And after all--the slander and the maledictions--Sir Richard Blackmore gained the victory, and the wits who never wearied of calling him "a fool" were defeated. The preface to "Prince Arthur" provoked discussion; the good sense and better taste of the country were roused, and took the reformer's side of the controversy. Pope and his myrmidons, it was true, were still able to make the _beau monde_ merry about the city knight's presumption--but they could not refute the city knight's arguments; and they themselves were compelled to shape their conduct, as writers, in deference to a new public feeling which he was an important instrument in calling into existence. "Prince Arthur" appeared in 1695, and to the commotion caused by its preface may be attributed much of the success of Jeremy Collier's "Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the Stage," which was published some three years afterwards. As a poet Sir Richard Blackmore can command only that praise which the charitable bestow on goodness of intention. His muse was a pleasant, well-looking, right-minded young lady, but nothing more. But it must be remembered, before we measure out our criticisms on his productions, that he never arrogated to himself the highest honours of poesy. "I am a gentleman of taste and culture, and though I cannot ever hope to build up the nervous lines of Dryden, or attain the polish and brilliance of Congreve, I believe I can write what the generation sorely needs--works that intelligent men may study with improvement, devout Christians may read without being offended, and pure-minded girls may peruse without blushing from shame. 'Tis true I am a hard-worked doctor, spending my days in coffee-houses, receiving apothecaries, or driving over the stones in my carriage, visiting my patients. Of course a man so circumstanced must fail to achieve artistic excellence, but still I'll do my best." Such was the language with which he introduced himself to the public. His best poem, _The Creation_, had such merit that his carping biographer, Johnson, says, "This poem, if he had written nothing else, would have transmitted him to posterity one of the first favourites of the English muse"; and Addison designated the same poem "one of the most useful and noble productions in our English verse." Of Sir Richard's private character Johnson remarks--"In some part of his life, it is not known when, his indigence compelled him to teach a school--a humiliation with which, though it certainly lasted but a little while, his enemies did not forget to reproach him when he became conspicuous enough to excite malevolence; and let it be remembered, for his honour, that to have been a schoolmaster is the only reproach which all the perspicacity of malice, animated by wit, has ever fixed upon his private life." CHAPTER XI. THE GENEROSITY AND THE PARSIMONY OF PHYSICIANS.