1828.] to the. Students of Anatomy. 



advance the interests of science. Indeed that looking to what is done 

 under the existing practice the decencies of society are no less con- 

 cerned than its security in supporting it. The real objection to dissec- 

 tion is however the necessary subjects for it may be procured, whether 

 by the means of theft or otherwise that the feelings of surviving rela- 

 tives are sometimes violated and afflicted by it. No man of even ordi- 

 nary intellect shrinks from the thought of being anatomised himself the 

 senseless mass can suffer nothing but two-thirds of the people feel great 

 horror at the thought of any slight being shewn to the remains of 

 their relatives. It is the knowledge here of the fact, therefore, that 

 makes the evil : it can be nothing else. And it is the knowledge coming 

 at a particular time too immediately, or briefly, after a domestic loss : 

 no man would be much distressed at finding that his great-grandfather, 

 who died thirty years before "he was born, had been anatomised ; although 

 he might be very much shocked at hearing that the same accident had 

 recently occurred in the case of a father, or a brother. Then it is clear 

 that the present system, by which bodies are procured for anatomical exa- 

 mination, is calculated to produce all this mischief in a very excessive 

 and needless degree. A church yard is found to have been broken into. 

 Some graves are found to have been emptied, and others disturbed. A 

 whole parish is flung into alarm and confusion : inquiries of a very 

 unpleasant description take place : and a certain number of persons are 

 placed in the painful condition of ascertaining that their relatives- 

 recently deceased have been removed ; they searchthreaten apply 

 to the law and end in finding that there is no possibility of reco- 

 vering them. Now here a real, and a needless wrong is committed, and 

 often a wrong attended by circumstances more painful and displeasing 

 than those which we have described. And that whole wrong is abso- 

 lutely got rid of by the proposal which we are now attempting to sup- 

 port ; for the only injury is to the feelings of the surviving relatives ; 

 and the first provision of the new project is, that " no bodies can be 

 made applicable, except in cases where no friends or relatives appear 

 who are anxious to prevent such a disposition." 



Upon every consideration, therefore, connected with the interests of 

 public decorum, we are quite sure that the plan proposed would be 

 incomparably better than the practice at present in existence. Far less 

 of that scandal which arises out of even speaking upon or discussing 

 particular subjects would be created by it. It would be easy to appoint 

 such regulations as should give the right to every member of the Col- 

 lege of Surgeons, to obtain, in due course, his chance of such subjects 

 as the new law should place at public disposal. A certain sum should 

 be paid for every body furnished, in order to ensure the correct dis- 

 posal of such supply ; and this sum ought not, as it strikes us, to be 

 less than from two to three pounds, that the facility of obtaining ma- 

 terials might never lead to any needless wastefulness or abuse. All the 

 circumstances connected with the transport or removal of such remains 

 would then be conducted with carefulness and decency surely they 

 should rather be so under legal regulation, than under the guidance of 

 the ruffians who now control them ? In twelve months thesystem once 

 only discussed and regulated the whole matter would go on in perfect 

 silence : and we should be spared all those disgusting accounts of " graves 

 broken open," of " corpses found in sacks and hampers," others " seized 

 in carts upon the public roads in hackney-coaches," &c. &c. j with 



M. M. New Series. VOL. V. No. 29. 3 P 



