John Donne, The First Sermon Preached to King Charles (1625)

We are still in the season of mortification; in Lent. But we search no longer for texts of mortification; the almighty hand of God hath shed and spread a text of mortification over all the land. The last Sabbath day, was his Sabbath who entered then into his everlasting rest. Be this our Sabbath, to enter into a holy and thankful acknowledgement of that rest, which God affords us, in continuing to us our foundations; for, If foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do? I scarce know any word in the Word of God, in which the original is more ambiguous, and consequently the translations more various, and therefore, necessarily also, the expositions more diverse, than in these words. There is one thing, in which all agree, that is, the argument, and purpose, and scope of the Psalm; and then, in what sense the words of the text may conduce to the scope of the Psalm. We rest in this translation, which our Church hath accepted and authorized, and which agrees with the first translation known to us, by way of exposition, that is the Chaldee Paraphrase, If foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?