EDMUND, a celebrated English poet, was the son of Robert Waller, Esq. of Agmondesham in Buckinghamshire, by Anne, the sister of the great Hamden who distinguished himself so much in the beginning of the civil wars. He was born in 1605; and his father dying when he was very young, the care of his education fell to his mother, who sent him to Eton school. He was afterwards sent to King's college in Cambridge, where he must have been very affilious in his studies, since, at fifteen or seventeen years of age, he was chosen into the last parliament of King James I. and served as burgess for Agmondesham. He began to exercise his poetical talent so early as the year 1623; as appears from his verses "upon the danger his majesty (being prince) escaped in the road of St Andero;" for there Prince Charles, returning from Spain that year, had like to have been cast away. It was not, however, Mr Waller's wit, his fine parts, or his poetry, that so much occasioned him to be first publicly known, as his carrying off the daughter and sole heiress of a rich citizen, against a rival whose interest was espoused by the court. It is not known at what time he married his first lady; but he was a widower before he was 25, when he began to have a passion for Sacharissa, which was a fictitious name for the lady Dorothy Sidney, daughter to the earl of Leicester, and afterwards wife to the earl of Sunderland. He was now known at court, cared for by all who had any relish for wit and polite literature; and was one of the famous club of which Lord Falkland, Mr Chillingworth, and other eminent men, were members. He was returned burgess for Agmondesham in the parliament which met in April 1640. An intermission of parliaments having disquieted the nation, and raised jealousies against the designs of the court, which would be sure to discover themselves whenever the king came to ask for a supply, Mr Waller was one of the first who condemned the preceding measures. He showed himself in opposition to the court, and made a speech in the house on this occasion; from which we may gather some notion of his general principles in government; wherein, however, he afterwards proved very variable and inconstant. He opposed the court also in the long parliament which met in November following, and was chosen to impeach Judge Crawley, which he did in a warm and eloquent speech, July 16th 1641.

This speech was so highly applauded, that 20,000 copies of it were sold in one day. In 1642, he was one of the commissioners appointed by the parliament to present their propositions of peace to the king at Oxford. In 1643, he was deeply engaged in a design to reduce the city of London and the tower to the service of the king; for which he was tried and condemned, together with Mr Tomkins his brother-in-law, and Mr Challoner. The two latter suffered death; but Mr Waller obtained a reprieve: he was, however, sentenced to suffer a year's imprisonment, and to pay a fine of 10,000l. After this, he became particularly attached to Oliver Cromwell, upon whom he wrote a very handsome panegyric. He also wrote a noble poem on the death of that great man.

At the Restoration, he was treated with great civility by Charles II. who always made him one of the party in his diversions at the duke of Buckingham's and other places. He wrote a panegyric upon his majesty's return; which being thought to fall much short of that he had before written on Oliver Cromwell, the king one day asked him in railing, "How is it, Waller, that you wrote a better encomium on Cromwell than on me?" "May it please your majesty," answered he, "we poets generally succeed best in fiction." He sat in several parliaments after the Restoration, and continued in the full vigour of his genius to the end of his life, his natural vivacity bearing him up, and making his company agreeable to the last. He died of a dropy in 1687, and was interred in the churchyard of Beaconsfield, where a monument is erected to his memory. Mr Waller has been honoured as the most elegant and harmonious versifier of his time, and a great refiner of the English language. The best edition of his works, containing poems, speeches, letters, &c. is that published in quarto by Mr Fenton, to 1739.