320 
LETTER TO SIR ASTLEY COOPER. 
horseman would never dream of sending for him), then this argu¬ 
ment has quite the contrary tendency. A surgeon or physician’s 
name, if it testifies anything, shows that the individual possesses 
medical knowledge, and yet may be a perfect novice or ignoramus 
when he comes to practise on the brute creation; in fact, it goes to 
show that he has attended certain lectures, valuable in them¬ 
selves, but not teaching an art which the same diploma cer¬ 
tifies he is qualified to practise. It is precisely the same thing as 
a farrier receiving an attestation from a watch-maker or a lock¬ 
smith; the two latter conceiving that, because they were well 
versed in mechanics, and practised them skilfully in their own 
handicrafts, they could instruct any one in making horse-shoes; or, 
at least, on account of any celebrity they might possess in their own 
trades, that the public would give them credit for such an exten¬ 
sion of theory to practice! Quite the reverse, however, we know 
to be the case: arts, even the most simple, in practice, in appear¬ 
ance, and the most closely allied, are yet constituted into difierent 
trades; we have the whitesmith and the blacksmith; one man to 
make a horse-shoe, and another to make a horse-nail; one man 
to hold a gun-barrel, a second to bore it, a third to make the loops 
for it, and a fourth to polish it; in fine, all these several artisans 
practise within their respective spheres without presuming to inter¬ 
fere one with another; and yet we outcast veterinary surgeons are 
told, that all the study and practice we can have will never qualify 
us to occupy those seats which, to our professional welfare, are so 
ably filled by the present examiners. This is, in truth, argument 
turn ad absurdum. 
In order, however, to combine the advantages of such names of 
renowm, and, at the same time, add a little wholesome practical 
information to the stock of knowledge possessed by the committee, 
it was proposed to let in two, or three, or four competent veterina¬ 
rians to act with the medical members; but the latter, clinging 
fast to their places and their monopoly, and disrelishing the idea 
of having to take wine, or starch their manners or conversation in 
the company of persons over whom they have so long usurped an 
unmerited, and now evidently injurious authority, replied,—that as 
the profession was in an eminently flourishing state, they did not 
see the necessity of any alteration in the constitution of the com¬ 
mittee. 
If our medical rulers would stand upon this ground, they must, 
first, prove to us that the profession really is in a flourishing condi¬ 
tion; and, secondly, that their committee has promoted such a 
state. Would any one believe it possible for these veiy men to 
declare us to be in a flourishing state,” who, with the same 
breath, denounce us as unfit to sit at our own board of examina- 
