For whom the bell tolls

Perchance he for whom this bell tolls may be so ill as that he knows

not it tolls for him. And perchance I may think myself so much better

than I am, as that they who are about me, and see my state, may have

caused it to toll for me, and I know not that. The church is

catholic, universal, so are all her actions; all that she does,

belongs to all. When she baptizes a child, that action concerns me;

for that child is thereby connected to that head which is my head too,

and ingraffed into that body, whereof I am a member. And when she

buries a man, that action concerns me; all mankind is of one author,

and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of

the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter

must be so translated; 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, and his hand shall bind up all

our scattered leaves again, for that library where every book shall

lie open to one another; as therefore the bell that rings to a sermon,

calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come;

so this bell calls us all: but how much more me, who am brought so

near the door by this sickness.

There was a contention as far as a suit (in which, piety and dignity,

religion and estimation, were mingled) which of the religious orders

should ring to prayers first in the morning; and it was determined,

that they should ring first that rose earliest. If we understand

aright the dignity of this bell, that tolls for our evening prayer, we

would be glad to make it ours, by rising early, in that application,

that it might be ours as well as his, whose indeed it is. The bell

doth toll for him, that thinks it doth; and though it intermit again,

yet from that minute, that that occasion wrought upon him, he is

united to God. Who casts not up his eye to the sun when it rises?

But who takes off his eye from a comet, when that breaks out? who

bends not his ear to any bell, which upon any occasion rings? But who

can remove it from that bell, which is passing a piece of himself out

of this world?

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 if a

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.

Neither can we call this a begging of misery, or a borrowing of

misery, as though we were not miserable enough of ourselves, but must

fetch in more from the next house, in taking upon us the misery of our

neighbors. Truly it were an excusable covetousness if we did; for

affliction is a treasure, and scarce any man hath enough of it. No

man hath afflicion enough, that is not matured and ripened by it, and

made fit for God by that affliction. If a man carry treasure in

bullion or in a wedge of gold, and have none coined into current

moneys, his treasure will not defray him as he travels. Tribulation

is treasure in the nature of it, but it is not current money in the

use of it, except we get nearer and nearer our home, heaven, by it.

Another may be sick too, and sick to death, and this affliction may

lie in his bowels, as gold in a mine, and be of no use to him; but

this bell that tells me of his affliction, digs out, and applies that

gold to me: if by this consideration of another's danger, I take mine

own into contemplation, and so secure myself, by making my recourse to

my God, who is our only security.