Donne Describes the Bible
“My God, my God, Thou art a direct God, may I not say a literal God, a God that wouldest bee understood literally, and according to the plain sense of all that thou saiest? But thou art also (Lord, I intend it to thy glory, and let no profane misinterpreter abuse it to thy diminution), thou art a figurative, a metaphorical God too; A God in whose words there is such a height of figures, such voyages, such peregrinations to fetch remote and precious metaphors , such extensions, such spreadings, such curtains of allegories, such third Heavens of hyperboles, so harmonious eloqutions, so retired and so reserved expressions, so commanding persuasions, so persuading commandments, such sinews even in thy milk, and such things in thy words, as all profane Authors, seem of the seed of the Serpent, that creeps, thou art the Dove, that flies.”
( Expostulation 19)