Arbuthnot. “What you have said will show the dignity of our art, and who will doubt of its liberality who reflects for a moment on the generous and spirited conduct of our poor friend Garth, whose death we all deplore? To whom but a Physician was the corpse of Dryden indebted for a suitable interment? We all recollect how he caused it to be brought and placed in our College, proposed and encouraged a subscription for the expense of the funeral, pronounced an oration over the remains of the great Poet, and afterwards attended the solemnity from Warwick Lane to Westminster Abbey, where it was conveyed on the 13th May, 1700, attended by more than a hundred coaches.
From a portrait of Garth by Sir Godfrey Kneller, in the Censor’s Room of the College.
“But Garth was indeed the best-natured of men: besides being a polite scholar, ever attentive to the honour of the faculty, and never stooping to prostitute the dignity of the profession through mean or sordid views of self-interest[31].”
Mead. “The loss of such a man we shall all long lament: besides there is something in the death of a colleague peculiarly melancholy. His mind has been formed by the same studies, the same motives must have actuated his conduct, he must have been influenced by the same hopes and fears, and run pretty nearly the same career in life with ourselves; and at his death we are forcibly struck with the futility of all our plans, the emptiness and littleness of all our schemes of ambition. I know not when I have been more affected than in reading, a few days ago, the story of the death of Dr. Fox as told by Hamey, in his Bustorum aliquot Reliquiæ. He was a younger son of Fox the martyrologist, and had been a warm friend and active patron of Hamey, the great benefactor, and, as I may call him, second founder of our College. In that curious MS. which contains the characters of his contemporary physicians, statesmen, and other celebrated persons of his day, Hamey speaks in the most pathetic terms of the death-bed scene of his friend, and I will endeavour to recollect the precise Latin expressions in which Fox takes leave of him. Mi amice, vale; crastinus dies liberabit tuum ab his angustiis. Et vale dixisse iterum, porrectâque quam suspicabar frigidiore mauu, expressisse mihi lacrymas, meamque illam imbelliam, averso leviter capite, redarguisse et susurrasse. Hoccine est philosophari? et fructum promere tot colloquiorum? Hamey adds, Victus ego dolore et pudore; me domum confero arbitratus in ista ἀμηχανία levius fore audire cœtera quam videre. But let us change this melancholy subject. Tell us,” addressing Arbuthnot, “are we to expect another volume of the Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus; or are Pope, Swift, and yourself tired of the project? I hope there is not an end of a scheme which was so calculated, by ridiculing the abuse of human learning, to benefit the cause of polite letters.”
The answer of that brilliant wit and scholar was unfavourable; and it evidently appeared, from the dejected tone in which he spoke, that the change in the fortunes of the illustrious triumvirate which had been occasioned by the death of Queen Anne, had depressed his spirits, and terminated the plan.
Most of the party had now assembled round Dr. Mead, to listen to this hasty recital of the merits of the distinguished physicians of former days. Of the names and persons of many of those present that evening, I have now no recollection: but, even at this distance of time, the figure of one who leaned on the arm of Arbuthnot is distinctly present to my imagination. He was protuberant before and behind, and used humorously to compare himself to a spider; and was so feeble that he could not, as I have heard, dress or undress himself, and was always wrapped up in fur and flannel, besides wearing a bodice of stiff canvas. In this description every one will recognise the form of Pope. He took no part in the conversation; but his fine, sharp, and piercing eye, directed as it was alternately to the different speakers, indicated that he felt no common concern in the subject. But he did not stay long; pleading as an apology for his departure an attack of his old enemy the headache, and the intention of returning to Twickenham[32] that evening. As he passed by the spot in which I was placed, I heard him say to a friend who accompanied him, and who, like himself, had just taken leave of Dr. Mead: “I highly esteem and love that worthy man. His unaffected humanity and benevolence have stifled much of that envy which his eminence in his profession would otherwise have drawn out; and, indeed, I ought to speak well of his profession, for there is no end of my kind treatment from the faculty. They are in general the most amiable companions and the best friends, as well as the most learned men I know.”
The party now moved to a little distance to inspect a bust of Harvey, which my master had lately caused to be executed by an excellent hand, from an original picture in his possession. “This bust,” said Mead, “I intend to present to the College, to replace in some measure the statue of Harvey which was erected to him during his lifetime, and stood in the hall of our former building, and which was no doubt lost in the great fire. I have long thought it a reproach that we should not at least possess a bust of him who, to use the strong and figurative language of the Latin inscription, gave motion to the blood, and origin to animals, and must ever be hailed by us Stator Perpetuus.”