LEEDS chemists’ ASSOCIATION. 
439 
it was a not imfrequent thing to receive urgent applications from unqualified 
practitioners, begging that I would send them qualified assistants, as they 
wanted to complete their studies in London and pass the Hall, heing threat¬ 
ened with prosecution.^ 
Further, I submit that it is not the frequency of prosecutions that proves 
the efiiciency of an Act of Parliament. If obedience to a law of the land be 
the rule, and the violation of it the exception, the prosecutions cannot be 
numerous ; but that proves the value and not the worthlessness of the law. 
Your President informs us, upon the authority of Professor Fawcett, that 
“ the exports of this country have trebled during the last twenty years,” and 
cites the fact to prove that it is the main cause of improving the education 
and position of medical men since 1^15. May I ask him if he is quite certain 
that he is not here “reasoning from imperfect analogy”? To me it seems 
that he could hardly have hit upon a more decided no7i sequUur, and that it 
would be just as logical to refer the improvement to the Atlantic cable of 1866. 
You have been asked, “Are we not certain that the more intelligent a 
man is, the more he will seek after real skill on the part of his medical at¬ 
tendant, and the less likely will he be to be deceived by mere pretenders ?” 
It may be well to answer by asking if Mr. Thompson has ever heard of the 
homoeopathic heresy? Has he noticed the triumphant boasts of its pro¬ 
fessors, that they number the late Archbishop Whately, Lord Ebury, and 
Mr. William Leaf among their adherents ? The logical archbishop, the phil¬ 
anthropic peer, the acute merchant,—would he reject these men and others 
of similar standing, from the numbers of the “ intelligent ” ? If not, how can 
you be “ certain ” that the intelligent man will seek real skill ? 
But if we assume, for the moment, as an established fact, that wealth and 
intelligence go together, I would ask what is to be done for the poor and un- 
iyitelligent ? Some of us may fancy that thinking men form the small mino¬ 
rity in all communities. If this be true, is the great majority to be uncared 
for by the Legislature ? If Dives, the wise, walks in the light of knowledge, 
is Lazarus, the ignorant, to be left to grope in darkness ? In other words, is 
legislative action to be withheld from the unintelligent, who are damnified by 
its absence, because the intelligent minority can take care of themselves ? 
The truth I believe to be, that from the very beginning physical suffering 
has rendered men willing to reward those whom they think able to alleviate 
it; that the horror of suffering is a thing common alike to rich and poor, 
to the intelligent and the uninformed. Prior to 1815 there was not a 
single apothecary in the land who had been examined as to his competence. 
How then were the unintelligent many to discriminate between the pre¬ 
tence of skill and the reality, however anxious they might be to make 
liberal remuneration, and to secure the most efficient service ? How, on the 
contrary, every village with 800 or 1000 souls has its fully examined medical 
practitioner, to whom intelligent and unintelligent can turn with the perfect 
certainty that his professional competence has been tested. I say that this 
is what the Act of 1815 has effected, and I ask you to contrast it with the 
state of things that would have now existed if no such Act had been passed, 
trebled exports notwithstanding. We must surely come to the conclusion 
that want of mental power or want of cultivation on the part of the larger 
section of the people, even supposing the intelligent left to their own devices, 
would have been no justification for leaving our suffering fellow-creatures to 
the mercy of mendacious quacks or ignorant pretenders. 
* Aliy member of the Pharmaceutical Council can confirm the fact that the threat of py'o- 
secuting has, in all cases of transgressing its provisions, sufficed to control offenders against the 
Pharmacy Act. 
