Garth might be, with equal justice, applied to Dr. Akenside; viz.-that no physician knew his art more, nor his trade less *.

The year 1757 is remarkable in the life of Akenside, for his having completed the first book of his second poem on the Pleasures of the Imagination.

In 1758 he wrote his Ode to the Country Gentlemen of England. The poet-laureate, WHITEHEAD, also published "verses to the people of England," at the same time; in the same form; and at the same price +.

“This ode,” says Mr. Justice Hardinge, in a

* "Garth was a man,” says Warton ‡," of the sweetest disposition, amiable manners, and universal benevolence; all parties, at a time when party violence was at a great height, joined in praising and loving him." And here I cannot deny myself the pleasure of quoting Pope's opinion of the physicians of his time.

"There is no end of my kind treatment from the faculty," said he, in a letter to Mr. Allen a few weeks before he died. "They are, in general, the most amiable companions, and the best friends, as well as most learned men I know." He can have but a very limited knowledge of society, who cannot apply this to the medical men of the present age, as well as to that which is passed.

+ Quarto, sixpence.

Ed. of Pope, Vol. I. p. 75.

letter to Mr. Nichols, "is unequal; but it has glorious passages in it. Mr. Elliott, father of Lord Minto, made an admirable speech in support of the Scotch militia, which I had the good fortune to hear, when I was a boy: and it was reported, that when commended, as he was, on every side, for that per

formance; If I was above myself,' answered he,

'I can account for it; for I had been animated by the sublime ode of Dr. Akenside.""

The criticisms of cotemporaries on eminent literary characters are of little authority, while those characters are living; but they become interesting in the distant time. With this impression I insert a criticism on this poem, from the Monthly Review. "The poetical productions of this twofold disciple of Apollo" have this peculiar excellence; they

*This title was first given to Akenside in Cooper's Call of Aristippus.

"O thou, for whom the British bays
Bloom in these unpoetic days,
Whose early genius glow'd to follow

The arts through Nature's ancient ways,

Two-fold disciple of Apollo !

Shall Aristippus' easy lays,
Trifles of philosophic pleasure,
Composed in literary leisure,
Aspire to gain thy deathless praise?

uniformly glow with the sacred fire of liberty; inasmuch that our public-spirited doctor well deserves to be styled the poet of the community. In this light we have read his Ode to the Country Gentlemen of England, with peculiar satisfaction. It is spirited, manly, and sufficiently poetical, for those to whom it is addressed ;-and as, in former times, the halls of our rural ancestors were adorned with passages from our old chronicles, so we heartily wish, that most of the stanzas of this patriotic performance were to supply the place, in our modern mansions, of race-horses, Newmarket jockies, and the trophies of the chase."

Soon after writing this poem, the author was seized with a violent sickness; to facilitate his recovery from which, he retired, for a short time, to Goulder's Hill, the seat of Mr. Dyson; where he had the satisfaction of hailing the arrival of a lady, whom his friend had recently married. To this agreeable circumstance he alludes in an ode, written on the occasion of his recovery. Never, in fact, was

Another writer * says, his Attic urn was

"Fill'd from Ilyssus by the Naiad's hand."

* Author of the Epistle to Christopher Anstey, Esq.

any friendship more beautiful than that, subsisting between these excellent persons!

"While around his sylvan scene
My Dyson led the white-wing'd hours;

Oft from th' Athenian academic bowers

Their sages came; oft heard our lingering walk;
The Mantuan music, warbling o'er the green,—
And oft did Tully's reverend shade,
Though much for liberty afraid,

With us of letter'd ease or virtuous glory talk.

But OTHER GUESTS were on their way,
And reach'd, ere long, this favour'd grove;
Ev'n the celestial progeny of Jove,
Bright VENUS! with her all-subduing son,
Whose golden shaft most willingly obey
The best and wisest. As they came,

Glad HYMEN waved his genial flame,

And sang their happy gifts, and praised their spotless throne.

I saw, when through yon festive gate

He led along his chosen maid,

And to my friend with smiles presenting said:
Receive that fairest wealth, which Heaven assign'd
To human fortune. Did thy lonely state
One wish, one utmost hope, confess?
Behold! she comes t' adorn and bless;

Comes, worthy of thy heart, and equal to thy mind.""

Though Akenside never married, it is evident from many passages in his poems, that he was sensibly alive to the comforts of a married state.

The loss of Parthenia occurred in early youth ;

that of Olympia in maturer manhood:

"Far other vows must I prefer
To thy indulgent power;

Alas! but now I paid my tear

On fair OLYMPIA's virgin tomb,

And lo, from thence, in quest I roam
Of Philomela's bower."

Akenside, like many a valiant knight, had laughed at love, when love was at a distance*; but there seems to have been no period of his life, in which he was not sensible to its impressions. Parthenia and Olympia he lost, when upon the eve of marriage with them; but he celebrates other ladies, and speaks of them even with affection; Amoret † and Melissa 1. To which of these he alludes in his ode, entitled the Complaint, we are left to conjecture.

"I know, I see

Her merit, needs it now be shown,

Alas! to me?

How often to myself unknown

CA

BO

* See particularly his Elegy on Love; his Ode on Love; and his Ode to a Friend, unsuccessful in Love.

† Ode x. b. ii.

P. of I. second poem, i. v. 366.