Mark Akenside, an English physician and poet, born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Nov. 9, 1721, died in London, June 23, 1770. He was the sou of a butcher, and was injured for life when very young by his father's cleaver falling upon him. He was educated for a Presbyterian clergyman, beginning his studies at an academy in Newcastle, and continuing them at the university of Edinburgh. While here he decided to become a physician, and devoted the last two years of his course to medical education. In 1742 he went to Ley den, where he took his degree of M. D. in May, 1744. Just before this he had published in London his poem "The Pleasures of Imagination." Even at an earlier age he had written verses for magazines. The "Pleasures of Imagination" achieved immediate and marked success. It was especially praised by Pope. Akenside practised first at Northampton, but afterward went to London. He was at this time assisted by a friend, Jeremiah Dyson, a lord of the treasury, who gave him an allowance of £300 a year until his practice should support him. He was made a fellow of the college of surgeons and a physician to the queen, but attained no great success in the ordinary walks of his profession.

Besides the "Pleasures of Imagination," his greatest work, he wrote several minor poems, and a large number of professional pamphlets and essays.