Matthew Prior

Matthew Prior studied at St John's College and Westminster School. The recorded working language is English. Places of work recorded in the authority are The Hague and London. Positions recorded include Member of Parliament in the Parliament of England and ambassador. Distinctions recorded are Fellow of the Royal Society.

• Born — 21 July 1664 • Died — 18 September 1721 • Occupation — * Poet • statesman • diplomat • Office5 — Secretary to the Embassy at The Hague • Term Start5 — 1 November 1690 • Term End5 — 11 December 1697 • Succeeded5 — Guillaume de Lamberty • Predecessor5 — Christopher Tromer • Office4 — Secretary to the Embassy at Paris • Term End4 — 21 August 1699 • Term Start4 — 21 January 1698 • Appointer4 — William III • Appointer5 — William III • Birthplace — London, England • Place of death — Wimpole, England • Office3 — Commissioner for Trade and Plantations • Term Start3 — 28 June 1700 • Predecessor3 — John Locke • Term End3 — 22 April 1707 • Appointer3 — William III • Office2 — Member of Parliament for East Grinstead • Term Start2 — 6 February 1701 • Term End2 — 25 June 1701 • Predecessor2 — Lionel Boyle, 3rd Earl of Orrery John Conyers • Succeeded2 — Lionel Boyle, 3rd Earl of Orrery John Conyers • Party — Whig (before 1701) Tory (after 1701) • Succeeded3 — John Pulteney • Predecessor — Charles Townshend, 2nd Viscount Townshend • Succeeded — John Dalrymple, 2nd Earl of Stair • Appointer — Anne • Term End — 25 March 1715 • Term Start — 28 November 1712 • Office — Minister Plenipotentiary to France • Office1 — Chief Secretary for Ireland • Term Start1 — 17 May 1697 • Term End1 — 24 November 1699 • Predecessor1 — William Palmer • Successor1 — Humphrey May • Monarch1 — William III • Alongside2 — John Conyers • Illustration — Prior by Thomas Hudson

Prior was born in Wimborne Minster, Dorset, where he lived with his father George, a Nonconformist joiner. His father moved to London, and sent him to Westminster School, under Dr Richard Busby. After his father's death, he left school, and was cared for by his uncle, a vintner in Channel Row. Here, Lord Dorset found him reading Horace, and set him to translate an ode. He did so well that the Earl offered to contribute to the continuation of his education at Westminster. One of his schoolfellows and friends at Westminster was Charles Montagu, 1st Earl of Halifax. It was to avoid being separated from Montagu and his brother James that Prior accepted, against his patron's wish, a scholarship recently founded at St John's College, Cambridge. He took his B.A. degree in 1686, and two years later became a fellow. In collaboration with Montagu, he wrote in 1687 the City Mouse and Country Mouse, in ridicule of John Dryden's The Hind and the Panther. He led an affair with French salonist Claudine de Tencin.

During an age when satirists could be sure of patronage and promotion, Montagu was promoted at once, and Prior, three years later, became secretary to the embassy at the Hague. After four years, he was appointed a Gentleman of the Bedchamber at court. Apparently, he acted as one of the King's secretaries, and in 1697 he was secretary to the plenipotentiaries who concluded the Peace of Ryswick. Prior's talent for affairs was doubted by Alexander Pope, who admittedly had little experience in diplomatic affairs, but it is not likely that King William would have employed in this important business a man who had not given proof of diplomatic skill and grasp of details. The poet's knowledge of French was recognised by his being sent in the following year to Paris in attendance on the English ambassador. At this period Prior could say with good reason that "he had commonly business enough upon his hands, and was only a poet by accident." To verse, however, which had laid the foundation of his fortunes, he still occasionally trusted as a means of maintaining his position. His occasional poems during this period include an elegy on Queen Mary in 1695; a satirical version of Boileau's Ode sur le prise de Namur (1695); some lines on William's escape from assassination in 1696; and a brief piece called The Secretary. After his return from France, Prior became under-secretary of state and succeeded John Locke as a commissioner of trade. In 1701 he sat in Parliament for East Grinstead. He had certainly been in William's confidence with regard to the Partition Treaty; but when Somers, Orford and Halifax were impeached for their share in it he voted on the Tory side, and immediately on Anne's accession he allied himself with Robert Harley and St John. Perhaps as a consequence of this; there is no mention of his name in connection with any public transaction for nine years. But when the Tories came into power in 1710, Prior's diplomatic abilities were again called into action, and until the death of Anne he held a prominent place in all negotiations with the French court, sometimes as secret agent, sometimes in an equivocal position as ambassador's companion and sometimes as fully accredited but very unpunctually paid ambassador. His share in negotiating the Treaty of Utrecht, of which he is said to have disapproved personally, led to its popular nickname of "Matt's Peace." Prior is also known as a contributor to The Examiner newspaper.

• Illustration — Monument to Prior in Westminster Abbey When Queen Anne died and the Whigs regained power, Prior was impeached by Robert Walpole and kept in close custody from 1715 to 1717. By this time he had already published a collection of verse, written in 1709. During his imprisonment, he wrote his longest humorous poem, Alma; or, The Progress of the Mind. It was published by subscription in 1718, along with Poems on Several Occasions. The sum received for this volume (4000 guineas), with a present of £4000 from Lord Harley, enabled him to live in some comfort.

Recorded positions include Member of Parliament in the Parliament of England, ambassador and Member of the 1701 Parliament. He belonged to Royal Society. He worked at The Hague and London.

Matthew Prior is recorded as having received Fellow of the Royal Society.