Lives of the Poets | Page 9

They whose names were inserted in the commission of array
were not capitally punished, as it could not be proved that they had
consented to their own nomination; but they were considered as
malignants, and their estates were seized.
"Waller, though confessedly," says Clarendon, "the most guilty, with
incredible dissimulation affected such a remorse of conscience, that his

trial was put off, out of Christian compassion, till he might recover his
understanding." What use he made of this interval, with what liberality
and success he distributed flattery and money, and how, when he was
brought (July 4) before the House, he confessed and lamented, and
submitted and implored, may be read in the "History of the Rebellion"
(B. vii.). The speech, to which Clarendon ascribes the preservation of
his "dear-bought life," is inserted in his works. The great historian,
however, seems to have been mistaken in relating that "he prevailed" in
the principal part of his
supplication, "not to be tried by a council of
war;" for, according to Whitelock, he was by expulsion from the House
abandoned to the tribunal which he so much dreaded, and, being tried
and condemned, was reprieved by Essex; but after a year's
imprisonment, in which time resentment grew less acrimonious, paying
a fine of ten thousand pounds, he was permitted to "recollect himself in
another country."
Of his behaviour in this part of life, it is not necessary to direct the
reader's opinion. "Let us not," says his last ingenious biographer,
"condemn him with untempered severity, because he was not a prodigy
which the world hath seldom seen, because his character included not
the poet, the orator, and the hero."
For the place of his exile he chose France, and stayed some time at
Roan, where his daughter Margaret was born, who was afterwards his
favourite, and his amanuensis. He then removed to Paris, where he
lived with great splendour and hospitality; and from time to time
amused himself with poetry, in which he sometimes speaks of the
rebels, and their usurpation, in the natural language of an honest man.
At last it became necessary, for his support, to sell his wife's jewels;
and being reduced, as he said, at last "to the rump-jewel," he solicited
from Cromwell permission to return, and obtained it by the interest of
Colonel Scroop, to whom his sister was married. Upon the remains of a
fortune, which the danger of his life had very much diminished, he
lived at Hallbarn, a house built by himself very near to Beaconsfield,
where his mother resided. His mother, though related to Cromwell and
Hampden, was zealous for the royal cause, and, when Cromwell visited

her, used to reproach him; he, in return, would throw a napkin at her,
and say he would not dispute with his aunt; but finding in time that she
acted for the king, as well as talked, he made her a prisoner to her own
daughter, in her own house. If he would do anything, he could not do
less.
Cromwell, now Protector, received Waller, as his kinsman, to familiar
conversation. Waller, as he used to relate, found him sufficiently versed
in ancient history; and, when any of his enthusiastic friends came to
advise or consult him, could sometimes overhear him discoursing in the
cant of the times: but, when he returned, he would say, "Cousin Waller,
I must talk to these men in their own way;" and resumed the common
style of conversation.
He repaid the Protector for his favours (1654) by the famous Panegyric,
which has been always considered as the first of his poetical
productions. His choice of encomiastic topics is very judicious; for he
considers Cromwell in his exaltation, without inquiring how he attained
it; there is consequently no mention of the rebel or the regicide. All the
former part of his hero's life is veiled with shades; and nothing is
brought to view but the chief, the governor, the defender of England's
honour, and the enlarger of her dominion. The act of violence by which
he obtained the supreme power is lightly treated, and decently justified.
It was certainly to be desired that the detestable band should be
dissolved, which had destroyed the Church, murdered the king, and
filled the nation with tumult and oppression; yet Cromwell had not the
right of dissolving them, for all that he had before done could be
justified only by supposing them invested with lawful authority. But
combinations of wickedness would overwhelm the world by the
advantage which licentious principles afford, did not those, who have
long practised perfidy, grow faithless to each other.
In the poem on the War with Spain are some passages at least equal to
the best parts of the Panegyric; and, in the conclusion, the poet ventures
yet a higher flight of flattery,