Lives of the Poets | Page 5

I was there present. Whether this was wisely done or no I leave
to my friends to determine." When he had signed the paper, he was told
by Walpole that the committee were not satisfied with his behaviour,
nor could give such an account of it to the Commons as might merit
favour; and that they now thought a stricter confinement necessary than
to his own house. "Here," says he, "Boscawen played the moralist, and
Coningsby the Christian, but both very awkwardly." The messenger, in
whose custody he was to be placed, was then called, and very
indecently asked by Coningsby "if his house was secured by bars and
bolts." The messenger answered, "No," with astonishment. At which
Coningsby very angrily said, "Sir, you must secure this prisoner; it is
for the safety of the nation: if he escape, you shall answer for it."
They had already printed their report; and in this examination were
endeavouring to find proofs.
He continued thus confined for some time; and Mr. Walpole (June 10,
1715) moved for an impeachment against him. What made him so
acrimonious does not appear; he was by nature no thirster for blood.
Prior was a week after committed to close custody, with orders that "no
person should be admitted to see him without leave from the Speaker."
When, two years after, an Act of Grace was passed, he was excepted,
and continued still in custody, which he had made less tedious by
writing his "Alma." He was, however, soon after discharged. He had
now his liberty, but he had nothing else. Whatever the profit of his
employments might have been, he had always spent it; and at the age of
fifty-three was, with all his abilities, in danger of penury, having yet no
solid revenue but from the fellowship of his college, which, when in his
exaltation he was censured for retaining it, he said he could live upon at

last. Being, however, generally known and esteemed, he was
encouraged to add other poems to those which he had printed, and to
publish them by subscription. The expedient succeeded by the industry
of many friends, who circulated the proposals, and the care of some
who, it is said, withheld the money from him lest he should squander it.
The price of the volume was two guineas; the whole collection was
four thousand; to which Lord Harley, the son of the Earl of Oxford, to
whom he had invariably adhered, added an equal sum for the purchase
of Down Hall, which Prior was to enjoy during life, and Harley after
his decease. He had now, what wits and philosophers have often wished,
the power of passing the day in contemplative tranquillity. But it seems
that busy men seldom live long in a state of quiet. It is not unlikely that
his health declined, he complains of deafness; "for," says he, "I took
little care of my ears while I was not sure if my head was my own."
Of any occurrences of his remaining life I have found no account. In a
letter to Swift, "I have," says he, "treated Lady Harriet, at Cambridge (a
Fellow of a College treat!) and spoke verses to her in a gown and cap!
What, the plenipotentiary, so far concerned in the damned peace at
Utrecht; the man that makes up half the volume of terse prose, that
makes up the report of the committee, speaking verses! Sic est, homo
sum."
He died at Wimpole, a seat of the Earl of Oxford, on the 18th of
September, 1721, and was buried in Westminster; where on a
monument, for which, as the "last piece of human vanity," he left five
hundred pounds, is engraven this epitaph:-
Sui Temporis Historiam meditanti,
Paulatim obrepens Febris
Operi
simul et Vitae filum abrupit,
Sept. 18. An. Dom. 1721. AEtat. 57.

H.S.E.
Vir Eximius Serenissimis
Regi GULIELMO Reginaeque
MARIAE
In Congressione Foederatorum
Hagae anno 1690
celebrata,
Deinde Magnae Britanniae Legatis
Tum iis,
Qui anno
1697 Pacem RYSWICKI confecerunt,
Tum iis,
Qui apud Gallos
annie proximis Legationem obierunt
Eodem etiani anno 1657 in
Hibernia
SECRETARIUS;
Necnon in utroque Honorabili consessu


Eorum,
Qui anno 1700 ordinandis Commercii negotiis,
Quique
anno 1711 dirigendis Portorii rebus,
Praeidebant,

COMMISSIONARIUS;
Postremo ab ANNA,
Felicissimae
memoriae Regina,
Ad LUDOVICUM XIV. Galliae Regem
Missus
anno 1711
De Pace stabilienda
(Pace etiam num durante
Diuque
ut boni jam omnes sperant duratura),
Cum sunma potestate Legatus;

MATTHAES PRIOR Armiger
Qui
Hos omnes, quibus cumulates
est, Titulos
Humanitatis, Ingenii, Ereditionis laude
Superavit;
Cui
enim nascenti faciles arriserant Mesae.
Hunc Puerum Schola hic
Regia perpolivit;
Jevenem in Collegio S'ti Johannis
Cantabrigia
optimis Scientiis instruxit;
Virum denique auxit, et perfecit,
Multa
cum viris Principibus censuetudo;
Ita natus, ita institutus,
A Vatam
Choro avelli numquam potuit,
Sed solebat saepe rerum civilium
gravitatem
Amoeniorum Literarum Studiis condire:
Et cum omne
adeo Poetices genus
Haud infeliciter tentaret,
Tum in Fabellis
concinne lepideque texendis
Mirus Artifex
Neminem habuit parem.

Haec liberalis animi oblectamenta:
Quam nullo illi labore
constiterint,
Facile ii perspexere, quibus usus est Amici;
Apud quos
Urbanitatem et Leporum plenus
Cum ad rem, quaecunque forte
inciderat,
Apte varie copioseque alluderet,
Interea nihil