Page:A review of the state of the question respecting the admission of dissenters to the universities.djvu/46

44 in the professions of law and medicine by the possessors of degrees in our universities. From the manner in which these privileges have been dwelt upon, and the hardships complained of, under which Dissenters labour for the want of them, a person unacquainted with the facts of the case would almost be led to imagine, that Dissenters were altogether excluded from the above professions, or obliged to enter upon them at such disadvantage as to throw great impediments in the way of their success. Let us see what the real state of the case is.

The only exclusive privilege is in the ecclesiastical courts, where, as the transactions relate to civil law, degrees in civil law are required as a qualification in order to practise. But the number of practitioners in this court is so extremely small, that this privilege has hardly been alluded to as a grievance in the discussions on the subject. The case, as regards the general profession of the law, is as follows:—The benchers of the inns of court, with whom rests the power of calling to the profession of the bar such persons as they deem duly qualified, entertaining the opinion that a course of general and liberal education is a good preparation for the more peculiar studies of the law, have determined to remit to persons who have attained the degree of M.A. two years of the time otherwise required in order to qualify a student to be called to the bar. Now, the degree of M.A. implies a standing of six