The work begins with the poet asking what ghost beckons him onward with its "bleeding bosom gor'd"; it is the spirit of an unnamed woman (the "lady" of the title) who acted "a Roman's part" (i.e., committed suicide) due to loving "too well."

There follows a description of her foreign burial in a "humble grave" unattended by friends and relatives, which Pope sums up in the striking couplet: A heap of dust alone remains of thee; 'Tis all thou art, and all the proud shall be!

Samuel Johnson in his Lives of the Poets also faulted the "Elegy" on similar grounds, referring to "the illaudable singularity of treating suicide with respect."

Mack acknowledges that there are beautiful passages in the poem, but also finds that it is marked by a certain incoherence between elements and attitudes which are not fully reconciled, such as the idea of Roman suicide vs. that of Christian burial, or the strange curse on the uncle and all his posterity for his unspecified crimes.

In spite of such objections, most critics would not deny the emotional impact of Pope's "Elegy," and even Johnson acknowledges that the poem "must be allowed to be written in some parts with vigorous animation, and in others with gentle tenderness."