John Donne’s “A Hymn to God the Father” is a personal prayer for forgiveness that moves through original sin, sins he keeps repeating, and the wrong of leading others astray. Each stanza ends with the pun “When thou hast done, thou hast not done”—even after forgiving these, God doesn’t yet “have” Donne; there’s always more sin. The repeated “Wilt thou forgive?” feels like a needling anxiety, creating a quietly desperate rhythm. In the last stanza, the fear shifts to a future sin: the terror that he might be lost at death. He asks God to swear that Christ’s light will shine on him, and only then does the refrain change to “thou hast done,” allowing him to say “I fear no more.” The mood climbs from anxious, almost obsessive guilt into a fragile but real confidence, making the poem feel like an intimate, trembling conversation with God.
A Hymn To God The Father — Summary
Wilt thou forgive that sin where I begun, Which is my sin, though it were done before? Wilt thou forgive that sin through which I run, And do run still, though still I do deplore? When thou hast done, thou hast not done, For I have more.
Wilt thou forgive that sin by which I have won Others to sin? and made my sin their door? Wilt thou forgive that sin which I did shun A year or two, but wallowed in a score? When thou hast done, thou hast not done, For I have more.
I have a sin of fear, that when I have spun My last thread, I shall perish on the shore; Swear by thyself, that at my death thy Son Shall shine as he shines now and heretofore; And, having done that, thou hast done, I fear no more.