from Edinburgh besides, vouching the same fitness not only to practise over any part of the kingdom, but, as we have already seen, ubique gentium,-at either pole, if I liked, had Captain Parry then found out the mode of taking me there. Surely the College will not allege that the severity of the examination to which they subject the Doctor of our great Universities for his fellowship, can fairly be regarded as a full security for his competency, if he was not competent before. Nor, indeed, does the testimonial of his fellowship affect such assurance, or to hold out any higher pledge of fitness; so that to say the honest truth, and with all my respect for this most valuable institution, if I am candid, I must own myself at a loss to know what either of us gained by my appearance. The College testimonial merely announces the competency of the fellow to do precisely the same things that the Universities did before, without stating one additional claim to respect. Its language in the name of the President recites: " Eique (i. e. Doctori) concessisse liberam facultatem et

licentiam exercendi, scientiam et artem medicam juxta formam statutorum ad hoc editorum, largitosque præterea usum et fructum omnium commoditatum, libertatum ac privilegiorum quæ Collegio nostro auctoritate prædicta et jam concessa sunt, et in futurum concedenda."

It is right we should bestow as candid a consideration on the state of medical education in the north, to which the adversaries of the London College of Physicians attach such transcendant importance. The first witness I shall call is himself a Scotch physician, (I like to shew every fair play,) an élève of the University of Edinburgh, and an authority, it must be allowed on all hands, in every point of view of the very first class; and I can add, from my own personal knowledge of his unbending integrity and honour, that a more truly respectable testimony could not possibly be selected for throwing light on the true merits of the question.

This letter is addressed to the patrons of the University, and entitled, "On the Reform of Medical Education, necessary to give the Public

an adequate Security for well-educated Men, and is dated, I think, 24th November last:

"GENTLEMEN,

"As a reform in our medical school has been for some time under your consideration, and several alterations have already been adopted with the view of amending the course of medical education pursued in this place, I trust I may be allowed to state what I consider the most serious defects of medical education, more especially as I conceive that not one of the new regulations reaches the source of the evil. I take this public way of making the communication, because what I have to say is not connected with the technicalities of science, but appeals to those broad principles of education which are intelligible to every man of common sense. It may not be improper to state, that I have had opportunities which can fall to the lot of few, of appreciating the effects of medical education, having been employed for many years in teaching the different depart

ments of medicine to advanced students of the most liberal class. My mode of teaching by examinations, has afforded me peculiar advantages in ascertaining their progress. I hope, therefore, I do not obtrude, without a reason, for offering you the results of my experience on a subject of great public interest,—the best means of improving medical education.

"The first and most serious defect of medical education at this place, arises from those entering on the profession not being necessarily required to have had the advantages of a liberal education. No test of this is exacted, and a lad may therefore enter on his medical career in a pure state of nature, with his mind a perfect tabula rasa. Why the preliminary discipline of a liberal education should not be enforced in medicine as well as law and divinity, is altogether unaccountable. There is no profession in which it is more necessary to apply the reasoning of a sound logic, or to acquire the habits of an accurate induction,none in which error is more pernicious, and none exposed to more sources of fallacy. Those exercises, then, which open the understanding

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and refine the taste, which give freedom, range, and activity to the mind, form a necessary introduction to the study of medicine as a liberal science. It is the rectitude of judgment and sense of propriety which this education has such a tendency to cultivate, that gives the public the very best security against all kinds of quackery, vulgar pretensions, and low arts.

"Just in proportion as there is something mysterious and occult in the nature of medicine, admirably adapted to insnare the credulous,and who is not credulous when diseased?-it becomes necessary to guard against this bias by the liberal institution of its professors. So essential to a cultivated understanding is a just medical observation, that without it the profession becomes a vulgar trade, where the whole contention is to adapt drugs to the swallow of the mob; and the old maxim, si populus vult decipi decipiatur,' is the watch-word of every sly trader. Many pride themselves on being mere matter-of-fact men in medicine; but these are so far from being just deservers, that they are almost uniformly the most puerile and most dangerous of all theorists. Facts in medicine