182S.] Supply of " Subjects" for Distectiok. 467 



and decorum, the apprehension of which forms the chief argument of 

 those who oppose innovation, would be fewer by far, and less painful in 

 their character, under an acknowledged and legalized system of supply 

 than they are under at the present. We may farther take leave to express 

 our opinion an opinion to which a very little examination too, we think, 

 will bring our readers that no improvement can be looked for of the 

 system connected with this matter unless it be by a direct and uncom- 

 promising change. All the schemes of half measures which have been 

 suggested ; indeed every proposal short of a plain and avowed allot- 

 ment of a specific provision for the object required, will exhibit their 

 powerlessness and insufficiency upon a very short inquiry indeed. 



One scheme to particularize a few of these last and one which has- 

 been rather favourably listened to, has been to bring dissection (if we 

 may use such a form of speech without the imputation of levity) into 

 fashion ; and medical men, as the most immediately interested in the 

 operation, have been called on to set an example, by giving up their 

 own bodies to the profession at their death. This scheme will never 

 be successful. Medical men, as a body, are no more free from weakness 

 on their death beds, or likely to be deaf to the persuasions and entreaties 

 of still weaker relatives, than other people. A second objection, how- 

 ever, is still more fatal. The bodies of male subjects alone will not 

 answer the object required ; and though many a man might be disposed, 

 from a feeling of public spirit, to give up his own person in aid of the 

 pursuits of science, scarcely any man would consent to abandon that of 

 his wife, his daughter, or any other female relative. 



The importation of subjects from foreign countries has been a second 

 expedient and it has been seriously urged for supplying the necessities 

 of the schools at home. This plan proceeds apparently on the principle 

 of an order in debts and duties that it is more allowable to devour our 

 neighbours than our friends; but it is no more feasible, in practice, 

 than the one we have been just discussing. In Paris, medical subjects 

 are obtained at a very cheap rate we believe at from about fifteen to, 

 twenty franks each. But the obstacles to their transport to this country 

 are so obvious as well as insurmountable, that it would be waste of time 

 even to name them. For one barrier on this side the water only to 

 subject such importations to a custom-house examination would be 

 perfectly impossible. Without the remotest desire to be hypercritically 

 delicate, there is an offence even in the idea of such an arrangement 

 which could not be tolerated. And, on the other hand, unless we 

 throw all trade entirely open between the two countries, it would be 

 still more impossible to open such a door to smuggling, as would be 

 furnished by the permission to import bulky articles of any kind unless 

 subject to every strictness of inspection. Not to dwell upon the fact 

 although it might pass for something in the argument that it is per- 

 fectly certain that the French themselves would refuse their consent to 

 any such traffic. 



We then come to a variety of suggestions, which may be dismissed 

 nearly en masse, for increasing the legal supply of the article in 

 question, without outraging, as it is called, public feeling upon the 

 subject. The abandoning all criminals executed no matter for what 

 crimes to dissection, instead of confining the penalty, as at present, 

 to cases of murder. The grant, for the same purpose, of the bodies of 

 suicides. And this last, we believe, was Mr. Peel's proposition 



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