[In the following essay, Robertson discusses several poems by Felltham that did not appear in his Lusoria and reprints “The Elegie on Mris. Coventry,” which previously had been unavailable.]

In Lusoria, first printed with the revised folio edition (the eighth) of the Resolves,¹ Felltham collected together forty-one poems most of which had been written at a much earlier date. There are only four poems known to be by Felltham that are not included in Lusoria. In Fasti Oxonienses (II, 454) Anthony à Wood gives an account of Lislibon Long, and wonders in his desultory way whether he was any relation of Kingsmill Long “who translated from Latin into English, Barclay his Argenis … which translation is dedicated by Long to Will. Drake of Averbury, Esq.; Owen Feltham hath verses in commendation of the translation.” This is the earliest printed poem by Felltham:² some clumsy heroic couplets inform us that the translator has done his difficult work well. Two similes have the distinction of the imagery of Felltham's Resolves:

Tis Rare: for Bookes translated doe, like Silke
Twice dy'de, lose glosse, or like remou'd Trees, welke.

Felltham's poem on Thomas Randolph,³ which was first printed in The Muses Looking glasse; and Amuntas (1638), and the poem “To the Memory of Immortal Ben” that Felltham contributed to Jonsonus Virbius (1638)⁴ are also omitted from Lusoria.

In Hazlitt's Handbook (1867) there is the following entry: “An Elegie on ye no^ble and excellent Mris M. Coventry per Owen Felljam (?Feltham) MS. Ashmole, 37. Art. 17.” This entry refers to MS. Ashmole 36 f172: there are fifty-two lines covering both sides of the manuscript leaf. The second side is again endorsed: “Feltham's Elegie on M^ris Coventry.” The whole manuscript, which is a collection of poems, is written in a seventeenth century hand. Although this poem was not included in Lusoria, nor printed separately in an anthology, there is no reason to doubt Felltham's authorship. We know that he had some connection with the Coventry family. Mistress Mary Coventry, who died on October 18th, 1634, was the daughter-in-law of Thomas Lord Coventry, to whom Felltham dedicated the second edition of the Resolves in 1628. Lusoria contains an elegy “On Thomas Lord Coventry, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England, who died Decemb. 1640.” The “Elegie on Mris. Coventry” is very much in Felltham's style; the simile of the industrious bee, one of his favourite illustrations, is used: the neo-platonic conception of the soul as a prisoner in the body, a continually recurring image in the Resolves, makes one of its less frequent appearances in the Poems. As this poem is not accessible in print I have transcribed it in full:

AN ELEGIE ON YE HO^BLE AND EXCELLENT MRIS M. COVENTRY BY OWEN FELTHAM.

I might persuade she were not dead and cry
That soe much vertue knew noe way to dye
But his Almighty Truth forbids; & we
Will be believd for powerfull sh' is; as she
When she was living, now alas! in vaine
We flatter desperate Ioyes, when we would faine
Lyfe in those lymbes y(t) are as cold, & low,
As her friends hopes, or as pale Sorrow now.
The sun returns, & every yeare ye Springe
Bidecks ye frozen Winters languishing
But when ye Soul from her clay house removes
There's noe reinsuing of their pristine loves
She now is gone for ever, ever to us,
There's noe Elisha now, noe Thesius
That may returne her from ye shades, & if
There were such vertue left, when she had lyfe
Tis now benum'd and fled, ye good we have,
With her is hasting to her sylent Grave.
Beauty and feature both since she is gone,
Suffer Eclipse and diminution,
And this is it w(ch) makes most ladyes knowne,
Borrow from Arte, what now is not their owne,
That in ye face, where harmlesse Ignorance
Thinks beauty sitts, lyes Italy and fraunce.
But if there be, since her, y(t) does not paint
To her chast wayes she owes her being Sainct.
The Virgin Yce roab'd with a Mayden Snow,
None knew a Chastity more pure; noe show
But sweetnesse all, such a Cherubick looke,
You'd think 'twere spotlesse Innocencyes booke
So in ye cradle-houres of new borne tyme
Shewd vncorrupted Nature in her pryme.
The Industrious Bee, y(t) midst her Hony lives
Yet vn-intangled keepes her winges & thrives
In hir owne stock of sweetnesse; told how she
Liv'd in y(e) World, from ye world's mazes free.
Mild as ye sent of Rose, that where ere
She with Charming Influence did appeare
The world (tempestious else) wore a calme peace,
As by ye Halcyon's nest, ye Tyrrhene-seas.
Not affable for ends, but from a minde
That in humility more height could fynde
Then ere sombre greatnes reacht at: and herein
Not seeking votes, she was cry'd up a Queene.
To whome, came all y(t) had but Eares or Eyes
Bowd, & departing, left their heartes hir prize.
Soe sweete, y(t) now, it cannot be withstood
But women may be loved, cause she was good
And sanctified their Sex. The world shall see
That they hereafter more shall honoured be,
For when Greate Queenes by fate are tane away,
Still to their figures, Subjectes reverence pay.

Notes

1. 1661: there were further editions in 1670, 1677, 1696, and 1709.

2. It is not mentioned in the article on Felltham in the DNB [Dictionary of National Biography].

3. Reprinted in The Poems of Thomas Randolph, ed. G. Thorn-Drury. Randolph had written a poem in praise of the Resolves before he had met their author.

4. Reprinted in The Works of Ben Jonson, ed. Gifford. Felltham also wrote a parody of Jonson's “New Inn Ode” which was included in Lusoria; it had already appeared in Parnassus Biceps (1656). There are versions in MS. Harleian 4955 and MS. Ashmole 38. It was quoted in full in Langbaine's Lives of the Dramatick Poets (1691).