HISTORY OI VERMONT. 45f \ 



was regulated by provincial laws ; and these the 

 colonies were much better qualified to deter- ! 



mine, than any European kings or parliaments. i 



The ludicrous absurdities which the system of ^ 



monarchy had introduced into the English sta- 

 tutes, did not apply to the practical course of < 

 events or of business in the colonies ; and their ! 

 courts had no occasion to compute on the cor- 

 ruption of blood, the respectability of an infa* 

 mous nobleman, or the sacredness of royal vice 

 or folly. Most of their lawyers were men of a ] 

 liberal education ; and several of them were ) 

 among the most respectable and useful men m 

 the country. But the time was not come to at- \ 

 tempt to improve the law or the profession. No ; 

 books of reports, no treatises on law or evidence, 

 or any thing appropriate to a colonial system of 

 law or practice had appeared ; all was in sub- ; 

 jection to British precedents and to British im- • 

 portance* I 



The medical part of science and the branches 

 more immediately connected with it, had as yet 

 only bore a practical aspect. The physicians i 



were as useful and practised with as much suc- 

 cess in the colonies, as in any part of the globe, ! 

 and no where did the people enjoy more health ; i 

 but their knowledge and success was much j 

 more the result of observation and practice, than • 

 of theory or system. No medical schools or ; 

 professorships, no regular courses of surgery^ ■, 

 chemistry, or clinical instruction, had at that ] 

 time been instituted in the colonies ; and scarce- ' i 

 ly any thing had been done in the materia me- , 

 dica, in botany or in the collections of natural \ 

 history. One important discovery was iutrodu- ^ 



