Page:Introductory Address on the General Medical Council, its Powers and its Work.djvu/33

 the Council in disciplinary cases made it necessary that, for the information and guidance of the profession, it should formulate its view of certain courses of conduct in the so-called "warning notices." These, as we saw, were not laws enacted, but only law interpreted and declared. In regard to education, the Council had no authority to lay down a compulsory curriculum applicable to all. Strictly speaking it could only consider on its merits each curriculum proposed by any one of the bodies, and pronounce it "sufficient" or "insufficient," If "insufficient" the body must in theory try again and again, until the Council was ready to say "sufficient." The inconveniences of this method are apparent, and out of them arose a virtual appeal to the Council to say, in general terms and beforehand, what would be sufficient. In this way the Council was impelled to formulate a statement of what subjects should be included in a sufficient course of study, and how many years at least should be spent in pursuing it. Thus, without formal enactment, yet with general consent and assent, first the four years' and later the five years' curriculum came 'into being. It is not prescribed by a ukase; in form it professes to be nothing more than a "requirement" for sufficiency, or a "recommendation" to the licensing authorities, but for practical purposes it has the same effect as if it were an authoritative regulation. All the bodies observe it, yet not as of law but as of grace.

Again, there is absolutely nothing in the Medical Acts about the general or non-professional education of medical students; nothing about matriculation or preliminary examinations; nothing about a volume that nearly touches many of you—I mean the Students' Register. I hope I shall not undermine your respect for that important document by making this admission. The Royal Commissioners of 1882 thought that the preliminary education and registration of students should be made a matter of statute. They say: "We agree in the opinion universally held by the witnesses that every intending medical student ought to pass an examination in general education before