I LLEGAL PRACTITIONERS. 
530 
cine. This is not a subject affecting the interests of one in- 
stitution, or one particular class of individuals, more than 
another: it is one which concerns the public in general as well 
as every member of the profession. It is, surely, of no small 
consequence to the former that they should have some evidence 
of the qualifications of persons in whose hands they entrust their 
lives ; and it is but fair that the practitioner should derive some 
advantage, in a legal point of view, as a return for the extended 
course of study he has gone through, and the marks of profi- 
ciency which he has been at the pains to obtain. It is not suffi- 
cient to leave it to the world to seek him out, and reward his 
labour and industry. The unlicensed and uneducated pretender, 
whose only object is gain, will resort to various means of im- 
posing upon the public which he is above employing ; and as, 
unfortunately, the majority of persons are not sufficiently good 
judges of medical attainments to avoid the snare which is laid 
for them, the practitioner pays the penalty of his own upright 
conduct, and is obliged to sit tamely by, and see the ignorant 
upstart gain the confidence of his patients, and deprive him of 
his practice. 
We alluded in our last number to the impropriety of that 
proposal which would throw open the doors of medical practice 
still wider, and, removing all compulsion to pass through a cer- 
tain course of study and to obtain certain diplomas, would sim- 
ply discountenance unlicensed practitioners, by excluding them 
from public appointments, &c., and would substitute honourable 
feeling in the place of legal authority. Such a project may sound 
very well at a distance, but, in its practical application, it would be 
any thing but advantageous. It would demolish altogether the 
partition wall, of the imperfection of which we are now feeling 
the ill effects, and would leave us naked to the aggression of 
any one who chose to encroach upon us. 
In favour of such a scheme it is said that all men who desire 
to practise their profession in an honourable and upright man- 
ner, and to maintain a proper position in society, will continue 
to take out their diplomas as heretofore. We doubt not that they 
will do so, whether compulsion be used or not. But are there 
not a great many who will be less scrupulous about acting in 
