PRIOR, MATTHEW, a celebrated English poet, was born in 1664; but whether in London, or at Winborn in Dor setshire, is not ascertained. His father, who was a joiner, died when his son was young, and left him to the care of an uncle, a vintner, who sent him to Westminster school. In order to teach him his own business, his uncle took young Prior from school; but his taste for the classics was fixed, and the Earl of Dorset fortunately encountered him in his uncle's tavern, reading Horace. This nobleman was so much gratified with the manners and talents of the young man, that he sent him to St. John's College, Cam bridge, where he was admitted in 1682, and obtained a fellowship in 1686. At this university Prior became inti mate with Charles Montague, afterwards Earl of Halifax; in conjunction with whom he composed the Country Mouse and City Mouse, a parody on Dryden's poem of the Hind and Panther. He next wrote his Ode on the Deity, which appeared in 1688.
In the year 1689, he was introduced at court by the Earl of Dorset; and in the year following he was nominated secretary to the English plenipotentiaries at the Hague. In 1697 he was made under-secretary to the commissioners for the treaty of Ryswick, and on his return he was ap pointed secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. In 1698 he went out as secretary to the British ambassador in France, the Earl of Portland; and he continued in that of ice under his successor, the Earl of Jersey. Some time .
afterwards he was appointed under-secretary of state, and during the negotiation of the partition-treaty, he went to assist our ambassador in Paris. On the death of the illus trious Locke, Prior succeeded him at the Board of Trade; and lie sat in parliament as member for East Grimstead.
Amid the bustle and duties of these high situations, Prior seems to have, in a great degree, neglected the mu ses. He resumed his poetical labours, however, by cele brating the great victories of Blenheim and Ramifies, and he soon after published a volume of poems, which con cluded with the popular poem of Henry and Enzina,or the Xut-Brown Maid.
The experience which Prior had acquired in diplomacy, induced our government to send him to Paris, in 1711, with proposals for peace; and in 1712, lie was with Lord Bo lingbroke, who had been sent to Paris to adjust some dif ferences that had occurred. Having remained in France
with the authority of an ambassador, and possessing the confidence of the court of St. Germains, he was charged by the French king with a special letter to Queen Anne, in favour of the Elector of Bavaria. The Duke of Shrews bury having declined to be joined in the same commission as ambassador with Prior, left Paris in 1713, when our author publicly assumed the functions of ambassador, which he continued to discharge till he was superseded by the Earl of Stair, at the death of Queen Anne. Upon his return, in 1715, the Whigs, who were now in power, com mitted him to the custody of a messenger. IN1 r. NValpule subsequently moved an impeachment against him, on a charge of high treason, for holding secret conferences with the French plenipotentiary. He was even made an ex ception to the act of grace which was passed in 1717; but though he was treated with undue rigour, it was thought prudent to discharge him without a trial.
The fellowship of St. John's College being new the only provision on which he depended for his future support, his poetical talents were again called into action, He com pleted his poem entitled Solomon, which, with some other poems, filled a folio volume, which was published by sub scription at two guineas, and, through the exertions of his friends, brought him in a considerable sum.
Prior had conceived the design of writing a history of his own times, a task for which his knowledge of political affairs rendered him peculiarly qualified. A lingering ill ness, however, prevented him from making any progress in this work, and put an end to his life on the 18th Sep tember, 1721, in the fifty-eighth year of his age, at Wim pole, the Earl of Oxford's seat in Cambridgeshire. His remains were deposited in Westminster Abbey; and on his monument, for which he left 5001. is a long Latin epi taph, written by Dr. Freind, the master of Westminster school.
A complete edition of Prior's poems, was published in 1733, in 3 vols 8vo. See Johnson's Lives of the Poets ; and the Biographia Brittanica.