horror, any good that can arise from it, and has neglected to study Anatomy, lest he should encourage this “disgusting traffic.” Imagine this philosopher encountering these difficulties at the bottom of a bleeding wound. He cannot find the vessel at all, perhaps, before he has divided it, and a fatal gush of blood informs him of the result of his temerity. Or, he opens the vein, he divides some of the nerves, or he ties them up with the artery. It is all the same. He might as well have laid open the original tumour, and thus have killed the patient at once. That man’s prejudices against Anatomy, Mr. Mayor, _and even against disinterment_, must be rooted indeed, who, in the face of such facts as these, would still oppose himself against some slight sacrifice of feeling, to secure such important advantages as anatomical knowledge has been seen to confer. But, Sir, _the law requires of medical men that they be Anatomists_. It is illegal to commence practice before obtaining the certificate of the Society of Apothecaries; and the candidate for this necessary credential is required to bring proofs of his having attended anatomical lectures, and is then examined as to his knowledge of Anatomy. Mark, therefore, Sir, I beseech you, the dilemma in which we stand. _It is illegal to obey the laws._ I would humbly hope, that a thorough investigation of the real state of things, may incline you, in any future transactions of this kind, to view them with that leniency which gentlemen will always feel inclined to extend toward scientific objects, and which has been ever held to be consistent with, if not the most ennobling quality of, Justice. And here let me pointedly assert, what is also, I understand, doubted by many, viz. that actual dissection of the human body is essential to any available anatomical knowledge. It is one of the terse remarks of the eminent anatomist whom I have before quoted, in reply to the vulgar complaint that the dead are “mangled” by Surgeons, “_Either the dead or the living must be mangled_:”――but, I believe, after what has been said before upon the connexion between Anatomy and Surgery, that it is needless to enlarge upon this point. It must be plain that books and plates cannot qualify a man to remove a stone from his neighbour’s bladder, or to lay open the fore part of his friend’s eye, and therefore I refrain from touching upon the subject.