Although satisfied with variolous inoculation, he had no objection to vaccination in itself. He thought it fair that experiments with cowpox should be tried, and the verdict of experience submitted to; but he complained that experience was anticipated and success proclaimed ere it was possible for the truth to be known, whilst every objector was overwhelmed with abuse. As an illustration of the unwarrantable persuasion that prevailed in favour of the new practice before there was time to justify it, Birch mentions that at the anniversary dinner at Guy’s Hospital in 1802, he was surprised to find the usual business set aside to secure signatures to Jenner’s petition for a vote of money from Parliament, and that after dinner toasts, songs, and compliments in honour of Vaccinia were the order of the day. Booksellers, he relates, declined to publish anything against vaccination, and editors of newspapers and magazines would not suffer a word to appear to its disparagement. Even the Post Office carried the cowpox and correspondence of the Royal Jennerian Society gratis until the collapse of the concern in 1806. Those who resorted to doctors and hospitals for inoculation with smallpox got cowpox instead in spite of assertions to the contrary. Church vied with chapel in recommending the new practice. The Archbishop of Canterbury was called upon to issue a letter directing the clergy to recommend vaccination from the pulpit, but, with the wariness of office, sent his chaplain to Birch to hear the other side, and the chaplain retired with the judicious observation, “His Grace must not commit the Church.” Many clergymen, however, not only preached vaccination, but practised it with restless assiduity. Erasmus Darwin was not without hope that baptism and vaccination might be associated. He wrote to Jenner from Derby, 24th February, 1802-- As by the testimony of innumerable instances, the Vaccine Disease is so favourable to young children, in a little time it may occur that the christening and vaccination of children may always be performed on the same day. _The Vaccine Disease so favourable to young children!_ The assertion affords a vivid glimpse of the prevalent enchantment. “The idea of connecting religious services with vaccination,” says Baron, “had occurred to several individuals in this country as well as on the Continent.”[160] I viewed with indignant scorn [wrote Birch], the ungenerous artifice adopted by the Jennerian Society of sticking up in every Station House, in the Vestries of fanatical Chapels, and in Sunday Schools, that false _Comparative View of the effects of Smallpox and Cowpox_ representing to the gaping multitude a frightful picture of Inoculation with the supposed misery attendant on it; and exhibiting representations equally false and exaggerated of the blessings of Vaccination.