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BLACKMORE.

IR RICHARD BLACKMORE is one of

SIR

those men whose writings have attracted much notice, but of whofe life and manners very little has been communicated, and whofe lot it has been to be much oftener mentioned by enemies than by friends.

He was the fon of Robert Blackmore of Corfham in Wiltshire, ftyled by Wood Gentleman, and supposed to have been an attorney: having been for fome time educated in a country-school, he was fent at thirteen to Westminster; and in 1668 was entered at Edmund-Hall in Oxford, where he took the degree of M. A. June 3, 1676, and refided thirteen years; a much longer time than it is ufual to spend at the university. He afterwards travelled: at Padua he was made doctor of phyfic; and, after having wandered about

a year

a year and a half on the Continent, returned home.

In fome part of his life, it is not known when, his indigence compelled him to teach a fchool; an humiliation with which, though it certainly lafted but a little while, his enemies did not forget to reproach him, when he became confpicuous enough to excite malevolence; and let it be remembered for his honour, that to have been once a fchool-mafter is the only reproach which all the perfpicacity of malice, animated by wit, has ever fixed upon his private life.

When he first engaged in the study of phyfic, he enquired, as he fays, of Dr. Sydenham what authors he should read, and was directed by Sydenham to Don Quixote; which, faid he, is a very good book; I read it ftill. The perverseness of mankind makes it often mifchievous in men of eminence to give way to merriment. The idle and the illiterate will long fhelter themselves under this foolish apophthegm.

Whether

Whether he refted fatisfied with this direction, or fought for better, he commenced physician, and obtained high eminence and extensive practice. He became Fellow of the College of Physicians April 12, 1687, being one of the thirty which, by the new charter of king James, were added to the former Fellows. His refidence was in Cheapfide, and his friends were chiefly in the city. In the early part of Blackmore's time, a citizen was a term of reproach; and his place of abode was another topick to which his adverfaries had recourfe, in the penury of fcandal.

Blackmore therefore was made a poet not by neceffity but inclination, and wrote not for a livelihood but for a fame; or, if he may tell his own motives, for a nobler purpose, to engage poetry in the cause of Virtue.

I believe it is peculiar to him, that his first publick work was an heroick poem. He was not known as a maker of verses, till he published (in 1699) Prince Arthur, in ten books, written, as he relates, by fuch catches and ftarts, and in fuch occafional uncertain hours

as

as his profeffion afforded, and for the greatest part in coffee-houses, or in paffing up and down the freets. For the latter part of this apology he was accufed of writing to the rumbling of his chariot-wheels. He had read, he fays, but little poetry throughout is whole life; and for fifteen years before had not written an bundred verfes, except one copy of Latin verfes in praife of a friend's book.

He thinks, and with fome reason, that from fuch a performance perfection cannot be expected; but he finds another reafon for the feverity of his cenfurers, which he expreffes in language fuch as Cheapfide easily furnished. I am not free of the Poets Company, having never kiffed the governor's hands: mine is therefore not fo much as a permissionpoem, but a downright interloper. Thofe gentlemen who carry on their poetical trade in a joint ftock, would certainly do what they could to fink and ruin an unlicensed adventurer, notwithstanding I difturbed none of their factories, nor imported any goods they had ever dealt in. He had lived in the city till he had learned its note.

That