satirically; (2) poems that reveal alchemical ideas about the nature, attributes and production of gold; (3) poems that make reference to the types of equipment, materials, and procedures that alchemists used in their experiments; and (4) poems especially concerned with transmutation and the making of elixirs and the philosophers’ stones,” (p.156).   

[20] Scholars have previously pointed to a metaphor between Donne’s “Angells” and an “angel” or gold coin (Labriola, p.79). It is likely that Donne is playing on this metaphor, but certainly not to lead his reader to a satirical end. Moreover, the allusion to the gold coin “angel” is more aptly a clue leading the reader to Donne’s alchemical theme, becoming synonymous for “gold.”

[21] “But when Donne deploys these tropes [Petrarchan] most overtly, he is most at pains to subvert them,” (Young, p.2).

[22] See Schoenfeldt’s article and his comments on Docherty and Young. Schoenfeldt’s article explains how Docherty may be correct: “In glossing the phrase pinnace, for example, Young appropriately suggests that it is a slang term for a prostitute in the period, but he ignores the assonance linking the word to the clinical term for male genitalia- penis- probably because it would require him to confront the same labiality among gender characteristics that I am arguing… If ‘love’s pinnace’ can be both female body and male phallus, both the object and the symbol of male desire, it truly is “overfraught” with opposing gender-specific meanings” (Schoenfeld, p.23).

[23] See GC I.3, 318^b 3-13 for more on “fire” as an “unqualified coming-to-be” and Parmenides’ account of this discussed by Aristotle, (p.520).

[24] Aristotle makes a distinction between “qualified and unqualified coming to be” that must be saved for a longer version of this study. The “Angells” in line four and “chylde” in line seven are examples of both a “qualified” and an “unqualified coming to be” in Aristotelian terms. For more information on this distinction, see GC I. 318^b28-32, p.521.

[25] “It is thus, then, that in the first place the elements are transformed; and that out of the elements there come-to-be flesh and bone and the like- the hot becoming cold and the cold becoming hot when they have been brought to a mean. For at the mean is neither hot nor cold,” (Aristotle, GC II. 334^b 24-27, p.548).

[26] “His [Aristotle’s] concern is quite simply that physical substances, and especially the four simple bodies, are capable of affecting one another in virtue of their qualitative differences, and that an understanding of the conditions and modes of such processes of interaction (along with touch and mixture) is requisite for an Aristotelian account of natural change,” (Wildberg, p.223).  See also his footnote 6, “In fact, we cannot understand Aristotle’s view of mixture (I.10) without it, nor the important Aristotelian tenet that the elements are capable of forming, at a higher level homoemoeric substances that are not earth, air, fire and water but in fact wood, flesh, bone and so on (p.223).

[27] Donne’s ideas about the soul here are his own in this poem.  Aristotle thought the the soul was something relative only to the body. See Aristotle, On the Soul, Book II, (pp.656-65).

Works Cited

Aristotle.  The Complete Works of Aristotle, edited by Jonathan Barnes, Two Volumes, Princeton UP, 1984. 

Bald, R.C. John Donne, A Life. Oxford UP, 1986.

Donne, John. The Oxford Authors, edited by John Carey, Oxford UP, 1990. 

Guibbory, Achsah. “Donne, the Idea of Woman, and the Experience of Love.” John Donne

Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne, Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9, Number 1, edited by Achsah Guibbory,1990, pp.105-12.

Herz, Judith. “Resisting Mutuality.” John Donne Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne, Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9, Number 1, edited by Achsah Guibbory, 1990, pp.27-31.

Johnson, Jeffrey. Digital Donne: The Online Variorum. The Donne Variorum Department of

 English at East Carolina U, 2019, http://donnevariorum.dh.tamu.edu. Accessed 23 Apr. 2020.

Labriola, Albert. “’This Dialogue of One’: Rational Argument and Affective Discourse in Donne’s ‘Aire and Angels’.” John Donne Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne, Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9, Number 1, edited by Achsah Guibbory, 1990, pp.77-83.

Linden, Stanton. Darke Hierogliphicks. Kentucky UP, 1996.

Mahoney, Kevin. Latin Dictionary. The Latdict Group, 2002-2020, https://latin-dictionary.net. Accessed 23 April 2020.

Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford UP, 2020, https://www.oed.com.  Accessed 23 Apr. 2020.  

Revard, Stella. “The Angelic Messenger in ‘Aire and Angels.’” John Donne Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne, Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9, Number, edited by Achsah Guibbory,1990, pp.15-8.

Roberts, John. “’Just such disparite’: The Critical Debate About ‘Aire and Angels.’” John Donne

Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne, Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9, Number 1, edited by Achsah Guibbory,1990, pp.43-64.

Schoenfeldt, Michael. “Patriarchal Assumptions and Egalitarian Designs.” John Donne Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne, Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9 Number 1, edited by Achsah Guibbory,1990, pp.23-6. 

Shawcross, John. “Donne’s ‘Aire and Angels’: Text and Context.” John Donne Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne, Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9, Number 1, edited by Achsah Guibbory, 1990, pp.33-41.

Stein, Arnold. “Interpretation: ‘Aire and Angels.’” John Donne Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne, Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9, Number 1, edited by Achsah Guibbory, 1990, pp.65-75.

Vendler, Helen.  The Art of Shakespeare’s Sonnets. Harvard UP, 1997.

Wildberg, Christian. “On Generation and Corruption I.7: Aristotle on poiein and paschein.” On Generation and Corruption Book I: Symposium Aristotelicum, edited by Frans de Haas and Jaap Mansfeld, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 2007, pp.219-42.

Young, R.V. “Angels in ‘Aire and Angels.’” John Donne Journal, Studies in the Age of Donne,

Special Issue: Interpreting “Aire and Angels,” Volume 9, Number 1, edited by Achsah Guibbory, 1990, pp.1-14.

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