But, as Mr. Gosse has pointed out, the sincerest and profoundest of Donne's devotional poetry dates from the death of his wife. The loss of her who had purified and sweetened his earliest love songs lent a new and deeper _timbre_ to the sonnets and lyrics in which he contemplates the great topics of personal religion,--sin, death, the Judgement, and throws himself on the mercy of God as revealed in Christ. The seven sonnets entitled _La Corona_ have been generally attributed to this period, but it is probable that they were composed earlier, and their treatment of the subject of Christ's life and death is more intellectual and theological than spiritual and poetical. It is when the tone becomes personal, as in the _Holy Sonnets_, when he is alone with his own soul in the prospect of death and the Judgement, that Donne's religious poetry acquires something of the same unique character as his love songs and elegies by a similar combination of qualities, intensity of feeling, subtle turns of thought, and occasional Miltonic splendour of phrase. Here again we meet the magnificent openings of the _Songs and Sonets_:-- This is my playes last scene; here heavens appoint My pilgrimages last mile; and my race Idly yet quickly run hath this last space, My spans last inch, my minutes latest point; or, At the round earths imagin'd quarters blow Your trumpets, Angels, and arise, arise From death you numberlesse infinities Of soules, and to your scatter'd bodies go: and again-- What if this present were the worlds last night! Marke in my heart, O Soule, where thou dost dwell, The picture of Christ crucified, and tell Whether that countenance can thee affright, Teares in his eyes quench the amazing light, Blood fills his frownes, which from his pierc'd head fell.