"on the side of charity against the intrigues of interest, and of regular learning against licentious usurpation of medical authority," as Johnson put it; and he sprang into favour, was eventually knighted, and became physician-general to the army. His last literary work, and his worst, was a crude but ostentatious preface to a translation of Ovid. As a matter of fact his writing was invariably mediocre, and Pope, in calling attention to the fact that the "Dispensary" poem had been corrected in every edition, unkindly remarked that "every change was an improvement." John Phillips, who may be ranked among the physicians, though it is doubtful whether he practised, enjoyed a better fate as a man of letters than did either Akenside or Garth. He sprang into sudden popularity by the publication of a whimsical and clever medley called "The Silver Shilling," and this he followed up by a sort of official commemoration of the victory of Blenheim. His greatest achievement was a poem in two books on "Cider," and he was meditating an epic on "The Last Day" when he died, at the early age of thirty-three. One curious fact about his writings, small as it is, is worthy of mention. He sang the praises of tobacco in every poem he wrote, except that on Blenheim. Dr. Johnson did not rate Phillips very highly; he said that what study could confer he obtained, but that "natural deficience cannot be supplied." The sturdy doctor, however, did his utmost to rehabilitate the damaged reputation of Blackmore, whom we may regard as the most remarkable of all the compounds of physician-poets with whom we can become acquainted. Blackmore obtained an undeserved success, which was followed by unmerited ridicule, and Johnson, who hated every form of injustice, constituted himself his champion. For the truth about Blackmore we must seek the medium between the extremes of Johnson's praise and of the censure of his enemies--the "malignity of contemporary wits," as Boswell termed it. When all is said and done the fact remains that Blackmore was a man of uncommon character, and a prodigious worker. His first work, a heroic poem in ten books, on Prince Arthur, was written, he related, by "such catches and starts, and in such occasional uncertain hours as his profession afforded, and for the greatest part in coffee-houses, or in passing up and down the streets." This work passed through several editions with rapidity, and two extra books were added to it. The King knighted him and gave him other advances, but the critics furiously assailed him, and his name became a by-word for all that was heavy and ridiculous in poetry. Notwithstanding this he persevered, and published successively a "Paraphrase on the Book of Job," a "Satire on Wit," "Elijah,"--an epic poem in ten books--"Creation, a Philosophical Poem," "Advice to Poets how to celebrate the Duke of Marlborough," "The Nature of Man," "Redemption," "A New Version of the Psalms," "Alfred"--an epic in