Is this sentence ok ? John even gave only TEN CENTS to MARY.

Sorry that is so late, but in your sentence, 'even' and 'only' seem to semantically contradict each other. 'Even' implies that the ten cents has a lot of value, whereas 'only' semantically ties a low value to the ten cents. Because of this, some may find the sentence to be confusing, although the main point will get across: John gave ten cents to Mary.

I would say it's best for you to choose between 'even' and 'only' to make the sentence clearer.

'John even gave ten cents to Mary.' This implies that the ten cents is quite valuable and that John is being generous.
'John gave only ten cents to Mary.' This implies that John is being stingy and that ten cents is a small value.
 'John only gave ten cents to Mary.' This implies that this is all John did to Mary.

I hope this helps.

To me, on first reading "John even gave only ten cents to Mary", whilst difficult to class as ungrammatical, comes over as not quite right. I can only imagine the sentence arising in very limited circumstances, e.g.

Peter: John is very mean.
Henry: He gave some money to Elizabeth.
Peter: He only gave her ten cents.
Henry: It’s still money.
Peter: He’s getting generous. He even gave only ten cents to Mary.

I am not sure that grammaticality really comes into it. Perhaps we can distinguish between (a) utterances which will always look right without any context even if ambiguous and (b) utterances which out of context look awry, but might actually be uttered and when uttered are not perceived as ungrammatical, but rather as the speaker being playful.

I once said to a French lady on a very windy day: Il fait un peu frais, to which she responded: Il fait un peu frais beaucoup! Clearly it cannot be both a little fresh and very fresh at the same time. Taken out of context the response looks self-contradictory, but in context we appreciate that the speaker was being playful.

Mallu has presumably posted because s/he has some doubts about the sentence. The question posed is not whether it is grammatical but whether it is OK, which is wider, though of course s/he may have meant it to mean grammatical. jul16ws responded by suggesting the problem was one of semantics. My initial reaction was that the sentence could not really be classified as "OK". So we have, it seems, three people whose initial reaction is that the sentence is not OK.

It is one thing to assert that whether a sentence is grammatical can be determined without reference to semantics, but another to suggest that semantics can be ignored to determine whether a sentence feels right - not the same thing as whether it makes sense. In any event, does grammaticality not involve some element of intuition?

I am not sure a rule of grammar can be formulated which tells us whether and when "even" and "only" can be used in the same sentence, unlike, say, a rule which explains when to use "any" and when to use "some". When people speak the grammar function of the brain is not in absolute control. The waters can be muddied allowing people to say things like "Il fait un peu frais beaucoup" which out of context will be characterised as not feeling right.

I think "even...only" sounds natural in some circumstances. For example:

John's exam results were poor in every subject. He even scored only 60% in English, in which he normally excels.