Garth came of a Yorkshire family, and was born in 1660. He was admitted a Fellow of the College of Physicians in 1693, gained a large practice, and is said to have been very benevolent to the poor. The _Dispensary_ (1699) is a satire called forth by the opposition of the Society of Apothecaries, to an edict of the College, and is a mock-heroic poem, which the quarrel made so effective at the time that it passed through several editions. The merit of achieving what the satirist intended may therefore be granted to the _Dispensary_. Few modern readers, however, will appreciate the welcome it received, and it is ludicrous to read in Anderson's edition of the poet that the poem 'is only inferior in humour, discrimination of character, and poetical ardour to the _Rape of the Lock_.' It would be far more accurate to say that the _Dispensary_ has not a single merit in common with that poem, and but slight merit of any kind. The following passage upon death is the most vigorous, and is interesting as having supplied Cowper with a line in the poem on his Mother's Picture:[31] ''Tis to the vulgar Death too harsh appears, The ill we feel is only in our fears; To die is landing on some silent shore Where billows never break, nor tempests roar; Ere well we feel th' friendly stroke 'tis o'er. The wise through thought th' insults of death defy, The fools through blest insensibility. 'Tis what the guilty fear, the pious crave; Sought by the wretch and vanquished by the brave. It eases lovers, sets the captive free, And though a tyrant, offers liberty.' Addison in defending Garth in the _Whig-Examiner_ from the criticisms of Prior in the _Examiner_, the organ of the Tory party, says he does not question but the author 'who has endeavoured to prove that he who wrote the _Dispensary_ was no poet, will very suddenly undertake to show that he who gained the battle of _Blenheim_ is no general.' The comparison was an unfortunate one. Marlborough's military reputation has grown brighter with time, Garth's fame as a poet has long ago ceased to exist. A literary although not a poetical interest is associated with the name of "well-natured Garth," who, as Pope acknowledges, was one of his earliest friends; like Arbuthnot, he lived among the wits, and as a member of the famous Kit-cat Club he wrote verses upon the Whig beauties toasted by its members. His name is linked with Dryden's as well as with that of his illustrious successor. It will be remembered how, on the death of Dryden, the poet's body lay in state in the College of Physicians, and how, before the great procession started for Westminster Abbey, Sir Samuel, who was then President, delivered a Latin oration.