PHILIPS, John, an English poet of some eminence, was born in 1676. He was educated at Winchester and Oxford, where he became acquainted with the works of Milton, whom he studied with great application, and traced in all his successful translations from the ancients. The first poem by which he distinguished himself was his Splendid Skilling, which in the Tatler is styled the "finest burlesque poem in the English language." His next was entitled Blenheim, which was written at the request of the Earl of Oxford and Mr Henry St John, afterwards Lord Bolingbroke, on the victory obtained by the Duke of Marlborough in the year 1704. It was published in 1705; and the year after, he finished another poem upon Cider, the first book of which had been written at Oxford. It is on the model of Virgil's Georgics, and is thought a very excellent piece. We have no more of Philips' writings except a Latin ode to Mr Henry St John, which is esteemed a masterpiece. He was meditating a poem on the Last Day, when he was cut off by consumption on the 15th of February 1708.