Epitaph on his Son.] From Strype's Stow, 1720. Book III, p. 266. describing the monuments on the north wall of St. Bride's, Fleet Street. Strype adds, 'These Verses are almost worn out and gone, and therefore I have preserved them here; being undoubtedly the easy natural Strain of the Poet, the Father'.
This Epitaph is in Hackett, A Collection of Epitaphs, 1757, ii. 31, introduced thus—
'St. Bride's, London.
Here lies the Body of Thomas Flatman, eldest son of Thomas Flatman, and Hannah his wife, who resigned his beloved soul the 28th of December 1682.'
Strype records that the boy was ten years old. The pastoral elegy on [p. 375] in all probability refers to the same child, though the date of his death is there given as January 28, 168⅔. Aubrey records (in Aubrey MS. 7, fol. 8 verso) that Flatman himself was buried in the same grave.
Lines to John Northleigh.
Though we that write in rhyme (it is confess'd)
Are wont to praise them most that need it least,
So far from doing what we had design'd