Diotimos Library · Journals, Notebooks & Fragments Collection · English Edition
Centuries of Meditations
Annotated Edition · With an Introduction, Notes and an Outline.
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English Edition · Branch 50 of 454
The First Century · Meditation I.36
Centuries of Meditations
p. 5036
The common error which makes it difficult to believe all the World to be wholly ours, is to be shunned as a rock of shipwreck: or a dangerous quicksands. For the poison which they drank hath infatuated their fancies, and now they know not, neither will they understand, they walk on in Darkness. All the foundations of the Earth are out of course. It is safety not to be with them: and a great part of Happiness to be freed from their seducing and enslaving errors. That while others live in a Golgotha or Prison, we should be in Eden, is a very great Mystery. And a mercy it is that we should be rejoicing in the Temple of Heaven, while they are toiling and lamenting in Hell, for the world is both a Paradise and a Prison to different persons.
Socrates
Reading Centuries of Meditations · The First Century · Meditation I.36
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.About This Reading Edition
Thomas Traherne’s Centuries explore felicity, childhood vision, love, and the soul’s capacity to enjoy the world. This annotated English edition presents all 410 meditations across five Centuries, with an introduction, explanatory notes, an outline, and textual apparatus.
Historical Text
The Centuries survive in Traherne’s manuscript and were first published by Bertram Dobell in London in 1908. The supplied edition follows the corrected Dobell text, with manuscript readings documented in its Note on the Text and Textual Notes. The four complete Centuries contain one hundred meditations each; the unfinished Fifth contains ten.
About This Edition
Diotimos Editions prepared the introduction, explanatory notes, glossary, reading guide, outline, and textual apparatus for this English original. Century and meditation numbers preserve the work’s structure, while verse line breaks, italics, and struck-through manuscript cancellations remain visible. Notes accompany their passages in the reader and Book Mode.
Rights
Thomas Traherne’s historical text and Bertram Dobell’s 1908 printing are in the public domain. The introduction, notes, and apparatus are © 2026 Diotimos Editions. Historical printing and transcription links identify the edition’s copy-text; manuscript corrections and unresolved readings are documented in the supplied editorial apparatus.