Letters to
Severall
Personages.
John Donne
The
printer noticed this mistake, and at the end of the _Elegies upon the
Author_ adds this note:
_Errata_. [6]
_Cvrteous Reader, know, that that Epistle intituled, Infinitati
Sacrum, 16. of August, 1601. which is printed in the
beginning of the Booke, is misplaced; it should have beene
printed before the Progresse of the Soule, in Page 301.
before which it was written by the Author; if any other in the
Impression doe fall out, which I know not of, hold me excused
for I have endeavoured thy satisfaction. _
Thine, I. M.
The closing lines of Walton's poem show that it must have been written
for this edition, as they refer to what is the chief feature in the
new issue of the poems (pp. 1-388, including some prose letters in
Latin and English, pp. 275-300, but not including the _Elegies upon
the Author_ which in this edition and those of 1639, 1649, 1650,
and 1654 are added in unnumbered pages). This new feature is their
arrangement in a series of groups:[7]--
Songs and Sonets.
Epigrams.
Elegies.
Epithalamions, _or_, Marriage Songs.
Satyres.
Letters to Severall Personages.
Funerall Elegies, (including _An Anatomie of the
World_ with _A Funerall Elegie_, _Of the Progresse of
the Soule_, and _Epicedes and Obsequies upon the
deaths of sundry Personages_. )
(Letters in Prose). [8]
The Progresse of the Soule.
Divine Poems.
While the poems were thus rearranged, the canon also underwent some
alteration. One poem, viz. Basse's _Epitaph on Shakespeare_ ('Renowned
Chaucer lie a thought more nigh To rare Beaumont'), which had found
its way into _1633_, was dropped; but quite a number were added,
twenty-eight, or twenty-nine if the epitaph _On Himselfe_ be reckoned
(as it appears) twice. Professor Norton, in the bibliographical note
in the Grolier Club edition (which I occasionally call Grolier for
convenience), has inadvertently given the _Elegie on the L. C. _ as one
of the poems first printed in _1635_. This is an error. The poem was
included in _1633_ as the sixth in a group of _Elegies_, the rest of
which are love poems. The editor of _1635_ merely transferred it to
its proper place among the _Funerall Elegies_, just as modern editors
have transferred the _Elegie on his Mistris_ ('By our first strange
and fatall interview') from the funeral to the love _Elegies_.
The authenticity of the poems added in _1635_ will be fully discussed
later. The conclusion of the present editor is that of the English
poems fifteen are certainly Donne's; three or four are probably or
possibly his; the remaining eleven are pretty certainly _not_ by
Donne.
printer noticed this mistake, and at the end of the _Elegies upon the
Author_ adds this note:
_Errata_. [6]
_Cvrteous Reader, know, that that Epistle intituled, Infinitati
Sacrum, 16. of August, 1601. which is printed in the
beginning of the Booke, is misplaced; it should have beene
printed before the Progresse of the Soule, in Page 301.
before which it was written by the Author; if any other in the
Impression doe fall out, which I know not of, hold me excused
for I have endeavoured thy satisfaction. _
Thine, I. M.
The closing lines of Walton's poem show that it must have been written
for this edition, as they refer to what is the chief feature in the
new issue of the poems (pp. 1-388, including some prose letters in
Latin and English, pp. 275-300, but not including the _Elegies upon
the Author_ which in this edition and those of 1639, 1649, 1650,
and 1654 are added in unnumbered pages). This new feature is their
arrangement in a series of groups:[7]--
Songs and Sonets.
Epigrams.
Elegies.
Epithalamions, _or_, Marriage Songs.
Satyres.
Letters to Severall Personages.
Funerall Elegies, (including _An Anatomie of the
World_ with _A Funerall Elegie_, _Of the Progresse of
the Soule_, and _Epicedes and Obsequies upon the
deaths of sundry Personages_. )
(Letters in Prose). [8]
The Progresse of the Soule.
Divine Poems.
While the poems were thus rearranged, the canon also underwent some
alteration. One poem, viz. Basse's _Epitaph on Shakespeare_ ('Renowned
Chaucer lie a thought more nigh To rare Beaumont'), which had found
its way into _1633_, was dropped; but quite a number were added,
twenty-eight, or twenty-nine if the epitaph _On Himselfe_ be reckoned
(as it appears) twice. Professor Norton, in the bibliographical note
in the Grolier Club edition (which I occasionally call Grolier for
convenience), has inadvertently given the _Elegie on the L. C. _ as one
of the poems first printed in _1635_. This is an error. The poem was
included in _1633_ as the sixth in a group of _Elegies_, the rest of
which are love poems. The editor of _1635_ merely transferred it to
its proper place among the _Funerall Elegies_, just as modern editors
have transferred the _Elegie on his Mistris_ ('By our first strange
and fatall interview') from the funeral to the love _Elegies_.
The authenticity of the poems added in _1635_ will be fully discussed
later. The conclusion of the present editor is that of the English
poems fifteen are certainly Donne's; three or four are probably or
possibly his; the remaining eleven are pretty certainly _not_ by
Donne.
