As we shall have frequent occasion in the course of this work to revert to these points, we do not now dwell on them more minutely, than to repeat our opinion, that a general knowledge of the law is not only becoming to the medical practitioner in his character of a gentleman, but highly useful and necessary to his professional career. We do not expect that medical students shall become special pleaders, or that the bar shall vie in chemistry and physiology with the professors of those sciences; but we shall endeavour to point out to each the sources from which they may draw information if they are desirous of acquiring it; we are of necessity confined within narrow bounds; but if within those limits we enable the two professions of law and physic to understand and appreciate each other, our object is accomplished. Medical Jurisprudence. PART I. 1. _Of the College of Physicians._—2. _College of Surgeons._—3. _Society of Apothecaries._—4. _Medical Liabilities and Exemptions._—5. _Public Health._—6. _Quarantine Laws._—7. _Medical Police._ 1. OF THE COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS. IT does not appear that the Professors of Physic were in any way classed, or incorporated, in England, until the year 1522, although we learn from the preamble of the Charter of Henry the Eighth, as well as from the petition of the 9th of Henry the Fifth, that other countries had long before that period established Medical Colleges, having considered such a measure not only as necessary for the encouragement of science, but as highly politic for the preservation of the public health. England, although destined to take the lead in research and discovery at a later period, was in the sixteenth century far behind her continental neighbours in the field of Science. And with respect to the study and practice of physic, it seems probable that, until after the foundation of the College of Physicians, it had not even assumed the character and dignity of a regular profession; for we find that the very few learned men in that branch, which the annals of the period can furnish, had acquired their knowledge in the foreign universities. Until the auspicious period of the Reformation, various circumstances contributed to retard the progress of medical science; the first and most considerable of which may be traced to the many monastic establishments[62] with which the country was infested; the Monks are known to have practised physic very extensively, and when the superstitious character of these ages is considered, we shall not feel surprised at the vulgar, and perhaps not the lower order alone, having preferred, to every other medical assistance, the aid of those who arrogated to themselves the immediate assistance of heaven in the preparation and administration of their medicines.