The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) Volume IV Part 4

Numb. 230. All, except the last Letter.

Numb. 231. A Letter on the awe of appearing before public a.s.semblies.

Numb. 237. On Divine Providence.

Vol. IV. Numb. 252. A Letter on the Eloquence of Tears, and fainting fits.

Numb. 302. The Character of Emilia.

Numb. 311. A Letter from the Father of a great Fortune.

Vol. V. Numb. 57. A Picture of Virtue in Distress.

Vol. VII. Numb. 525. On Conjugal Love.

Numb. 537. On the Dignity of Human Nature.

Numb. 541. Rules for p.r.o.nunciation and Action, chiefly collected from Cicero.

Vol. VII. Numb. 554. On the Improvement of the Genius, ill.u.s.trated in the characters of Lord Bacon, Mr. Boyle, Sir Isaac Newton, and Leonardo da Vinci.--We have not been able to learn, what papers in the Guardian were written by him, besides Number 37, Vol. I. which contains Remarks on the Tragedy of Oth.e.l.lo.

In the year 1715 Mr. Hughes published a very accurate edition of the works of our famous poet Edmund Spenser, in six volumes, 12mo. to this edition are prefixed the Life of Spenser; an Essay on Allegorical poetry; Remarks on the Fairy Queen; on the Shepherd's Calendar, and other writings of Spenser; and a Glossary explaining the Old and obsolete Words.

In 1718 he published a piece called Charon, or The Ferry-Boat, a Vision. This, and Mr. Walsh's aesculapius, or Hospital of Fools, are perhaps two of the finest dialogues we have in English, as well as the most lively imitations of Lucian.

Sir Richard Steele, in a paper called The Theatre, No. 15. has paid a tribute to the memory of Mr. Hughes, with which as it ill.u.s.trates his amiable character, we shall conclude his life.

'I last night (says he) saw the Siege of Damascus, and had the mortification to hear this evening that Mr. Hughes, the author of it, departed this life within some few hours after his play was acted, with universal applause. This melancholy circ.u.mstance recalled into my thought a speech in the tragedy, which very much affected the whole audience, and was attended to with the greatest, and most solemn instance of approbation, and awful silence.' The incidents of the play plunge a heroic character into the last extremity; and he is admonished by a tyrant commander to expect no mercy, unless he changes the Christian religion for the Mahometan. The words with which the Turkish general makes his exit from his prisoner are,

Farewel, and think of death.

Upon which the captive breaks into the following soliloquy,

Farewel! and think of death!--was it not so?

Do murtherers then, preach morality?

But how to think of what the living know not, And the dead cannot, or else may not tell!

What art thou? O thou great mysterious terror!

The way to thee, we know; diseases, famine, Sword, fire, and all thy ever open gates, That day and night stand ready to receive us.

But what, beyond them? who will draw that veil?

Yet death's not there.----No, 'tis a point of time; The verge 'twixt mortal, and immortal Being.

It mocks our thought----On this side all is life; And when we've reach'd it, in that very instant, 'Tis past the thinking of----O if it be The pangs, the throes, the agonizing struggle, When soul and body part, sure I have felt it!

And there's no more to fear.

'The gentleman (continues Sir Richard) to whose memory I devote this paper, may be the emulation of more persons of different talents, than any one I have ever known. His head, hand, or heart, was always employed in something worthy imitation; his pencil, his bow (string) or his pen, each of which he used in a masterly manner, were always directed to raise, and entertain his own mind, or that of others, to a more chearful prosecution of what is n.o.ble and virtuous. Peace be with thy remains, thou amiable spirit! but I talk in the language of our weakness, that is flown to the regions of immortality, and relieved from the aking engine and painful instrument of anguish and sorrow, in which for many tedious years he panted with a lively hope for his present condition.' We shall consign the trunk, in which he was so long imprisoned, to common earth, with all that is due to the merit of its inhabitant[A].

[Footnote A: There are several copies of verses written to the memory of Mr. Hughes, prefixed to Mr. Duncomb's edition of his poems, of which one by a lady who has withheld her name, deserves particular distinction.]

MATTHEW PRIOR, Esq;

This celebrated poet was the son of Mr. George Prior, citizen of London, who was by profession a Joiner. Our author was born in 1664.

His father dying when he was very young, left him to the care of an uncle, a Vintner near Charing-Cross, who discharged the trust that was reposed in him, with a tenderness truly paternal, as Mr. Prior always acknowledged with the highest professions of grat.i.tude. He received part of his education at Westminster school, where he distinguished himself to great advantage, but was afterwards taken home by his uncle in order to be bred up to his trade. Notwithstanding this mean employment, to which Mr. Prior seemed now doomed, yet at his leisure hours he prosecuted his study of the cla.s.sics, and especially his favourite Horace, by which means he was soon taken notice of, by the polite company, who resorted to his uncle's house. It happened one day, that the earl of Dorset being at his Tavern, which he often frequented with several gentlemen of rank, the discourse turned upon the Odes of Horace; and the company being divided in their sentiments about a pa.s.sage in that poet, one of the gentlemen said, I find we are not like to agree in our criticisms, but, if I am not mistaken, there is a young fellow in the house, who is able to set us all right: upon which he named Prior, who was immediately sent for, and desired to give his opinion of Horace's meaning in the Ode under consideration; this he did with great modesty, and so much to the satisfaction of the company, that the earl of Dorset, from that moment, determined to remove him from the station in which he was, to one more suited to his genius; and accordingly procured him to be sent to St. John's College in Cambridge, where he took his degree in 1686, and afterwards became fellow of the College.

During his residence in the university, he contracted an intimate friends.h.i.+p with Charles Montague, esq; afterwards earl of Hallifax, in conjunction with whom he wrote a very humorous piece, ent.i.tled The Hind and Panther transversed to the story of the Country Mouse, and the City Mouse, printed 1687 in 4to. in answer to Mr. Dryden's Hind and the Panther, published the year before.

Upon the revolution Mr. Prior was brought to court by his great patron the earl of Dorset, by whose interest he was introduced to public employment, and in the year 1690 was made secretary to the earl of Berkley, plenipotentiary to King William and Queen Mary at the Congress at the Hague.

In this station he acquitted himself so well, that he was afterwards appointed secretary to the earls of Pembroke, and Jersey, and Sir Joseph Williamson, amba.s.sadors, and plenipotentiaries, at the treaty of Ryswick 1697, as he was likewise in 1698 to the earl of Portland, amba.s.sador to the court of France. While he was in that kingdom, one of the officers of the French King's houshold, shewing him the royal apartments, and curiosities at Versailles, especially the paintings of Le Brun, wherein the victories of Lewis XIV. are described, asked him, whether King William's actions are to be seen in his palace? 'No Sir, replied Mr. Prior, the monuments of my master's actions are to be seen every where, but in his own house.'

In the year 1697 Mr. Prior was made secretary of state for Ireland, and in 1700 was created master of arts by Mandamus, and appointed one of the lords commissioners of trade and plantations, upon the resignation of Mr. Locke. He was also Member of Parliament for East-Grimstead in Suss.e.x. In 1710 he was supposed to have had a share in writing the Examiner, and particularly a Criticism in it upon a Poem of Dr. Garth to the earl of G.o.dolphin, taken notice of in the life of Garth.

About this time, when G.o.dolphin was defeated by Oxford, and the Tories who had long been eclipsed by the l.u.s.tre of Marlborough, began again to hold up their heads, Mr. Prior and Dr. Garth espoused opposite interests; Mr. Prior wrote for, and Garth against the court. The Dr.

was so far honest, that he did not desert his patron in distress; and notwithstanding the cloud which then hung upon the party, he addressed verses to him, which, however they may fail in the poetry, bear strong the marks of grat.i.tude, and honour.

While Mr. Prior was thus very early initiated in public business, and continued in the hurry of affairs for many years, it must appear not a little surprizing, that he should find sufficient opportunities to cultivate his poetical talents, to the amazing heights he raised them.

In his preface to his poems, he says, that poetry was only the product of his leisure hours; that he had commonly business enough upon his hands, and, as he modestly adds, was only a poet by accident; but we must take the liberty of differing from him in the last particular, for Mr. Prior seems to have received from the muses, at his nativity, all the graces they could well bestow on their greatest favourite.

We must not omit one instance in Mr. Prior's conduct, which will appear very remarkable: he was chosen a member of that Parliament which impeached the Part.i.tion Treaty, to which he himself had been secretary; and though his share in that transaction was consequently very considerable, yet he joined in the impeachment upon an honest principle of conviction, that exceptionable measures attended it.

The lord Bolingbroke, who, notwithstanding many exceptions made both to his conduct, and sentiments in other instances, yet must be allowed to be an accomplished judge of fine talents, entertained the highest esteem for Mr. Prior, on account of his s.h.i.+ning abilities. This n.o.ble lord, in a letter dated September 10, 1712, addressed to Mr. Prior, while he was the Queen's minister, and plenipotentiary at the court of France, pays him the following compliment; 'For G.o.d's sake, Matt. hide the nakedness of thy country, and give the best turn thy fertile brain will furnish thee with, to the blunders of thy countrymen, who are not much better politicians, than the French are poets.' His lords.h.i.+p thus concludes his epistle; 'It is near three o'clock in the morning, I have been hard at work all day, and am not yet enough recovered to bear much fatigue; excuse therefore the confusedness of this scroll, which is only from Harry to Matt, and not from the secretary to the minister. Adieu, my pen is ready to drop out of my hand, it being now three o'clock in the morning; believe that no man loves you better, or is more faithfully yours, &c.

'BOLINGBROKE.'

There are several other letters from Bolingbroke to Prior, which, were it necessary, we might insert as evidences of his esteem for him; but Mr. Prior was in every respect so great a man, that the esteem even of lord Bolingbroke cannot add much to the l.u.s.tre of his reputation, both as a statesman, and a poet. Mr. Prior is represented by those who knew, and have wrote concerning him, as a gentleman, who united the elegance and politeness of a court, with the scholar, and the man of genius. This representation, in general, may be just, yet it holds almost invariably true, that they who have risen from low life, still retain some traces of their original. No cultivation, no genius, it seems, is able entirely to surmount this: There was one particular in which Mr. Prior verified the old proverb.

The same woman who could charm the waiter in a tavern, still maintained her dominion over the emba.s.sador at France. The Chloe of Prior, it seems, was a woman in this station of life; but he never forsook her in the heighth of his reputation. Hence we may observe, that a.s.sociations with women are the most lasting of all, and that when an eminent station raises a man above many other acts of condescension, a mistress will maintain her influence, charm away the pride of greatness, and make the hero who fights, and the patriot who speaks, for the liberty of his country, a slave to her. One would imagine however, that this woman, who was a Butcher's wife, must either have been very handsome, or have had something about her superior to people of her rank: but it seems the case was otherwise, and no better reason can be given for Mr. Prior's attachment to her, but that she was his taste. Her husband suffered their intrigue to go on unmolested; for he was proud even of such a connexion as this, with so great a man as Prior; a singular instance of good nature.

In the year 1715 Mr. Prior was recalled from France, and upon his arrival was taken up by a warrant from the House of Commons; shortly after which, he underwent a very strict examination by a Committee of the Privy Council. His political friend, lord Bolingbroke, foreseeing a storm, took shelter in France, and secured Harry, but left poor Matt. in the lurch.

On the 10th of June Robert Walpole, esq; moved the House against him, and on the 17th Mr. Prior was ordered into close custody, and no person was admitted to see him without leave from the Speaker. For the particulars of this procedure of the Parliament, both against Mr.

Prior, and many others concerned in the public transactions of the preceding reign, we refer to the histories of that time. In the year 1717 an Act of Grace was pa.s.sed in favour of those who had opposed the Hanoverian succession, as well as those who had been in open rebellion, but Mr. Prior was excepted out of it. At the close of this year, however, he was discharged from his confinement, and retired to spend the residue of his days at Downhall in Ess.e.x.

The severe usage which Mr. Prior met with, perhaps was the occasion of the following beautiful lines, addressed to his Chloe;

From public noise, and factious strife, From all the busy ills of life, Take me, my Chloe, to thy breast; And lull my wearied soul to rest: For ever, in this humble cell, Let thee and I, my fair one, dwell; None enter else, but Love----and he Shall bar the door, and keep the key.

To painted roofs, and s.h.i.+ning spires (Uneasy feats of high desires) Let the unthinking many croud, That dare be covetous, and proud; In golden bondage let them wait, And barter happiness for state: But oh! my Chloe when thy swain Desires to see a court again; May Heav'n around his destin'd head The choicest of his curses shed, To sum up all the rage of fate.

In the two things I dread, and hate, May'st thou be false, and I be great.

In July 1721, within two months of his death, Mr. Prior published the following beautiful little tale on the falshood of mankind, ent.i.tled The Conversation, and applied it to the truth, honour, and justice of his grace the duke of Dorset.

The CONVERSATION. A Tale.

It always has been thought discreet To know the company you meet; And sure, there may be secret danger In talking much before a stranger.

Agreed: what then? then drink your ale; I'll pledge you, and repeat my tale.

No matter where the scene is fix'd, The persons were but odly mix'd, When sober Damon thus began: (And Damon is a clever man)

I now grow old; but still from youth, Have held for modesty and truth, The men, who by these sea-marks steer, In life's great voyage, never err; Upon this point I dare defy The world; I pause for a reply.