me. College of Physicians. 
ings, they endeavoured to learn the full 
extent and weight of their objections. 
‘They found them without experience in 
vaccination, supporting their opinions by 
hearsay information, “and hypothetical 
reasoning, and, upon investigating the 
facts which they advanced, they found 
them to be either misapprebended or 
misrepresented; or that they fell under 
the description of cases of imperfect small 
pox, before noticed, and which the Col- 
lege have endeavoured fairly to appre- 
ciate. 
The practice of vaccination is but of 
eight years standing, and i = promoters, as 
well as opponents, must keep in mind, 
that a period so short is too limited to as- 
certain every point, or to bring the art to 
that perfection of which it may-be capa- 
ble. The truth of this will readily be ad- 
mitted by those acquainted with the 
history of innoculation for the small 
pox. Vaceination, is now, however, well 
understood, and its character accurately 
described. Some deviations from the 
usual course lave occasionally occurred, 
which the auchor of the practice has 
called spurious cow-pox, by which the 
public have been misled, as if there were 
@ true and a false cow-pox; but it ap- 
pears, that nothing more was meant, than 
to express irregularity or difference from 
that common form and progress of the 
vaccine pustule from which its efficacy 1 is 
inferred. Those who perform vaccina- 
tion ought therefore to be well instructed, 
and should have. watched “with the 
greatest care the regular progress of the 
pustule, and learnt the most preper time 
for taking the matter. There is little 
doubt that some of the failures are to be 
imputed to the inexperience of the early 
vaccinators, and it is not unreasonable to 
expect that farther observation will yet 
suggest many improvements that will re- 
duce the number of anomalous cases, and 
furnish the means of determining, with 
greater precision, when the vaccine dis- 
ease has been effectually received, 
Though the College of Physicians have 
confined themselves in estimating the 
evidence to such facts as have occurred 
in their own country, because the accu- 
racy of them could best be ascertained, 
they cannot be insensible to the confirma 
tion these receive from the reports of the 
successful introduction of vaccination, not 
only into. every part of Europe, ‘but 
throughoutthe vast continents of Asia and 
America. 
4, Several causes have had a partial 
eperation in retarding the general adop- 
i 
[ Aug. ] 9 
tion of vaccination; some writers have 
greatly undervalued the security it af- 
fords, while others have considered it 
to be of a temporary nature only; but if 
any reliance is to be placed on the state- 
ments which have been laid before the 
College, its power of protecting the hu- 
man body from the small pox, though 
not perfect indeed, is abundantly sufti- 
cient to recommend it to the prudent and 
dispassionate, especially as the small pox, 
in the few instances where it has ‘sub- 
sequently occurred, has been generally 
mild and transient. ‘The cpinion that 
vaccination affords but a temporary se= 
curity, 1s supported by no analogy ut na- 
ture, nor by the facts which have hitherto’ 
occurred. Although the experience of 
vaccine inoculation be only of a few 
years, yet the same disease, contracted ° 
by the milkers of cows, in some districts, 
has been long enough known to ascer- 
tain that in them at least the unsuscep-= 
tibility of the small pox contagion does 
net wear out by time. Another cause 
is the charge against vaccination of pro= 
ducing various new diseases of frightful 
and monstrous appearance. 
Representations of some of these have 
been exhibited in prints in a way to 
alarm the feelings of parents, and to in- 
fuse dread and~ apprehension into the 
minds of the uninformed. Publications 
with such representations have been 
widely, circulated, and though they origi- 
nate eile in gross ignorance, or wilful 
misrepresentation, yet have they lessened 
the confidence of many, particularly of 
the lower classes; in vaccination; no 
permanent effects, ‘however, in retarding 
the progress of vaccination, need be ap- 
prehended from such causes, for, as soon 
as the public shall view them coolly, and 
without surprise, they will excite con 
tempt, and not fear. 
Though the College of Physicians are 
of opinion that the progress of vaccina= 
tion has been retarded in a few places by 
the above causes, yet they conceive that 
its general adoption has been prevented 
by causes far more powerful, and of a 
nature wholly different. The lower or- 
ders of St can hardly be induced to 
adopt © precautions against evils which 
may be at a'distance; nor can it be ex- 
pected’ from them, if these precautions 
are. attended with expence. Unless 
therefore, from the immediate dread of 
epidemic ‘small pox; neither vaccination 
nor inoculation appear at any time to 
have been general, and when the cause 
of terror has passed by, the public have 
its et 
