body of men, had power and intereft fufficient to introduce into great practice one of their own denomination; this was John Fothergill, a young man of parts and industry, who being bred an apothecary, and having obtained a Scotch degree, fettled in London, and attached himself to Schomberg, taking him, in many parts of his conduct, for his exemplar: fo that, upon Schomberg's decease, he flid into his practice, and became one of the most popular of the city phyficians. These two perfons, first one, and then the other, for full thirty years, carried all before them; and within that space of time, not fewer than twenty of the profeffion, whom I could name, lived in great ftraits, fome of them leaving, at their decease, fcarce fufficient to bury them. From thefe, and many other inftances that might be produced, it is evident, that neither learning, parts, nor skill, nor even all thefe united, are fufficient to enfure fuccefs in the profeffion I am fpeaking of; and that, without the concurrence of adventitious circumstances, which no one can pretend to define, a physician of the greatest merit may be loft to the world; and further it may be faid, that the fairest hopes may be fruftrated by the want of that quality, which Swift fomewhere calls an aldermanly virtue, difcretion, but is in truth, of greater efficacy in our intercourfe with mankind, than all fcience put together. Had Akenfide been poffeffed of this gift, he had probably become the firft in his faculty; but that he was able to acquire no other kind of celebrity than that of a scholar and a poet, is to be accounted for by fome particulars in his life and conduct, with which few but myself, who knew knew him well, are acquainted, and which I here infert as fuppletory to those which Johnson has recorded of him. Mr. Dyson and he were fellow ftudents, the one of law and the other of phyfic, at Leyden; where, being of congenial tempers, a friendship commenced between them that lafted through their lives. They left the university at the fame time, and both fettled in London: Mr. Dyson took to the bar, and being poffeffed of a handfome fortune fupported his friend while he was endeavouring to make himfelf known as a physician; but in a fhort time, having purchased of Mr. Hardinge, his place of clerk. of the house of commons, he quitted Westminster hall, and for the purpose of introducing Akenfide to acquaintance in an opulent neighbourhood near the town, bought a house at North-End, Hampstead; where they dwelt together during the fummer feafon : frequenting the long room, and all clubs, and affemblies of the inhabitants. At these meetings, which as they were not select, must be supposed to have confifted of fuch perfons as ufually meet for the purpose of goffiping, men of wealth, but of ordinary endowments, and able to talk of little elfe than news, and the occurrences of the day, Akenfide was for difplaying those talents which had acquired him the reputation he enjoyed in other companies; but here they were of little use to him, on the contrary, they tended to engage him in difputes that betrayed him into a contempt of thofe that differed in opinion from him. It was found out that he was a man of low birth, and a dependant on Mr. Dyfon; circumftances that furnifhed thofe whom he offended with a ground of re proach, that reduced him to the neceffity of afferting in terms that he was a gentleman. Little could be done at Hampstead after matters had proceeded to this extremity; Mr. Dyson parted with his villa at North-End, and fettled his friend in a small house in Bloomsbury fquare; affigning for his fupport fuch a part of his income as enabled him to keep a chariot. In this new fituation Akenfide ufed every endeavour to become popular, but defeated them all by the high opinion he every where manifefted of himself, and the little condefcenfion he fhewed to men of inferior endowments; by his love of political controverfy, his authoritative cenfure of the public councils, and his bigotted notions refpecting government, fubjects foreign to his profeffion, and with which fome of the wifeft of it have thought it prudent not to concern themselves. In the winter evenings he frequented Tom's coffee-house in Devereux court, then the refort of fome of the most eminent men for learning and ingenuity of the time, with fome of whom he became entangled in difputes and altercations, chiefly on fubjects of literature and politics, that fixed on his character the stamp of haughtinefs and felf-conceit, and drew him into difagreeable fituations. There was at that time a man of the name of Ballow, who used to pass his evenings in the fociety abovementioned, a lawyer by profeffion*, but of no practice; he having, by the interest of some of the Townshends, to whom he had been a kind of law tutor, obtained a place in the exchequer, which yielded him a handsome He was the author of a treatise on equity, in folio, published without a name. income, income, and exempted him from the neceffity of attending Westminster-hall. He was a man of deep and extenfive learning, but of vulgar manners; and being of a splenetic temper, envied Akenfide for that eloquence which he displayed in his conversation, and fet his own phrafeology very low. Moreover he hated him for his republican principles; and finally, being himself a man of folid learning, affected to treat him as a pretender to literature, and made it his ftudy to provoke him. One evening at the coffee-houfe a difpute between these two perfons rofe fo high, that for fome expreffion uttered by Ballow, Akenfide thought himfelf obliged to demand an apology, which not being able to obtain, he fent his adverfary a challenge in writing. Ballow, a little deformed man, well known as a faunterer in the park, about Westminster, and in the streets between Charing crofs and the houses of parliament, though remarkable for a fword of an unusual length, which he conftantly wore when he went abroad, had no inclination for fighting, and declined an answer. The demand of fatisfaction was followed by feveral attempts on the part of Akenfide to fee Ballow at his lodgings, but he kept clofe, till by the interpofition of friends the difference could be adjusted. By his conduct in this business, Akenfide new. * This method of refenting affronts offered to physicians is not The grave and placid Dr. Mead was once provoked to it by Dr. Woodward of Grefham college, who, in the exercise of his profeffion, had faid or done fomething to offend him he went to Woodward's lodgings to demand fatisfaction, and meeting him under the arch in the way from the outer court to the green Akenfide acquired but little reputation for courage, for the accommodation was not brought about by any conceffions of his adverfary, but by a refolution from which neither of them would depart, for one would not fight in the morning, nor the other in the afternoon all that he got by it was, the character of an irafcible man; and many who admired him for his genius and parts were fhy of becoming his intimates.. Yet where there was no competition for applause or literary reputation, he was an easy companion, and would bear with fuch rudeness as would have angered almost any one. Saxby, of the customhouse, who was every evening at Tom's, and by the bluntnefs of his behaviour, and the many fhrewd fayings he was used to utter, had acquired the privilege of Thersites, of saying whatever he would, was once in my hearing, inveighing against the profeffion of phyfic, which Akenfide took upon him to defend. This railer, after labouring to prove that it was all impofture, concluded his difcourfe with this fentiment: Doctor,' faid he, after all you have faid, 'my opinion of the profeffion of phyfic is this, The ancients endeavoured to make it a fcience and failed; and the moderns to make it a trade and have fuc court, drew his fword and bid him defend himself or beg pardon, which, it is fuppofed, he did. This rencounter is recorded in an engraved view of Grefham college, inferted in Dr. Ward's lives of the Gresham profeffors, in which Woodward is reprefented kneeling, and laying his fword at the feet of his antagonit; and was thus explained to me by Dr. Lawrence the phyician. Mead was the friend and patron of Ward, which muft be fuppofed to have been his inducement to perpetuate an event fo foreign to the nature of his work, • çeeded,' |